Pure Potential

All About Careers - Human Resourcing

Human resources is one of the most misunderstood departments in the corporate world. People who work in HR as it is commonly known as are not just responsible for hiring and firing, but they are in charge of retaining the right people, developing their skills and ultimately making sure that staff are performing to their best abilities. They form a vital part of any organisation, commercial or non-commercial, private or public sector, large or small.

There are a number of different roles in human resources. If you have an appetite for variety, you can be a human resources generalist, where you’ll be doing a bit of everything in the HR department’s remit. Otherwise, you might want to specialise in a certain HR area, such as: compensation and benefits; employee relations and performance; organisation development; and recruitment.

All these different areas require different skills, but you really do have to be a ‘people person’ as HR offices are always dealing with employees. Those with top class analytical and assessment skills are found working in organisation development, which involves restructuring businesses to maximise efficiency. Are you a people person? Then becoming a specialist in employees’ emotional, social and psychological wellbeing might be the perfect option for you, you could even become an occupational psychologist.

So what do you need to work in HR? You should be genuinely friendly, have excellent communication skills, bags of confidence and great organisational skills. You can apply to work in HR with a degree in any discipline although graduates with HR-related degrees (such as psychology and business management) are preferred. Above all, you need great people management and interpersonal skills. You should able to deal with everyone: from a factory worker to the CEO of a company.

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