Hardboiled HR: How the Covid-19 crisis challenges the double role of HR as ’the extended arm’ of the management and then caregiver of employee well-being

Abstract

Crisis, like the Covid-19 crisis, expands the inherent tension within HR between loyalty towards and executor of management decisions, and then caregiver of employee well-being. Crisis research points out that HR’s balancing out this tension is pivotal for the company to steer through a crisis. Yet despite this knowledge, HR’s role often tilts towards acting like ’the extended arm’ of the management while employee well-being is being downgraded during crisis. Is it at all possible for HR to accommodate both of these often opposing needs of respectively managers and employees in order for the company to survive the crisis with a sustainable economy and a healthy working environment for all employees? This article pursues this question. We draw on data from interviews with 15 Danish HR managers about their experiences with managing the Covid-19 crisis. In line with Minbaeva (2020), our research demonstrates how the HR managers recognize HR as ’disrupted’ during the Covid-19. However, rather than focusing on digital and online changes as ‘disruptors’ of HR, as highlighted by Minbaeva (2020), we identify a HR disrupted in its sense of purpose, role and practice because of Covid-19. This applies particularly to companies that have been going through straining processes of layoffs and relocations of employees. Consequently, the crisis tests HR in its difficult act of balancing out the tension between narrow economic (management) interests and a human focus with negative implications for employee well-being.