Is HR Overpopulated With People-Orientated People?
Why?
Human Resources is an intriguing function precisely because it sits in a state of constant evolution. What began as a transactional back-office service, processing payroll, managing leave, and maintaining compliance, has been redefined as a strategic stakeholder advisory service expected to navigate the fine line between individual employee and business need. At its best, HR has the potential to shape and sustain organisations that are truly fit for purpose, capable of consistently meeting market need and customer demand.
What?
However, despite this evolution, HR still struggles for influence and credibility. It remains too often seen as an administrative necessity and liability rather than a strategic enabler and asset. To change the organisational perception of HR we need to understand why they are perceived as they are, and the effect this has on HR’s ability to challenge, advise, and partner effectively at the highest level.
How?
We’ll deconstruct a real-world scenario using psychometric data I collected during a large enterprise transformation. This will provide insight on the individual and collective psychologies of those involved, shedding light on the gap between HR intention and HR Impact, particularly when partnering with other heads of service and their corresponding departments. To explore this friction we will answer three key questions:
What are psychometrics and how can they be used as an effective diagnostic tool for systemic failures?
What can psychometrics tell us about the correlation between temperament and the roles people choose to inhabit?
What does our insight tell us about competence, hiring practices and organisational culture?
Psychometrics
Every psychometric framework, with the exception of The Big Five (O.C.E.A.N), remains controversial within scientific circles. Most are self-reported assessments, meaning they lack the rigour and replicability required for true empirical validity. Yet despite these limitations, they still hold practical value. Their purpose isn’t to label people with scientific precision, but to provoke conversation, helping teams recognise that individuals bring distinct strengths, preferences, and blind spots to the table. When those differences are understood and leveraged, teams become more than the sum of their parts.
There are countless profiling tools available, but for simplicity and illustration, we’ll focus on Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Developed in the 1920s and loosely inspired by the work of Carl Jung, MBTI was created by Katharine Briggs and Isabel Myers, neither of whom had formal training in psychology. Despite its informal origins, MBTI remains widely used because it provides an accessible language for discussing personality dynamics in the workplace.
The MBTI matrix below shows sixteen personality types arranged across four primary dichotomies, Extraversion/Introversion, Sensing/Intuition, Thinking/Feeling, and Judging/Perceiving, resulting in broad groupings that reveal how individuals process information and make decisions. The simplified groupings below offer a useful shorthand for team-level discussion:
Source: MBTI UK Distribution, European OPP Data 2011
I’m not going into detail on specific traits in this case study as the purpose of this example is to provide a simple demonstration of the impact different personalities can have on each other and the role psychometrics can play in terms of successful outcomes. In the spirit of brevity we will make do with a vastly over simplified summary of groupings:
NF’s: Value orientated, tend to make emotional decisions based on future possibilities in pursuit of enlightenment.
SF’s: Relationship orientated, tend to make emotional decisions based on present reality in pursuit of social harmony.
ST’s: Process orientated, tend to make logical decisions based on present reality in pursuit of order.
NT’s: Outcome orientated, tend to make logical decisions based on future possibilities in pursuit of change.
You can see within the spectrum of each group there are four very different ends in mind combined with four very different paths to attaining them. So what does this model have to do with HR?
A few years ago, I worked with a newly appointed HR Director within a large enterprise who was struggling to understand why their function couldn’t gain traction with Heads of Service during a major organisational transformation. The feedback from HR teams painted one picture; the behaviours observed across the business told another. Having previously gathered a substantial number of psychometric profiles across departments as a coincidental result of other transformation work, I decided to test a hypothesis: could the friction between HR and the wider business be explained, at least in part, by a mismatch of temperaments?
Human Resources
We have already discovered the main drivers behind each group, so what comes next will highlight a pattern as to why significant friction can present between HR and its stakeholders. Below is a snapshot that correlates actual HRBPs with the actual Heads of Service they supported. There were far more Human Resource Business Partners than highlighted here, all in the NF or SF quadrants. However, I was unable to capture and correlate the remaining corresponding heads of service and wanted to stick with what could be reliably demonstrated. That said I think it’s fair to speculate the trend would continue based on temperaments typically associated with such roles and organisational hierarchy.
Source: HR Business Partners vs Heads of Service, MBTI Type Matrix, Kenny Wallace 2014
Based on what we have already learned we can see the contrast between Human Resource Business Partners and Heads of Service was considerable in terms of approach and objectives, a complete mismatch. A population of predominantly relationship orientated Business Partners attempting to have nice chats with outcome orientated Heads of Service only interested in what will be improved and/or accelerated as a result of their Business Partners input. In the absence of a demonstration of competence the Heads of Service deemed the Business Partners irrelevant and actively ignored them.
This pattern isn’t surprising. Outcome-orientated people tend occupy senior roles and relationship-orientated people gravitate to people-centric roles. However, the Business Partners had failed to step into the shoes of their stakeholders to understand their world. They also failed to recognise they are a guest at their key stakeholder table, which is earned and not a right.
Rightly or wrongly the Heads of Service didn’t consider it their responsibility to teach the Business Partners how to think strategically and influence, skills they should already possess that are fundamental to their role. Any professional development is ultimately the responsibility of the Business Partner and their line manager.
We can debate the merits of who could have done what to improve the situation, but thats for another day. What I will say is this had been a long standing issue, several years in fact. With this in mind, once all my findings were out in the open it was an easy fix.
Lets provide further context around this paradoxical phenomenon to better understand what is happening on the ground with 6 specific examples from a long list. Each of these examples are from different organisations, SMEs to large enterprises.
Situation: New in role HRD tells HRBPs to stop hiding behind their computers, get out and go build relationships with their stakeholders to find out how HR can support with delivery of stakeholder objectives.
Outcome: HRBPs return with insight on stakeholders marriage, preferred holiday destinations and how well their children are doing at school. No information collected on stakeholder objectives or how HR might support. Credibility lost.
Situation: Learning & Development team asked by a line manager to provide training for their team. Line manager wants to give their team something fun and interesting to do.
Outcome: L&D comply. No enquiry to ascertain what business problems will be solved, where the benefits will be realised or measured. No evidence of potential ROI. Credibility lost.
Situation: HRBP came to me seeking understanding as to why they have been excluded from head of service team meetings. Discussion reveals HRBP was unable to demonstrate how to support stakeholder objectives.
Outcome: HRBP explains to me that “No has ever told me this is part of my job”. After some coaching HRBP is able to demonstrate value-add and is eventually invited to take a seat at the table. Credibility gained.
Situation: HRBP approaches Head of Service with documentation demonstrating the aspects of HR Strategy they intend to implement in Head of Service’s area. Documentation is immediately discarded without reading it.
Outcome: HRBP failed to take time to understand head of service need in terms of objectives to be delivered. Head of service automatically assumed HR offer will be misaligned, therefore a hinderance. HRBP actively ignored.
Situation: HRBP asked to intervene by head of service on individual pay-dispute to achieve resolution by leveraging company policy and agreed contracts.
Outcome: HRBP spends time repeatedly attempting to make opposing parties friends, rather than support contract-based decision making to resolve core issue. HRBP actively ignored.
Situation: HRBP population of 10 facilitated to better understand stakeholder barriers, all of whom are Heads of Service. 84% of HRBP’s at a loss, having only ever tried to be supportive and friendly.
Outcome: Discussion reveals the same 84% of HRBP’s fundamentally don’t understand what business partnering is, therefore do not understand how to fulfil their role. Coaching to develop strategic thinking and influencing skills advised.
This last example is of particular note as it raises a deeper question: How does such a group of people get hired as HRBPs when almost everyone in the group demonstrably lacks the two key-skills of strategic thinking and influencing that are fundamental to their role, and no-one in an HR Department of 100+ people noticed?
The HRBPs are not at fault in this instance, as they clearly navigated the accepted recruitment process to success. Their appointments indicate a systemic problem caused by those in senior HR roles, responsible for the organisational design and build of the HRBP community, having excluded the precise temperament and competencies required to execute the role from their selection process. Therefore, we can reasonably deduce that senior leadership lacked a fundamental understanding of the problem they had hired people to solve, which resulted in almost an entire population landing in a context they were wholly unskilled to deal with. These examples all share common themes: Absence of strategic thinking, influencing skills, and the trait of disagreeableness, all of which are required to achieve resolution in each instance.
I should highlight that I’m using the term disagreeable in a psychometric context taken from Goldbergs 5-Factor-Model: OCEAN: A willingness to challenge, set boundaries, and tolerate discomfort, prioritising objectivity over appeasement, and accountability over harmony. Agreeableness manifests as: Keen to please, less likely to push back or say no, attempts to keep everyone happy, avoids perceived conflict and challenge. These two terms form a dynamic continuum we are all on.
I’ve experienced and supported resolution of similar issues in other departments, though they tend to be isolated to one or two people. What’s fascinating, to me, is the scale at which this phenomenon appears to occur in HR, though it does require further investigation.
Organisational Performance
Below is a representation of an ideal development scenario using a simplified version of Prof. Mihály Csikszentmihályi Flow model, which he originally discovered in 1975 after identifying the components of high performance. I have updated this to demonstrate the relationship between Strategy, Operations and High Performance, which can be applied to any individual, team or organisation. By looking at the relationship between Challenge, defined as: Degree of difficulty to be overcome, and Support, defined as: Available resources. Four states emerge:
Source: Based on Massimini, Csíkszentmihályi & Carli Model 1987 and Kenny Wallace 2019
These four states correlate with specific behaviours that can be measured in any individual, team or organisation.
Anxiety: Missed deadlines, avoidance of interaction, likely negatively impacting employee sickness absence.
Apathy: Absence of enthusiasm or presence of indifference, likely negatively impacting employee retention.
Comfort: Lack of activity and accountability, likely negatively impacting employee productivity.
Flow: Pro-active, self-directed, emphasis on personal responsibility, likely positively impacting all above.
In our earlier example, the HR Business Partners sat largely in Anxiety, some drifting toward Apathy given the long-standing nature of their situation. By redefining the role of the Business Partner, drawing clear boundaries with stakeholders, and shifting the quality of conversation, it was possible to move them gradually toward Flow.
Across multiple organisations, however, a broader social pattern emerges. HR appears to attract, and then reinforce, a concentration of highly-agreeable people-oriented personalities. While this alignment may satisfy individual values and intentions, it also creates a structural imbalance. A function over-populated with highly-agreeable, relationship-oriented individuals lacks the diversity of temperament needed to identify blind spots or challenge assumptions. Groupthink follows, often accompanied by the belief: It’s not us, it’s everyone else.
The result is a culture of conflict avoidance, one where maintaining harmony outweighs addressing dysfunction. Well-meaning HR professionals repeatedly attempt to save toxic or incompetent individuals rather than remove them, sacrificing organisational health for personal comfort. Over time, this breeds apathy, resentment, and declining performance. It’s a form of wilful negligence masked as compassion: abandoning the duty of care owed to the majority to protect the comfort of an incompetent few. Those affected witness the absence of competence and courage to act. Trust erodes, confidence in leadership collapses, and the ripple effects of inaction spread throughout the organisation, the behavioural signature of Apathy in the Flow model.
The deeper irony is that the very decision-makers responsible for maintaining the balance between employer duty of care and employee personal responsibility often display the strongest aversion to short-term discomfort. In doing so, they allow long-term damage to take root, financial, cultural, and human. It’s the behavioural signature of Anxiety writ large across a system that confuses being nice with being effective.
Conclusion
So what?
Psychometrics revealed their greatest value not as instruments of precision, but as mirrors for conversation. They make visible the patterns we intuitively sense but struggle to articulate, the systemic imbalances that shape behaviour long before results appear. In this case, they exposed a clear diagnostic signal: a concentration of relational social-harmony-driven temperaments (NF and SF) within HR, misaligned to the logical outcome-driven temperaments (NT) that dominate senior leadership.
Within Human Resources, that imbalance translated into a persistent credibility gap. Relationship-oriented Business Partners sought connection where their stakeholders sought delivery. The absence of challenge was mistaken for collaboration; the absence of measurable progress was rationalised as support. In trying to be helpful, many became peripheral. HR’s problem wasn’t a lack of empathy, it was the absence of counterweight.
Viewed through performance and culture, the pattern scaled into anxiety, apathy, and avoidance. The Flow model showed a function trapped between wanting to help and fearing to confront, sustained by leadership too comfortable with consensus. Competence drifted from strategic capability to emotional labour. The data makes the answer clear: HR isn’t overpopulated with people-oriented people, it’s underrepresented in those ready to hold discomfort, challenge constructively, and lead under pressure.
Now what?
The implications reach far beyond HR. Any system dominated by a single temperament becomes self-reinforcing and fragile. Whether in business, sport, or public service, performance decays when diversity of thought, style, and challenge disappears. Empathy without accountability breeds comfort; accountability without empathy breeds fear. The goal is balance, and balance must be designed. In this sense, psychometrics and similar diagnostic tools have value well beyond individual profiling; they reveal how systems drift when they lose internal counterweights. Used well, they make the invisible visible, offering a way for any organisation to examine not just what it does, but how it behaves under pressure.
For HR, that means redefining its purpose around outcomes, not activities. Recruitment becomes a measure of retention, integration, and contribution, not vacancy fill rate. Learning & Development becomes a measure of behavioural and operational change, not attendance or satisfaction scores. These are not semantic shifts but strategic ones: they move HR from counting inputs to owning impact. The same principle applies elsewhere. When teams of any kind prioritise visible activity over measurable value, they drift toward self-justification rather than improvement. Strategic alignment depends on a constant loop between intent, evidence, and effect.
More broadly, the profession, and by extension any leadership function, must reframe its self-concept. HR is not a sanctuary for people-people; it’s a strategic function responsible for maintaining the equilibrium between duty of care and performance accountability. In that sense, it has more in common with law enforcement than social work, upholding the integrity of the system it serves. The same duality applies to leadership everywhere: the courage to hold boundaries while protecting those within them. Cultures that master this balance, between compassion and competence, empathy and edge, are the ones that sustain readiness and perform when it counts.
What next?
Now that you have a clearer picture of how temperament shapes behaviour, how imbalance skews systems, and how credibility erodes when comfort replaces challenge, let’s consider how you might apply what you’ve learned:
When you notice patterns repeating, in yourself, your team, or your system, do you examine what’s driving them, or do you rationalise them away? What might become visible if you treated behaviour as diagnostic data rather than personal flaw?
How often do your partnerships prioritise harmony over progress? What would change if you intentionally built teams for friction, diverse in temperament, thought, and challenge, rather than comfort and consensus?
Across your system, are you designing for readiness or reassurance? What would shift if credibility, courage, and balance between empathy and accountability became your true measures of performance?
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If you are in the process of dealing with issues similar to the one in this case study, then do consider working with me to either assess your Individual Readiness to manage the situation you are in or address issues that have come to your attention as result of this case study.
