![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/110618-jm-braswell-headshot-01.jpg?resize=160%2C207&ssl=1\")
<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nCiting 2017 and 2024 efficiency studies, he said nothing has been done after both studies showed human resources is a bottleneck holding back other departments within the county.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Kandis Baker-Buford, Polk County’s director of Equity and Human Resources, and County Manager Bill Beasley were both the targets of Braswell’s frustration with HR inaction.<\/p>\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/Kandis-Baker-Buford.webp?resize=720%2C406&ssl=1\")
<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nAfter sending out an email to his colleagues on the board on Feb. 12, Braswell had a chance to explain to his colleagues and many of the county’s top administrators why he’s become \u201ctired of inaction\u201d during the commission’s agenda review session on Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve seen my letter. I think we have a failed HR system,\u201d he said. \u201cYou had an audit and nothing changed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHR is seen more of a hindrance to advancement as opposed to working with the rest of the county.\u201d He said reclassifications of employees are taking too long, and HR is \u201cstonewalling.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Addressing Beasley, he said \u201cBill, that goes right to you. These people work for you. I\u2019m not happy with it. … I think you have the wrong people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAnd if the answer is \u2018we\u2019re working on it,\u2019 you had seven years,\u201d Braswell added. \u201cThat\u2019s about six years longer than you should have had. So my point to you is you need to do something about it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Beasley said he had a plan to deal with the lingering issues identified within HR.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Braswell said a \u201cmanagement shakeup\u201d was needed. \u201cYou have department heads who feel like they can\u2019t get anything done.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFor an individual to stonewall an operation of 2,200 people is just unacceptable,\u201d Braswell said. \u201cIf it was in any private business, a lack of efficiency gets flushed out of the door real quick.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Beasley said there is progress in the pipeline, since the fall of 2024, that is not contained in the efficiency study and that involves a crystallizing of the issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Further, Braswell said he wants SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures or manuals) so everyone knows what to do. But there are still none written.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Beasley said he believed there have been some incremental improvements to staffing, technology, feedback, office training and more solid operating procedures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
During a fiery exchange, Braswell interrupted the county manager saying: \u201cBut we don\u2019t have time for that; that ship has sailed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhat bothers me as much as anything is an audit can be accomplished, efficiencies annotated and nothing happened. That should be a shock. They are not my employees, but I would clean house.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m not opposed to changing the top, Bill,” Braswell said. “I will be honest with you. This has pushed me to the point where big changes need to be made.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the email, Braswell repeated the key takeaways in an analysis of the 2017 and 2024 efficiency studies, including.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Minimal progress since 2017 in improving planning, decentralizing authority, training, and enhancements to recruitment and communication.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Leadership issues and strategic deficiencies due to the HR director\u2019s heavy involvement in day-to-day operations, limiting strategic planning by staff, nor the creation of an assistant HR director position to alleviate the director\u2019s burdens so she could focus on policy, vision, and planning.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Recruitment and retention challenges persist because of slow hiring, inconsistent recruitment processes, and unstructured onboarding. The 2024 study suggested recruitment be brought back in-house because of inconsistent screening and inaccurate information for\u00a0candidates via a third-party vendor.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Formal training and workforce planning of managers and HR personnel have not been implemented since the 2017 recommendations, leaving staff unprepared for key functions without constant oversight.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- HR lacks Standard Operating Procedures and an IT workforce plan, and the Polk One system is not being fully utilized so service is inefficient and delayed.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Customer service and communications problems persist with other departments because of poorly communicated policies, processes, and expectations. The efficiency studies suggested an HR manual and a satisfaction survey.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
Attempts to reach Baker-Buford by phone for comment Monday were unsuccessful. In an email to The Ledger, county Communications Director Amber Smith said, “We do not have a comment at this time.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Baker-Buford’s annual salary is $153,701.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Polk County Commissioner Bill Braswell wants a management shakeup of the county’s human resources department, or either the county manager or department director needs to go, he said during Friday\u2019s agenda… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7010,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"14","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyMFwvMDRcLzExMDYxOC1qbS1icmFzd2VsbC1oZWFkc2hvdC0wMS5qcGc_Zml0PTE2MCUyQzIwNyZzc2w9MSIsInR4dCI6IlBvbGsgQ291bnR5IGNvbW1pc3Npb25lciB3YW50cyBhIG1hbmFnZW1lbnQgc2hha2V1cCBvZiBIUiBkZXBhcnRtZW50IiwidGVtcGxhdGUiOiJoaWdod2F5IiwiYmxvZ19pZCI6MTYzMDQwNjYxfQ.9IjQRb02gtx8FcIPtzFd6NK3xGy3kVWFog27FFy4OuUMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":7010,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/110618-jm-braswell-headshot-01.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[10929],"class_list":["post-54035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-polk-county-commissioner-wants-a-management-shakeup-of-hr-department"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54035"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54035\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54037,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54035\/revisions\/54037"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}