Research clearly indicates that there is a strong need for the Human Resources (HR) function, and the people in it, to adopt a more strategic and business-linked approach. In one study business executives ranked the HR function as third, after sales and customer service, as a function that makes a very significant contribution to a company's bottom line.

Unfortunately research also indicates that few HR functions have become strategic. Most still operate in a primarily administrative and tactical manner—the very work that is increasingly being outsourced. Clearly there is a gap between what business leaders and employees need from their HR departments and what HR is providing.

HR functions must become more integrated into the business, with some people on the HR team assuming the role of Strategic Business Partner (SBP). Here, Dana and Jim Robinson offer guidance for HR, Organization Development and Learning professionals who aspire to transform themselves into effective Strategic Business Partners. They explain how SBPs build partnerships, based upon credibility and trust, with key organization leaders. These partnerships provide SBPs with opportunities to identify and support projects directly aligned with business goals. The success of these projects deepens the SBPs' credibility, enabling them to be viewed as strategic partners. At this higher level of accountability, SBPs work with business leaders to form long-range business strategies and plans, creating and implementing people initiatives that link into and support the business strategies and plans.

This practical guide offers case studies, exercises, tips, and tools you can use to become a Strategic Business Partner in your organization.

• By the coauthors of the bestselling Performance Consulting and Zap the Gaps (with Ken Blanchard)- each more than 60,000 copies sold
• The first book to show human resource professionals precisely how they can assume the critically important role of Strategic Business Partner
• A how-to book filled with specific techniques and practices to use on the job

The need to beat the many systems that compromise our quality of life goes without saying. When was the last time you dealt with a bureaucracy--a business, a government agency, a school, a hospital--and got a direct answer to a question or received a service you wanted without having to weave through a maze of infuriating hand-offs? Have you found these systems to be utterly indifferent to the inconvenience or hardship they cause? Want to learn how to beat them?

Beating the System shows you how. Coauthors Russell Ackoff and Sheldon Rovin have spent their lives studying how organizational systems work, and here they share both perversely entertaining anecdotes about the abuse of individuals by a variety of bureaucracies, and descriptions of the creative--and deeply satisfying--approaches these people used to get even.

The authors begin by exploring how systems function and malfunction, where their weaknesses are, and what drives them. They then show that much of bureaucratic power is based on unchallenged assumptions--assumptions systems make about themselves and us, and assumptions we make about these systems and ourselves, and that challenging these assumptions is the essence of creativity and the first step in system beating. Ackoff and Rovin use stories to illustrate successful strategies and tactics for defying these assumptions and turning the tables on the many bureaucracies that frustrate us.

• Provides practical, easy-to-use tactics and strategies for creatively beating any bureaucratic system that is trying to beat you
• Full of entertaining real-world stories of people who have been frustrated by unresponsive systems and have successfully fought back
• Coauthor Russell L. Ackoff is an internationally renowned pioneer in the world of systems thinking who has spent over 50 years studying how organizations work

Creating justice-centered organizations is the next frontier in DEI. This book shows how to go beyond compliance to address harm, share power, and create equity.

Traditional DEI work has not succeeded at dismantling systems that perpetuate harm and exclude BIPOC groups. Proponents of DEI have put too much focus on HR solutions, such as increasing representation, and not enough emphasis on changing the deeper organizational systems that perpetuate inequities-in other words, on justice. DEIJ work diverges from traditional metrics-driven DEI work and requires a new approach to effectively dismantle power structures.

This thought-provoking, solutions-oriented book offers strategic advice on how to adopt a justice mindset, anticipate and address resistance, shift power dynamics, and create a psychologically safe organizational culture. Individual chapters provide pragmatic how-to guides to implementing justice-centered practices in recruitment and hiring, data collection and analysis, learning and development, marketing and advertising, procurement, philanthropy, and more.

DEIJ pioneer Mary-Frances Winters and her coauthors address some of the most significant aspects of adding a justice focus to diversity work, showing how to create a workplace culture where equity is not a checklist of performative actions but a lived reality.

Is email taking over your life? Meet Harold, an HR director so overwhelmed by email he feels like a hamster on a wheel.

Just in time, Harold meets a coach—a leading expert on email efficiency and etiquette with a simple system that helps Harold eliminate needless emails, write better messages, and file and find information in a flash. He gets immediate results—and reclaims his life.

The Hamster Revolution is chock-full of practical advice that really works. Included is a landmark case study that shows how 2,000 Capital One associates cut their email time by 23 percent while improving overall email quality by 52 percent.

Professionals waste up to a month per year on email—costing their companies billions in missed opportunities. The good news? Hope and help are here. The Hamster Revolution is the definitive book for our times.

Go the Distance!

Whether you're running a race or running a company, pacing is everything. Go too fast and you'll burn yourself out—too slow and you're left in the dust. So how can leaders find the right speed? Growth expert Alison Eyring, who is also a long-distance runner and triathlete, found the answer in endurance training.

It's a concept she calls Intelligent Restraint. Eyring shows leaders how to evaluate their company's and team's current capacity for growth and identify the right capabilities and pacing strategies to increase growth steadily and sustainably. She masterfully weaves physiological and psychological research, in-depth business case studies, examples from real leaders, and practical tools with her own narrative of endurance training. The result is a revolutionary new mindset for enduring success.

Corporate structures, products, and processes permeate our society -but what do they really mean to us in our daily lives? The bottom-line mentality that drives corporate America, say Ellen Augustine (formerly Schwartz) and Suzanne Stoddard, is creating a world unresponsive to human needs, corrosive to the democratic process, and destructive to the planet itself. Taking Back Our Lives in the Age of Corporate Dominance shows the links between our mundane everyday struggles and the global corporate economy, image-driven media, and the relentless pace which consumes us all. And it tells us how we can change things by transforming both our work and leisure.

The authors use hard-hitting examples and illuminating personal vignettes about confronting fear, anger, death, family problems, and the stultifying effects of staying in the "comfort zone." They detail over 75 steps for personal and societal actions-some quick and immediate, others in-depth and long term-for retaking control of our lives. The authors include provocative questions for reflection that shock, prod, and jump-start the reader into thinking about what matters most to them.

Deeply moving, outrageous, encouraging, compelling, and inspiring, Taking Back Our Lives in the Age of Corporate Dominance blends unrelenting candor with the comfort of real-life stories of hope-and ultimately shows us that choice is the most important tool we have for reviving our lives and our world.

• Reveals the profound impact of the global corporate economy on our daily lives
• Details 75 immediate and long-term Action Steps for empowering ourselves both individually and as a society
• Offers specific tips, ideas, and resources on how to pare down our lives and open up our time
• Provides questions for reflection that help readers to think in new ways about what matters most to them