David Ulrich HR Model Pitfalls

The HR Model by David Ulrich is very modern and implemented in many large organizations all around the world. But, it is implemented, but the success of the implementation is not that automatic.

HR Model by David Ulrich needs a different set of skills and competencies. The implementation of the HR Model is a true change project as Human Resources works differently and other skills and competencies are valued. The fluctuation and turnover is usually very high during such a change.

The David Ulrich’s HR Model is usually implemented as the Front Office - Back Office - Centers of Excellence model. It is a good model as the current employees are usually moved to Centers of Excellence and Back Office as they are experts and they are experienced in HR Processes in their own area.

The Front Office is then built from the newcomers to the organization and it has to build its position. Employees of the Front Office are confronted with the managers trying to solve their old issues and HR Employees in Back Office waiting for the Front Office mistakes.
The HR Front Office employees are not experts in HR Processes, they are advanced users of the processes and they can make a wrong promise to their managers, which also brings a huge conflict into Human Resources.

The implementation of the HR Model is always long and painful process as the HR Front Office has to grow and it takes some time to build a really efficient Front Office, which is seen as the value added HR unit, not just the email forwarding unit.