Illusions of Organizational Power
There he or she sits, as if in a fortress behind her impressive door, guarded by her secretary. The individual in question holds one's fate in his or her hands. One must please this powerful individual with one's voice, demeanor, and general attitude. One must never be negative, even when describing one's past employer. One must be decisive enough to express an opinion, but not so opinionated one is apt to alienate the aforementioned individual.
The individual is not the CEO of a powerful organization, but merely the person in charge of hiring, namely the head of human resources of any company, large or small. On the corporate totem pole, human resources persons are usually considered of middling importance, in comparison to the financial, technical development, and executive areas. Often it is relegated to its own division. This is not to minimize its importance -- no company can run without a competent staff. But quite often, the hiring process is so uncomfortable and intimidating, it is easy to confer more power to the HR department head than the department actually possesses over one's everyday fate at the company, simply because it has the ability to hire one as an individual. But performance reviews and other, more crucial matters regarding one's advancement are not in the HR department's sphere of influence.
Once one has secured a place at the company, it is important to remember that unless one is employed within the HR department itself, the human resources people are there to guide you, in terms of managing your retirement packages, leave and personal comp time, and vacations, as well as mitigating conflicts between one's self and one's more immediate supervisors. They hiring process conveys an illusion of power more than power itself over one's position. Merely because they had power over one's employment during the initial hiring period, and the often eviscerating nature of the hiring process, does not make them deities, and the distance with which they hold themselves from prospective employees is not emblematic of their relationship with one's self as an employee, after one has been hired and oriented into the company framework, in one's different and respective department.
