Imagine a football match. Eleven players are on the field, each with a defined role. The strikers are expected to score, midfielders create opportunities, defenders prevent attacks and the goalkeeper protects the final line. Every player makes mistakes during a match. A striker can miss a clear opportunity, a midfielder can lose possession and a defender can misjudge a tackle. Yet there is something interesting about the goalkeeper. When a striker misses an easy chance, there may be disappointment, criticism and then the game moves on. But when the goalkeeper makes a mistake and the ball crosses the goal line, the entire stadium notices. One mistake can suddenly become the defining moment of the goalkeeper’s performance.

Sometimes, I wonder whether HR is the goalkeeper of the corporate world.

HR often finds itself at the last line of defence when it comes to people related issues. Employee grievances come to HR. Disciplinary matters come to HR. Compliance risks come to HR. Employee engagement comes to HR. Performance concerns, workplace conflicts, attrition, policies and organisational behaviour all eventually find their way to the HR desk. And when something goes wrong, one of the first questions that is often asked is, “What did HR do?”

An employee resigns and HR is asked why the person could not be retained. A conflict develops between an employee and a manager and HR is expected to resolve it. A new policy does not produce the desired result and HR is questioned about why the policy was introduced. An engagement initiative does not receive the expected response and the initiative is labelled an HR failure. A performance management system faces resistance from managers and HR is expected to fix it. Of course, HR has accountability in all these situations. But accountability and blame are not necessarily the same thing.

The goalkeeper analogy becomes even more relevant when we consider the fact that HR is increasingly expected to experiment. The workplace is changing rapidly. Employee expectations are changing, technology is transforming HR processes, artificial intelligence is entering the workplace, performance management is evolving and organisations are constantly looking for better ways to attract, develop, engage and retain talent. HR cannot simply continue doing things the way they were done ten or fifteen years ago. It has to experiment with new ideas, new processes and new approaches.

A new performance management system may not work exactly as expected. A new employee engagement initiative may fail to generate the desired enthusiasm. A revised policy may create an unintended consequence. A new recognition programme may not receive the anticipated response. These things can happen. Experimentation inherently carries the possibility of failure. Yet HR is sometimes expected to get everything right the first time.

We do not apply the same standard to every other function. A sales team can miss its target and the organisation discusses what went wrong and how to improve the numbers. A product launch can fail and the business analyses the market response. A project can miss its deadline and the project team examines the reasons. A striker can miss several scoring opportunities and is still expected to take the next shot. Failure, in these situations, is often treated as part of learning and improvement.

Why should HR be different?

There is another reason why the HR role is particularly difficult. HR often operates between competing expectations. Management expects HR to protect the organisation, while employees expect HR to protect their interests. Business leaders want speed and flexibility, while compliance requires caution and consistency. Managers want autonomy, while organisations need accountability. Employees want freedom, while policies need to establish boundaries. HR frequently has to balance these competing expectations, and sometimes it has to disappoint both sides.

HR may have to tell an employee that a particular request cannot be approved. At another time, HR may have to tell a senior manager that a particular decision is not appropriate from a people, policy or compliance perspective. HR may have to challenge a manager’s assessment of an employee. It may also have to implement an organisational decision that employees do not particularly like. In many such situations, HR becomes the visible face of a decision even when HR was not the person who made the decision.

This is perhaps where the goalkeeper analogy becomes uncomfortable but accurate. The goalkeeper is visible when the team concedes a goal, but the goal may have resulted from several events that happened before the ball reached the penalty area. The defender may have lost possession, the midfield may have failed to track back and the opposition striker may have found space. Yet once the ball enters the net, everyone’s eyes turn towards the goalkeeper.

The same can happen with HR. An employee may leave because of a manager’s behaviour, lack of career opportunity, compensation expectations, workload or personal reasons. Yet the conversation can quickly become, “What did HR do about retention?” A workplace conflict may have developed over months because of poor managerial communication, but when it finally escalates, HR is expected to resolve it immediately. A performance problem may have existed for a year, but when it becomes serious, HR is asked why it was not addressed earlier.

That does not mean HR should escape accountability. In fact, the opposite is true. A mature HR function must be willing to examine its own mistakes honestly. If a policy is poorly designed, HR should acknowledge it. If a process has created unnecessary bureaucracy, HR should simplify it. If employees do not understand a policy, HR should improve its communication. If an HR initiative fails, HR should analyse the reasons rather than immediately blaming the employees for not participating.

The real mark of a strong HR function is not that it never makes mistakes. It is the ability to say, “Yes, we made a mistake. Here is what happened, here is what we learned and here is what we are going to change.” That is not weakness. It is organisational maturity.

But there is an equally important point that organisations need to understand: HR cannot solve every people problem on its own.

Employee engagement is not solely an HR responsibility. Performance is not solely an HR responsibility. Retention is not solely an HR responsibility. Workplace culture is not solely an HR responsibility. HR can create the framework, establish processes, provide data, coach managers and facilitate interventions, but managers ultimately lead people every day. Leaders shape culture through their behaviour. Employees influence the workplace through their own actions. Business decisions influence workload, compensation, career opportunities and ultimately employee experience.

Therefore, when a people-related problem occurs, perhaps the first question should not always be, “What did HR do?” A better question may be, “What happened across the team?”

Football provides a simple lesson here. A team cannot depend entirely on its goalkeeper. If the defence repeatedly allows opponents to enter the penalty area, even the best goalkeeper in the world will eventually concede a goal. The goalkeeper can make exceptional saves, but cannot be expected to compensate for every weakness in the rest of the team.

The same applies to HR. HR can design a good performance management system, but managers have to use it properly. HR can create an employee engagement framework, but leaders have to create an engaging workplace. HR can develop policies, but managers and employees have to follow them. HR can identify retention risks, but the organisation must address the underlying reasons why people want to leave.

Perhaps, therefore, we need to stop looking at HR merely as the goalkeeper of the organisation.

HR needs to be a strategic player on the entire field. It needs to understand the business, anticipate people risks, build organisational capability, improve performance, strengthen leadership, shape culture and help the organisation prepare for the future. It should not merely wait for the ball to come towards the goal. It should be involved much earlier in the game.

And perhaps organisations also need to change the way they judge HR.

Do not judge HR only by the goals it failed to prevent. Look at the problems it anticipated, the risks it reduced, the systems it built, the managers it supported, the employees it developed and the organisational improvements it enabled.

A goalkeeper cannot save every shot. A striker cannot score every opportunity. A defender cannot stop every attack. And HR cannot prevent every people problem.

A football team wins not because one player performs perfectly, but because the entire team performs together.

The same is true in an organisation.

So the next time something goes wrong and someone asks, “What did HR do?”, perhaps we should pause for a moment and ask a bigger question:

“Was this really an HR problem, or was it a team problem?”

Because even the best goalkeeper in the world needs a strong team playing in front of them.