What the HR department is responsible for
HR owns the employee lifecycle, from the day a department head raises a hiring request to the day the last full and final settlement is paid. In between, it issues offer letters and the appointment letter that every employee must receive under the OSH Code, collects joining documents, registers joiners for PF and ESI where they apply, maintains the employee master and publishes the holiday list. Every month it closes attendance and leave so payroll can run. It also writes policies, handles grievances and disciplinary cases, and constitutes the Internal Committee that the POSH Act requires at every workplace with 10 or more employees.
- Talent acquisition: manpower requisitions, sourcing, interviews, offers and joining
- HR operations: employee records, letters, attendance, leave, transfers and exits
- Payroll and statutory compliance: salary inputs, PF, ESI, professional tax and registers
- Employee relations: grievances, domestic enquiries, POSH cases and standing orders
- Learning and performance: induction, training calendar, goal setting and review cycles
How HR is structured at 50, 500 and 5,000 employees
At about 50 employees, HR is usually one person: an HR executive or an HR and admin executive who also looks after the office, housekeeping vendors and travel bookings. Salaries are often processed by the accountant or an outside payroll consultant, and the founder still interviews every hire. This person reports straight to the founder or a director and spends much of the month chasing attendance registers and joining documents.
Around 500 employees, a common setup is an HR manager with a recruiter, an HR operations executive, a payroll executive and an HR generalist at each plant or large branch. Policies get written down, probation reviews get a calendar, and department heads start receiving a monthly headcount and attrition report. In a 5,000-strong company the head of HR is usually a CHRO or VP HR. HR business partners are aligned to business units, specialist teams run talent acquisition, compensation and benefits, learning and employee relations, and a shared HR operations and payroll team serves every location.
How HR works with other departments
Finance is HR's closest partner. HR finalizes attendance, leave and payroll inputs; finance funds the salary account, releases the bank transfer and deposits PF, ESI and professional tax. Department heads raise manpower requisitions, sit on interview panels, rate probationers and recommend increments, while HR checks each request against the approved headcount budget. Admin and IT need notice of every joiner for the desk, laptop, email and access card, and they must confirm the return of each item before HR releases a full and final settlement. Legal steps in for disputes, show cause notices that may end in termination, and contract staffing agreements.
HR reporting lines and approvals
The head of HR reports to the managing director or CEO. In some family-run companies the HR manager reports to a director or to the CFO, which works until people issues start competing with finance priorities for attention. Inside the department, executives report to their functional manager, and plant or branch HR staff often have a solid line to the unit head and a dotted line to corporate HR. Leave, attendance corrections and overtime usually need the reporting manager's approval first and then HR's, and in ZeniaHR these requests follow exactly that chain. Offers above the approved salary band, terminations and policy changes go to the head of HR and, for senior roles, to the MD.
Typical human resources team structure
Human Resources designation hierarchy
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What does the HR department do in a company?
The HR department manages everything about employment: hiring, joining formalities, employee records, attendance and leave, payroll inputs, statutory compliance, training, performance reviews, grievances and exits. In a small company one HR executive covers all of it. In a large company these areas become separate teams under a head of HR who also advises leadership on structure, pay and policy.
What is the hierarchy of an HR department?
At the top of HR sits the CHRO or VP HR, with HR managers and HR business partners below, then HR executives and generalists, and HR assistants and trainees at the entry level. Specialist managers for talent acquisition, payroll and compliance, learning and employee relations appear at the manager level once the company crosses a few hundred employees.
Who does the HR manager report to?
The HR manager usually reports to the managing director, CEO or founder. In mid-sized family businesses the line sometimes goes to a director or the CFO. At a plant or branch, the unit HR manager often reports to the plant head for daily work and to the corporate head of HR for policy, hiring standards and pay decisions.
When should a company hire its first full-time HR person?
Hire a full-time HR person when hiring, joining paperwork, attendance and payroll inputs start eating into a manager's week and mistakes begin to show up in payslips. Other triggers are PF and ESI registration, a second office or site, and the POSH Act requirement to constitute an Internal Committee once you have 10 employees, which someone must own and keep current.