Why HR Is Still Misunderstood in Business Leadership?

File 37: In this file of Workforce Therapy Files, the hosts turn the spotlight on Jamie Swaim to explore her journey into human resources and leadership strategy. Jamie discusses why HR is often misunderstood in executive spaces and explains the difference between reactive HR support and proactive people strategy. They explore workforce planning, compliance challenges, and the growing complexity of managing people across multiple states and industries. The discussion highlights the importance of ambiguity management, resourcefulness, and cross-functional thinking for modern HR leaders. The group reflects on how meaningful relationships, mentorship, and practical experience have shaped Jamie’s approach to leadership. The conversation reinforces the idea that strong HR strategy is deeply connected to business success and organizational trust.

Key Themes:

·      Beyond the Support Desk: Why Executives Misunderstand HR

·      Proactive Workforce Planning: Scaling Without Surprises

·      The State-Line Trap: Navigating Multi-State Compliance Risks

·      From Middle School Passion to HR "Encyclopedia"

·      The Three Pillars of Modern HR: Ambiguity, Resourcefulness, and Empathy

·      Real Talk Over Theory: The Inspiration Behind Parcel

Episode Transcript

Jason Heflin:

Welcome back to the Workforce therapy files. Today we're doing something really fun. It's the final in our series of interviewing the founders of our podcast. And we got Jamie Swain, one of my favorite people.

Jamie Swaim:

CEO.

Jason Heflin:

CEO.  President. Supreme Leader.

Molley Ricketts:

Grand Poo-bah.

Jason Heflin:

Grand Poo-bah.

Jamie Swaim:

That’s my personal preference. I'm just kidding.

Jason Heflin:

So thanks for being here today and taking some time out of your busy schedule.

Jamie Swaim:

Absolutely. Thank you for having me.

Jason Heflin:

Absolutely. I'm going to kick it off with some questions for your if you're ready.

Jamie Swaim:

I'm ready.

Jason Heflin:

Okay. So this is us interviewing Jamie as if we just didn't even know her.

Molley Ricketts:

Okay.

Beyond the Support Desk: Why Executives Misunderstand HR

Jason Heflin:

So we may know some of the answers to these, but going to, I bet we're going to be surprised. Jamie, why is HR still misunderstood in the executive room?

Jamie Swaim:

I think it's because the day-to-day interactions before you become an executive with HR are support focused. They're compliance focused, and the further the individuals go in the HR space, the more it's strategy focused. And sometimes people ascend to the executive space before they've ever seen HR as a strategy. I think that's the biggest issue. And so they still want to interact as like, Hey, can you pull this report for me? Can you file this for me? Instead of, can you help me think through how our people will be impacted by this business need or this projected route that my company is going to go down? I think that's the biggest area that's misunderstood.

Jason Heflin:

Yeah, that's good. And it's true. I mean, it's easy to get disconnected or not be connected in the first place. Well, what's the difference between HR support and people strategy?

Jamie Swaim:

Yeah. I think the biggest difference is that support's in the moment largely it is reacting to what the challenges of right now and appropriate behavior, performance concern bubbled up. How do I help you through this navigate this tricky water moment that you're experiencing right now? Strategy to me is how do I make sure that the things we're putting in place right now align to where you want the company to go, but it takes being partners in that and understanding where companies want to go to be able to put strategies in place.

Jason Heflin:

Would you say it's proactive thinking over reactive thinking?

Jamie Swaim:

Absolutely.

Jason Heflin:

So I'm going to go off script a little bit.

Jamie Swaim:

That's fine.

Proactive Workforce Planning: Scaling Without Surprises

Jason Heflin:

What's a quick thing that people can do to be better at that, to be better at that strategic long-term planning and thinking.

Jamie Swaim:

In terms of people?

Jason Heflin:

In terms of their people, in terms of talent.

Jamie Swaim:

I think the biggest one for me is really creating a workforce plan. Every year, companies get together and they say, what are the goals that we're going to have for this year? What are the budgets we're going to have for this year? And sometimes those are the only two things that leaders will do together to plan for their company. And they're not thinking through what that means from a people perspective. So you get surprised things like, we need to hire 45 people because we're supposed to start this on Tuesday.

You’re like, gosh, I wish I'd known that whenever I was putting together my team for this year. And those kinds of things can't continue to happen. If you want a seamless execution, if you don't want to do things like we've cautioned on this podcast, like hiring quick or not building intentionality in how you scale and grow or contract. Even having conversations of like, I'm not really sure that based on our sales forecast that we're going to be able to sustain this workforce. Okay, well, here's our turnover number. Do we want to just let natural attrition happen and not backfill it? Or are there other things that we'd like to do? We can have conversations about that upfront that save you some of the things that you sacrifice and the trust that you have with the people that work there.

The State-Line Trap: Navigating Multi-State Compliance Risks

Jason Heflin:

Yeah. Good. I'm going to use a scary word in this next one called compliance. We've been talking in my company a lot about compliance. There's a new Americans with Disabilities Act law coming into effect in April. All websites, government, healthcare, all the major service websites have to be ADA compliant.

Molley Ricketts:

How?

Jamie Swaim:

There's a lot of things.

Molley Ricketts:

How will they be ADA compliant?

Jason Heflin:

ADA compliance for websites is visual and audio. So if somebody has a visual disability or can't hear, and there's audio or video on the site.

Jamie Swaim:

Also color considerations.

Jason Heflin:

You have two similar colors of blue are sitting next to each other that are too close. People can't tell the difference. Different fonts, the readers can't read them to people. So anyway, that's a side journey. 

Molley Ricketts:

Sorry, didn't know.

Jamie Swaim:

But we're all learning.

Jason Heflin:

But I've been talking about compliance half the day every day for the last few weeks. So it's scary. People are like, what comply I have to comply? Yes, yes. It's a minimum of $115,000 fine. So now are they going to, who knows if these compliances are going to be enforced or not? Somebody's going to have to call you out. Probably won't. But compliance is scary when people bring it up. So what's the biggest compliance risk companies are ignoring in the space of hiring and people and talent?

Jamie Swaim:

I think the biggest one from my perspective is when we're thinking about scaling and growth and ignoring the fact that compliance is bigger than just federal law. So every state in our country has a different set of requirements. And so, choosing to scale might also mean that you need to choose how you're going to support your organization with additional requirements. And it can't always be absorbed by the two people you gave to the HR team.

So, you're in 45 states. Well, that might mean that I have two more people that are necessary just to be able to do the basics. And that's not counting the other meaningful things that the function can offer. And it's not just in HR. That's true for safety. It's true for finance requirements, tax laws, how the unemployment's set up, how workers' comp is set up. All of it is down to the state line. And I don't think companies always think about that, especially if founders or growing company CEOs have not worked in that space before. If they haven't hired an HR expert that they're spending time with, it may not be something that they pay attention to.

The second one though, that is also something I stay with my head on pivot right now is immigration laws. It's a growing space, and for some industries, you got to stay really connected to it, especially in rural medical settings, agriculture, people with highly-skilled workforces where you've got individuals on a lot of visas. Paying attention to where we are from an immigration standpoint is going to be really important to make sure you have the right budgets and support to navigate it.

Jason Heflin:

And it doesn't have to be scary. Right?

Jamie Swaim:

It doesn't have to be scary. But here's the thing. We need to all accept the fact that the people that write these laws are not people that are executing the work. So they don't always write them in ways that are so clear that you're like, oh, okay, well that's step one. I understand that. And they don't always provide the tools to help you do it well. So finding someone who understands the ways that companies have bumped their heads on this is it's worth the time and it's worth the investment to have somebody that you can trust to help you navigate it.

Molley Ricketts:

Can I get an amen?

Jamie Swaim:

Thank you.

From Middle School Passion to HR "Encyclopedia"

Jason Heflin:

Can I ask you another off-script question? I'm going to start with a compliment. So you are probably the most knowledgeable person when it comes to these type of topics, like the technicality of human resources.

Jamie Swaim:

That Jason knows.

Jason Heflin:

Yeah. So I don't know many, but no, but seriously, you really are. And whenever you dive into these things, it's like you could just keep going and keep going because you've seen so much. How did you learn all this? You're an encyclopedia. What's your backstory? This is about getting to know Jamie. So what's your backstory? How'd you get here? How did you become such a brainiac?

Jamie Swaim:

Actually, I think part of it is because I was born that way. No, I'm just kidding. I decided I was going to be in HR in middle school, which I know is not when a lot of people make those choices.

Molley Ricketts:

You were 12?

Jamie Swaim:

Yes. And I had a situation where one of my family members had applied for a position that they were already doing and had been doing it for six months and they didn't get the job. And then the person that was hired, they were asked to train.

Molley Ricketts:

Oh.

Jamie Swaim:

For months. For months. It was a promotion. And then the hiring manager asked that person if they ever planned on losing weight? And I don't know whether or not the decision to do that was connected, but there's no way that you would disconnect it, if you were somebody who was on the receiving end of that. And I remember being in middle school and being like, what a dumb way to make business decisions. So, when I got to high school, I had a whole conversation with my guidance counselor, because this is pre-internet, just so we're clear. I had a conversation with my guidance counselor and I said, I just want to be part of how do you influence these kinds of decisions so that they're not made based on things that don't actually drive value. And for some reason, this was very interesting to me. It's like I grew a passion about it. So, I got really involved in things like Junior Achievement and those kinds of things, and I just enjoyed learning about it. So then I was looking at a college, my guidance counselor said, there's two that we could find in Kentucky that had an HR track. It was just at the beginning of no longer calling it Personnel.

And so we were moving into this HR space and here was the outlook. And I knew I wanted to affect business, but I didn't want to be an accountant and I didn't want to work in finance. And this really spoke to me because I really, I'm going to give you the generic thing that everybody who first gets started in HR says is I love people, but sorry, it gets on my nerves now. But at the beginning, that was how I felt too. I felt like, how can I help people? But then this is in the early parts of the internet to get started. I had this crazy CEO, and if you're listening to this, you know exactly who you are. Crazy CEO, who promoted me before I was ready.

And he said, I'm going to give you two things. I'm going to give you an attorney that you can call. Shout out to Jim Smith, and I'm going to give you a consultant that you can use because I think you have the right heart and I think you have the right mind for things. But I know that there are going to be things that we're going to come across that you don't have experience to tackle. And I used those relationships in every possible way. I read every SHRM magazine. I dove into every piece of content that I could get to try to learn these things. I actually read the Family Medical Leave Act. My gosh, I ordered that.

Jason Heflin:

Nerd.

Jamie Swaim:

Right?

Molley Ricketts:

Totally.

Jamie Swaim:

I ordered it and the Fair Labor Standards Act, and I read it word for word because I thought I needed to. Okay. Which I don't know that you need to.

Molley Ricketts:

Not word for word.

Jamie Swaim:

There’s stuff in there you don't even come across. But that's how I grew my knowledge around these things because I thought that's what it meant to be in HR. And this was before I started learning other things. Long answer, I think Jason, but…

Jason Heflin:

Good answer.

Jamie Swaim:

Thank you. I'm a nerd. I guess is if you wanted to underline something twice what the answer is.

Molley Ricketts:

But I love that nerdiness about you.

Jamie Swaim:

Thank you.

Molley Ricketts:

Because that means that someone like me, I can lean into you the same way that you leaned into those two people because I know you're going to be the best.

Jamie Swaim:

Thank you. Gosh.

Molley Ricketts:

So when you think about how far you've come and everything that you've experienced, and I know that I get to talk to you sometimes when I'm like, I don't know what the heck I'm supposed to be doing right now. And you're like, you know what? Let's talk through it. And I always love that about you. You give me the grace when sometimes you know that I know the answer, but you need to help me walk through it to find it together.

Jamie Swaim:

By the way, one of the biggest privileges I have in my life is to be behind the curtain with people before they take it and deliver it to someone else.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah.

Jamie Swaim:

It took me a while to get my head around it that way. So thank you for allowing me the opportunity to be with you behind the curtain.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah, always.

Jamie Swaim:

Yeah.

The Three Pillars of Modern HR: Ambiguity, Resourcefulness, and Empathy

Molley Ricketts:

So you've come through the ranks. You've lived like me through different seasons of what it means to be in HR. Started out as Personnel and HR and human capital. I think we went through a phase of that and gosh, I don't even know what else.

Jamie Swaim:

People. Now we're just a people.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah. So, what capabilities do you think HR has to have now that maybe you didn't have to have 10 years ago? What capabilities must HR leaders have now or learn now, build now that you didn't have to 10 years ago, 5 years ago?

Jamie Swaim:

I'm going to say this because some of it is that I didn't know I needed it 10 years ago, but it probably was true then too.

Jason Heflin:

Okay.

Jamie Swaim:

I think the first is the ability to deal with ambiguity. And it's because nothing is predictable when you're dealing with people.

Molley Ricketts:

Never.

Jamie Swaim:

You can't judge somebody correctly just because you interviewed them for two hours. You can't judge somebody quickly because you worked with them for five years. When life circumstances shifted and you've never seen them through that season.

You got to be real comfortable to be like, I have no idea how we're going to get through this and rely on the fact that, but you have before gotten through other things that you had no idea how you're going to get through that ability to deal with ambiguity, to say I don't know what I'm talking about right now, but I have the tools to learn more about it so that I can show up appropriately. I think that really matters.

The second thing is I really lean into resourcefulness. And if I'm adding anybody on my team as a leader or a team member, I need to know that when you don't know something that you won't automatically fizzle, that you'll continue to be like, I am committed to figuring it out. Right?

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah.

Jamie Swaim:

I'm going to make a phone call. I'm going to look something up. I'm going, I'm not going to wait for somebody to be the authority on the topic. Right? I would rather you give me something to react to than to rely on me wholly to create it. That's what I look for.

And the third is the ability to think in terms of the other person's seat as it relates to cross-functional capability.

Molley Ricketts:

That's deep.

Jamie Swaim:

I'm not a finance person, but I should care about what finance has to control. I should understand my impact on their work. I should care about how I manage my budget. I should be clear about what my needs are. I should understand why priorities are selected that aren't mine, but advocate for them effectively. I feel like it's appropriate for me to understand the challenges that my operational partners are up against, so that whenever I'm like, okay, but tomorrow we're going to start our performance review cycle and it's going to take you 15 hours to get stuff done in two days, well, that's not reflective of the life they're living.

And I think there's a lot of ways that HR does that, where they put timelines or deadlines out there that, because the work is important, but it almost gets lost because it's impossible to execute. So I think you got to be thinking about how you're affecting other people and how you all have to work together in order to make great things happen.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah. So you've been in corporate, you've been in small, you've been a medium…

Jamie Swaim:

Fortune 5.

Molley Ricketts:

Fortune 5. You've been a solopreneur.

Jamie Swaim:

Yeah.

Molley Ricketts:

In that experience that you've had, what are the greatest relationships that you feel like you have to have for your position to make a move to be respected? So often the HR is the, oh, you have to go to the principal's office kind of thing. From your experience and where you sit, looking back on your knowledge, what has been the greatest relationship that you know have to have as soon as you go into an organization?

Jamie Swaim:

It depends on the industry, but finance and IT are the two places that I really care about building some connection because whether or not I have the funds to execute something, whether or not I fully understand the impact of my decisions on the business output and whether or not I have the right systems or tools to navigate it most efficiently, those relationships to me are really key, really key. But I think the biggest one is the leaders that are on my team. I need to know that we're walking right foot, left foot together, and that we're sharing a brand, that we are building something together that we could speak for each other in a way of like, no, I know that's what you heard, but I know that person so well that I'm wondering if we're missing a sliver. Because like I said, we're dealing with ambiguity every day. So I think having people that you know can trust is super important.

Molley Ricketts:

And what two great positions to acknowledge that you have to align with and get to know for your impact to be meaningful the way that you want it to throughout the organization. So, one of the things that I love to hear from other leaders like yourself, that started at the age of 12, what value do you think HR brings to the table and how do you bring that value in a way that helps everyone else see it? So it's not just HR and compliance and almost like you're the person that puts up the guardrails and tells me what I can't do.

Jamie Swaim:

That’s right. Well, I think one of the values is almost every compliance expectation was created because companies were jerks. Okay>

Molley Ricketts:

Shout out to Eric Williamson there.

Jamie Swaim:

That's right. Shout out, Eric. And the big thing is, is that if I can understand the spirit and intent of why the law exists or why the regulation is required, and I can make sure that we are doing that compliance effectively, HR is already paid for itself because the risks, like the one that Jason talked about, is probably more than what it would take to navigate that. And that's true across the board. Everything else that we do is icing for the company

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah.

Jamie Swaim:

So if we are contributing new strategic thoughts, ways to approach something, ways to focus on things like transferable skills or that we know the people that work there so well that we're like, you've got that problem. Have you talked to so-and-so? Because we're connectors and the organization that get to know people, what makes their blood pump and what they like to work on and where their talents lie. There's magic that starts to happen there when that is cranking out, right? Which is why I think HR business partners that just that job title has grown so significantly. When I started, it was HR Generalist only, and that just meant they weren't going to staff a full HR team. So you were going to do all the things.

Molley Ricketts:

Jack of all trades.

Jamie Swaim:

Yes, that's right. But business partners that understand why those performance expectations matter, how that translates to your outcomes, understand the return on investment of the development activities they're suggesting because they understand where your team's going. Gosh, that's where absolute incredible work happens.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah, that's great. So you told us a little bit about the reason why you started, and you've talked a lot about what you've learned and how you've grown within your position. So what advice would you give someone in middle school or maybe a little older that is considering the work that you do? What would you tell them today that you wish someone would've told you then?

Jamie Swaim:

I had no idea the steps I was going to have to take to be able to reasonably affect the things that were the inspiration behind me starting in this career. And I remember the first several years, the shock that when I got my first HR job that I wasn't even doing the stuff I did when I had an internship, I was doing data entry, I was tracking attendance. I was filing. There's nothing, not a moment when I was deciding what I was going to major in and go into debt for in college, where I was like, I sure hope I file.

Molley Ricketts:

And track attendance.

Jamie Swaim:

And track attendance. But the biggest thing for me is I've always told people that you got to lean into the relationships network gain sponsors, people that would say your name in rooms you aren't in. You got to care about that.

And every single file that I would work within, I read it, all of it. I got to see examples of how the work was done to see, I got to see other people that work there to see whether or not the things they put on their performance improvement plan, did it actually improve performance. Because I cared about stuff like that. So take every grain of what's offered you in terms of a requirement and see what it turns into in terms of nuggets that lay a foundation that allow somebody you respect to say, you know more than anybody I know about this topic. It's because I've cared about every detail that's come across my desk.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah. I mean, you read the FMLA.

Jamie Swaim:

I did. Which I wouldn't advise, by the way. Google helped a lot of things.

Molley Ricketts:

Well, I want to tell you that I appreciate you and the commitment that you go to finding the right answer, and I say the right answer because we all have opinions.

Jamie Swaim:

Oh, absolutely.

Molley Ricketts:

And being able to discern when you know that you need to find the right answer and not just your opinion, that takes a big person and someone that's very self-aware. And I thank you for that.

Jamie Swaim:

Thank you.

Real Talk Over Theory: The Inspiration Behind Parcel

Molley Ricketts:

So I think that you're closing out this chapter of files that we've committed to here at WTF, Workforce Therapy Files. You're the last one wrapping us up. So is there anything you want to close us out on that you think people need to know about Jamie Swaim?

Jamie Swaim:

The only thing I would like to put a pen in, if you don't mind, is that there's an inspiration story behind why I created Parcel. And part of it was because I worked in all of these corporate settings, and there would be times where I didn't have enough people on my team to do the things that were being asked and the time I was given to do it. And then for the moments where I needed to go and find someone, I kept running into consultants that all they had ever done was lived in the theoretical.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah.

Jamie Swaim:

I knew that I was not going to hire those consultants. I was not going to partner with people who were using theory and textbook to drive meaningful outcomes for companies, especially small and medium businesses. And I'm really proud of the people that we brought into the Parcel fold over the years because they've all been individuals that I know have walked the walk and that are not living in the utopian version of how you should be doing this, which is my biggest pet peeve about HR conferences.

So I just want to say that because if you're in a situation where you don't know how to navigate something and you want somebody who's going to be real talk with you, I'm proud of what Parcel has done in that space.

Molley Ricketts:

Yeah, that's great. And I'll attest to the work effort. Thanks for being on the show.

Jamie Swaim:

Thanks for having me.

Molley Ricketts:

All right, Jim, close that file.

 

That’s where we’ll leave the conversation for today. Before we close the file, we invite you to reach out to us with questions, suggestions or other comments. We’d love to hear from you.

 

Did You Enjoy Today’s Conversation?

Visit www.WorkforceTherapyFiles.com to listen to additional WTF files or to let us know you’d like to be a guest on an upcoming file.

 

Need Help Supporting Your Company’s Recruiting and Staffing Goals?

We’re here to help. You can contact us via our individual websites, depending on your specific needs or questions:

·      Jamie Swaim, SPHR - www.ParcelKnows.com

·      Molley Ricketts - www.IncipioWorks.com

·      Jason Heflin - www.CrowdSouth.com

 

We hope you found this file insightful and helpful. Thank you for listening!