Simply put,
HRBP is a role,
Markdown is a syntax.

Lirian is a male programmer,
Mia is a female HR.
They often explain various terms to each other,
Lirian decided to write down their conversations.

HRBP

So one day Lirian asked Mia:
“A question — what exactly is an HRBP?”

Mia was very surprised:
“Why are you suddenly asking this? Is your company hiring HRBPs?”

“No, no, I’m just curious.
Like first let’s talk about HR. I was thinking,
HR’s full name is actually Human Resources,
literally translated that’s 人力资源 (human resources).
Then if someone says ‘I am an HR’,
literally translated isn’t that ‘I am a human resource’?
Feels weird.”

“Aiya, this is just idiomatic usage.”

“Then what about HRBP? What’s the full form of HRBP?”

“The full form of HRBP is Human Resources Business Partner.
First you have to have a concept:
in the broad sense, HRBP is not a job title,
but rather a role definition.”

Lirian was confused: “What do you mean?”

Mia didn’t answer the question directly,
but instead threw out another question:
“Let me tell you from the source.
The traditional classification of human resources
is divided into six major modules.
You know that, right?”

Lirian indicated he knew:
“Let me think, don’t tell me,
the six modules should be recruitment, training, salary… uh…
uh… and the other three modules!”

“Hmm, the recruitment, training, and compensation you said earlier are all correct.
After those there’s performance, labor relations,
and… human resources planning~
But this classification is very dogmatic.
How can someone only do compensation,
or only do recruitment?
For example, if you do recruitment,
you definitely need to understand candidate salaries,
and you also need to understand performance.
So later someone completely abandoned this theory of six modules
and proposed the brand-new Three Pillars theory.”

“So what are the three pillars?”

“The first is HRBP.
The second is SSC, Share Service Center.
SSC handles general affairs.
There’s another called COE, Center Of Expert,
which is the human resources expert.
You can imagine those lecturers who
specialize in training, recruitment, performance.”

Lirian curiously asked:
“So when someone says like ‘I’ll just be a little HR’,
does this little HR generally refer to SSC?”

“Yep, most HR people in the world can count as SSC.
In a large company,
this part of HR will specifically handle miscellaneous tasks.
The entry threshold for this type of HR is actually very low.”

“So if I want to be an HRBP,
do I also have to start as an SSC?”

“Not necessarily.
If you want to be an HRBP,
the most effective thing is actually if you originally were from a business department.
For example, I used to write code,
but I felt aiya writing code is too taxing.
I can write, but I don’t write well,
so I went and became an HR. (Lirian laughs)
Then I took HR courses,
got certifications,
did a few years of recruitment,
then jumped to a company to be the R&D department’s HRBP.
HRBPs usually have high seniority requirements.
This is the kind where you come from a business department
and directly switch to doing HR.
Your advantage would be very big,
but in fact relatively few people choose to do this.
My manager Tina is one of them.
She used to sell ERP software in sales,
so when she later became a headhunter doing recruitment, she had a big advantage,
and then later she became HR.”

Lirian expressed confusion about business departments:
“What departments count as business departments?”

Mia gave a definition:
“A business department is a department that directly brings profit to the company.”

“Oh! Like sales!”

“Yes, also product, after-sales support.
Of course this one is already a bit of a stretch.”

“What about the tech department?”

“Tech department also counts~”

Lirian thought about how they often purchase phones and stuff,
and felt a bit ashamed:
“But I feel like all we do is spend the company’s money…”

“But you’re the ones who produce the product.
In the long run you produce value for the company
and bring in profits.
HR department, admin, finance don’t count as business departments.”

Lirian remarked:
“So it feels like cross-disciplinary people have an advantage”

“Yes, this is the type in HR who isn’t from a traditional HR background.
There’s another type: completely straight-and-proper,
studied human resources in college,
then from SSC,
to HR Specialist,
to HRBP,
step by step working their way up to Expert. There are these too.”

After hearing this section,
Lirian roughly had some idea of what HRBP is.
He asked again:
“So what exactly does an HRBP do?”

“This depends on many situations.
For example, an HR with fifteen-plus years of experience,
like our boss,
often has to attend meetings.
And what kind of meetings does he attend?”

“Yeah, what kind?”

“Actually at this level of HR,
many of them participate in company strategic planning with the boss.
For example, if a Team Leader has a goal,
then HRBP will say, from the human resources angle,
from the talent allocation angle, help them achieve this goal.
Especially when there are some problems in the team,
that’s when the HRBP’s advice is needed.
Like there’s too much work and they need to hire;
or competitors are constantly poaching our people.”

“Uh, wait.
Hearing this I feel HRBP isn’t applicable in all situations, right?
Like what if someone doesn’t believe in this philosophy,
what if a Leader thinks business department matters
should be solved by the business department themselves.
Of course from the HR angle,
that’s definitely them not recognizing HR’s importance,
but I feel there must be lots of companies like this without HRBP.”

“Yes, startup companies are like this.
Big companies usually have dedicated positions.
In smaller companies these tasks are actually shared by the manager,
the supervisor, or the department’s HR.
But don’t forget,
at that time the business department head
is actually taking on this part of the role himself.”

“Scientific.
By this definition,
whoever does this part of the work
takes on the HRBP role.”

“Yes.”

“Then let me restate my understanding of HRBP.”

Mia spread her hands:
“Please begin your performance.”

Lirian summarized three points: "

• First, HRBP in the broad sense is a role; in the narrow sense it can also be a position.
• Then, HRBP exists to help the business department handle strategic matters.
• Also, because they have to help the business department, if they’re from a business background, they have a certain advantage.

"

Mia added a bit more:
“HRBP is there to help the business department solve pain points.
If they’re from a business background, they have a huge advantage.
Because the department boss can easily be convinced by them.
Otherwise if the HRBP has never written code,
the tech department leader might think:
‘You don’t even understand, on what grounds are you telling me what to do’…”

“Yeah, right.
So it feels like once an HRBP gets really good,
the next step is becoming senior management?”

“It’s possible,
but actually quite rare.
Compared to other departments,
basically an HRBP can hardly become CEO.
At most they become the head of the HR department, that’s the ceiling.”

“Oh, so that’s how it is.”

Mia thought of something
and added:
“What we just talked about
is what real HRBPs do.
But the fact is that in most companies these days HRBPs aren’t doing this.
The HR system in China was imported from the West to begin with,
so many places have shifted in meaning.
Some HRBPs initially do both recruitment and training,
and any problem that comes up you need to solve.
This kind of HRBP becomes more like a dedicated HR for each team.”

“Oh,
so normally HRBP can take on tasks,
but miscellaneous tasks go to SSC.
Highly specialized tasks can go to Expert.”

“Exactly,”
Mia accepted Lirian’s answer,
then suddenly wanted to quiz him again,
and asked:
“So what do you think is the difference between HRM, that is, HR Manager, and HRBP?”

Lirian thought about it and said:
“I feel these two aren’t on the same dimension.
HRBP feels like a role in the Three Pillars.
HRM feels more like a level of seniority,
like little HR, regular HR, and HR Manager.”

“More or less.
A big difference between them is that
HRBP doesn’t make the company’s regulations or whole systems,
because they’re targeted at a specific team and specific business.
But HRM has this responsibility
to make the whole set of regulations.
For example if the company is about to IPO,
the boss needs someone to help him create a complete compensation-benefits system,
a performance evaluation system.
At that time what he needs is an HRM,
not an HRBP.”

Lirian learned a lot,
and quickly showed an expression of sudden enlightenment:
“I learned!”

Mia took a sip of water
and gave her closing remarks:
“Anyway I think the highest-level HRBP
is one who thinks about issues from the boss’s perspective.
Although that’s kinda a loss,
taking HR’s pay
while doing the boss’s work.”

Lirian laughed:
“But if I were the boss,
I’d definitely love employees like you.
If every one of my employees had ownership,
and thought about issues like the boss,
then my company would definitely be a great company.”

Markdown

After drinking some water
and resting a bit,
Mia asked Lirian:
“What about that Markdown you said you wanted to tell me about last time?
What’s that?”

Lirian again expressed shame:
“I feel this can be explained in two or three sentences…”

“Tell me, tell me~”

“Markdown is actually just a syntax for writing articles,
like how a Word file specifies which characters are headings,
which characters are bold — same kind of syntax.
Using Markdown to write articles lets you control formatting better.”

“Huh? That’s it?”

“… yeah, that’s it…”

Mia felt brushed off by two or three sentences,
unwilling to accept it, so she kept asking:
“Then last time I saw you using Youdao Cloud Note to write things,
why were there two screens, one black and one white, on the left and right?”

“Oh, the right side is the preview page.”
Lirian thought about it
and explained in detail:
“To talk about Markdown,
I first need to talk about Markup.
The name Markdown
was actually originally tit-for-tat against Markup.
Markup is the syntax used for displaying fonts on web pages.
What Microsoft Word uses can also be considered a kind of Markup.
What Markup advocates is WYSIWYG:
What You See Is What You Get.
For example, to bold a font,
we select the font and bold it.
But this has a problem,
which is WYCSYCG:
What You Can’t See You Can’t Get.
The formatting power is only as much as you can see at a glance.
If I want the same text
to display differently in different environments,
I can’t do it.
So we have Markdown.”

Mia listened with a confused face.
Lirian grabbed a laptop and started showing:
“For example, with Markdown syntax,
we can write articles like this”

# This is a big heading

## This is a sub-heading

To **bold** text, add two asterisks on each side of the text. *For italic just add one asterisk on each side*.

To quote what someone said you can add backticks, `like this`.

To quote Lu Xun you can add a greater-than sign at the start of a line:

> People online are always fabricating my famous quotes — Lu Xun

1. You can use numbers for ordered lists
2. Like this

* You can also do unordered lists
* Like this

The Markdown above renders to look like this:

This is a big heading

This is a sub-heading

To bold text, add two asterisks on each side of the text. For italic just add one asterisk on each side.

To quote what someone said you can add backticks, like this.

To quote Lu Xun you can add a greater-than sign at the start of a line:

People online are always fabricating my famous quotes — Lu Xun

1. You can use numbers for ordered lists
2. Like this

• You can also do unordered lists
• Like this

After watching this demo,
Mia said:
“I feel this is a lot like writing programs.
You have to memorize lots of things,
and after writing it you also need to render it.
Feels pretty troublesome.”

Lirian explained:
“In Markdown,
there are only about 10 commonly used syntax rules.
This is easy to learn.
And using Markdown lets you convert all rich text into plain text.
Plain text doesn’t have the problem of rendering differently on different computers.”

Mia thought about it
and finally asked:
“Then why do cloud notes need to specifically support Markdown?
Feels like this feature was designed for programmers…”

Lirian:
“I don’t know either…”