Ted, I think you are missing the real game here. Executives hate anyone who threatens their power which is anyone who is in a union or who complains about harassment, bullying, unfair discrimination or exploitative policies. HR minimise these threats to management by running internal propaganda campaigns to persuade people that everything is awesome; by pretending to be peoples friends so they can spy on them and by getting people to put their complaints through internal dispute resolution processes that protect the boss and prevent people from going to the authorities or to unions. Basically they act as the KGB of the organisation. Executives love HR when they prevent or remove these threats to the chain of command. If a HR Director is feeling unappreciated all they need to do is to lean into managements nastiness to cause problems and then be the hero who saves them from the fallout.