Is counselling a part of HR or totally a different field?

Have we not said or heard this often at the work place?

"With the recent restructuring and the faster cycle of business, My staff is finding work pressure difficult to cope with. I am finding it hard to coach them to cope with the transition."Concerned Line Manager....or..........

"I have become very anxious lately due to my heavy workload and family responsibilities. I start taking medicine to calm myself, but it doesn't seem to help."

Counseling is definitely one service that can help people learn to manage themselves. A major portion of the HR’s job is to look after the human resource. Counseling therefore is its major role and responsibility.
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has set up a network " Maitree" in 2005 to counsel its 30,000 employees. Under the initiative, 90% of TCS offices organize family get-togethers and activities such as ball dancing and yoga classes and theatre workshop, helping employees working long hours keep healthy.
"At Wipro, to reduce employee stress after long working hours, HR initiated "Mitr", an in house counseling service, in 2003, the set up trains employees in counseling to help out colleagues in distress," said a senior HR manager with Wipro Technologies"
Recent tragic death of young couple made headlines in the print media were not so fortunate, Only if they had called the 24x7 helpline Infosys set up two years ago the out come would not have been tragic.

We can not deny the significance of the role of counseling and we should not alienate it from the functions of the HR department.  By vertue of what it is called the HR department is obligated towards the welfare of its human resource.

A counselor in a work place can work with designated personnel as a thinking partner, a revealing mirror, and a pacesetter among others.
A counselor can help in leveraging core capacities of employees.
Can help create a culture for greater synergy in organizational learning and development.
Can help employees increase their self-awareness regarding their thinking patterns and behavioral tendencies so as to make them more effective as an individual and in turn effective in their job also.
Managers know that many problems at work often stem from an employee's personal life rather than just the work situation.
What we do from 9 to 5 at job is directly related to what we do between 5 to 9 outside the work place.
Counseling is an effective and preventive people management strategy for organizations to help employees better managing stress, personal issues or work related problems.

Dimensions that can be added to workplace counseling:

• Managers could be trained in some basic counseling skills.
• Some growth and development workshops can be conducted in emotional Intelligence, Transactional Analysis, Marriage enrichment etc can also be conducted by the counselor.

yes, it is part of HR. thanks for sharing.

Thanks Manish , not necessary that It is hr activity only ,it applicable  to various fields and areas . doctors consulting each other at Operations is not hr ,but  consulting and consulling . Health problems ,drs consulling not hr . thechnical issues consulting discussiion amoung 2.3 persons no hr ,but consulling .

Hi,Swati,

The Counselling is a part of HR.There are three stages where HR can help the candidates

Stage-I

The HR should draw specific desirability criteria at the time of issuing notification  for recruitment where, candidate can understand his or her future role in the company.

Stage-II

The HR can counsel the candidate about the prospectus of jobs post recruitment when he or she reports for duty.

Stage-III

The HR can help the candidate to resolve his or her misconception about the company when performing assigned job.

So the JOB of HR is multidimensional as a lot of time and  money is invested  in recruitment.The retention of a candidate will depend on quality of advice he or she receives.

Thanks manish, for referral

Major roles of HR -  recruiting, training and development, planning and strategy, keeping employee records, pay roles, develop and retain talent etc.  Counselling is a part of the activity under develop and retain the talent.  So undoubtedly counselling is part of the activity of HR.

I beg to differ with Abhay. Counselling is a certainly a part of HR. And it is required to retain talent.

Dear Swati it's a totally different field