I can’t remember when I first heard someone use the term resources when they were actually referring to people.
What I do know is that over the years it’s really p*ssed me off.
In case you’re not familiar (highly unlikely if you’ve worked in any medium to large business or vaguely corporate context), let me give you some examples:
“We need to allocate more resources to this team.”
“If we want this project to deliver we’re going to need to hire some more resources.”
“Which resources can we cut in order to hit the budget numbers?”
And so on…
Somehow this use of the word resources, often explicitly when we mean people, or sometimes to lump together people as well as things, like servers, computing capacity or office equipment, has become commonplace, acceptable even. And which in my view just isn’t right. We’re not resources, we’re humans, people with lives that encompass much more than working for a company or delivering a profit.
So a long time ago I bought this domain peoplearenotresources.org, with a vague notion of hosting a service which allowed people to publicly sign a pledge to personally commit to never using the word resources when referring to people. As a small, simple yet defiant act to combat and counter the practice and that might grow over time.
In my head this would build a movement of people who would steadfastly say “people” even when the person they were interacting with was dropping the word “resource” all over the shop. Hence the act of small defiance without the need for confronting them if it wasn’t appropriate or you frankly didn’t have the energy. But that nonetheless made a difference and would influence others at least in a subtle way. For something less subtle, check out our Klaxon… 😉
It’s now September 2026 and I’ve finally done something about it. Welcome to the People are not resources movement!
What’s the big deal?
In my view, language matters. The words we use to communicate have an impact far beyond what I think many people give thought to. When we use the word resource when we’re referring to a person, even a hypothetical one, we’re dehumanising them and subtly sending a message that they’re not important. At least not as important as delivering the project or running the company.
It also creates distance. By distance I mean it creates a wider gap between our experience of the world and theirs. It reduces connection between people, allowing us to lose sight of our common humanity, to see our colleagues as roles that deliver things rather than fully fledged people with lives outside of work. Which in turn makes it harder for us to care, to be kind and above all to be compassionate.
“Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business”
Jacob Marley, A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
And this matters because that’s what makes us human. To me that’s more important than pretty much all else when it comes down to it; are we being decent human beings during our limited time on this planet? But secondly it actually reduces our ability to perform. Turns out that people quite like feeling like they’re human and not simply a replaceable unit of production, and when they feel valued, they’re more engaged, more productive and more creative.
Inspiration and thanks
I’m certainly not the first or the only person to have had this thought, that there’s something not right about accepting the use of the word resources in this way. In addition to my own experience of hearing it many times in the corporate organisations I’ve worked in or with, I also wanted to highlight and credit others who’ve published similar thoughts and sentiments well before me.
Firstly Johanna Rothman. I was lucky enough to go on a two day agile leadership course run by Johanna back in 2014, roughly around the time she published an article entitled People are not resources. At the time I was Head of Testing and Design for a financial services company and grappling with how to help a rapidly scaling company deliver increasingly complex products while still making it an enjoyable and engaging place to work. Her focus on great management being about coaching and developing people was a big influence on me, and her calling out of the management myth that “I can treat people as interchangeable resources” really resonated.
Secondly Emily Webber. I’ve got to know Emily over the last year whilst on some consulting work together and have discovered that she’s equally annoyed by the use of the term resources when what we mean is people. She’s also beaten me to it by about 8 years, having written a great blog post Should I call people resources? together with a handy flowchart to help you work out which term to use. A definite inspiration for some of the satire I’m planning here and we share a similar sense of humour and outlook I like to think.
In reading around the topic I also came across plenty of similar articles, such as this one by David Carboni and this one by Andre Faria, both on Medium. Let me know what else, it’s great to know that there’s already traction.
The intention
Where am I hoping this will go? Well if I allow myself to dream, firstly to generate a grass roots movement of people who pledge to not use the term resources when referring to people and, kindly, encourage others to do likewise. And through this, to grow rapidly into a movement that counters the dehumanising use of the term in businesses across the globe. But let’s just get to one hundred signatories to start with 😉
Secondly, and more importantly, to stand for more than just switching out one word. That is, to represent a movement that works towards more compassionate workplaces and organisations. Recognising that people are not resources should be the first small step, not the only one, towards looking at all the ways we can act with more compassion at work. So the intention is to also use People are not resources to share thoughts, information and inspiration around compassionate leadership and how you can develop this in your own organisations.
And thirdly, to not take ourselves too seriously while doing so. I believe work, and life, should ideally be fun, so why not bring in some humour where we can. People are not resources uses some wit and satire to poke fun at the corporate systems we’ve inadvertently created, and with the intention of making it easier to challenge the dehumanising approaches whilst also not blaming any individuals.
What next?
Join us! Sign the pledge if you’ve not already done so, and spread the word. Hopefully this is the start of a movement against treating people as resources and a stand for more human and compassionate workplaces. The more people we bring along the better.
