espite the greater lip service given to personnel issues and human resources, a recent study by the U.S. Society for Human Research Managers (SHRM) shows that most companies continue to consider their HR departments to be of little importance. Former U.S. SHRM chair, and head of HR at Yahoo, Libby Sartain noted that the study also revealed that many HR people have a similarly low opinion of their own departments. Despite the high value placed on HR directors by a few corporate officers like former General Electric CEO Jack Welch, some in the HR field feel that practitioners must become more business oriented in order to move beyond the dim view most businesspeople have taken of HR since its emergence.
See "A higher status for the people person", MICHAEL SKAPINKER, Financial Times, January 28, 2002