Remember that Fast Company article entitled "Why We Hate HR"?    Man, did we talk a lot about that one.

Guess what?  Some are still less than enamored with us.  Need Evidence?  Just check out the following article from CFO.com, where Rutgers professor Richard Beatty is using the old lightning rod strategy to increase his personal revenues:

"Addressing a crowd of about 300 financial executives this morning, a professor of human resources soundly denounced the corporate HR profession for being mostly unable to provide analytics that are useful in making workforce decisions that build economic value.

Most companies today spend too little effort on attracting and retaining top strategic talent and too much on satisfying the rest of the employee base, asserted Rutgers University's Richard Beatty, who spoke at a general session during the CFO Risingconference in Orlando. In fact, he claimed that typical human resources activities have no relevance to an organization's success. "HR people try to perpetuate the idea that job satisfaction is critical," Beatty said. "But there is no evidence that engaging employees impacts financial returns."

By the way, the title of the article is built to get you worked up - "Memo to CFOs: Don't Trust HR".

The pattern is pretty simple to understand.  About every 6-8 months, some entity (Fast Company, a consulting shop, or in this case, a professor) comes along and attempts to take a big shot at HR.  Why shouldn't they take a shot?  We tend to react to the charges like we need to defend our worth to all around us.

Except, we don't.  The folks around you know whether you are any good or not as an HR pro.  I guarantee that.  For those of you who are strong, your business peers know the value.

Let's stop wringing our hands and start acting like we belong.  Please.  Every time you comment on a story like this one, you guarantee five similar studies/articles will come along in the next year.

So be different - don't whine, don't lash out.   Put your energy into cramming the stereotype down the world's throat by being a different type of HR pro.  Be better than you were last month.  Add a value- added project that someone in your organization didn't expect.  Rinse, repeat.

Get better and be different from the HR pros you know whom you believe are mailing it in.  Period.