Experiences of working in HR?

[user0512]

Posting on AIBU for traffic - sorry!

Hi All,

I've been offered a new role within my current school (I work in a school).

I went into this job to pursue my passion to work with kids. However, I've been offered a new role for more money.

Can anyone share their experiences of working in HR? Can I make a career out of it?

Thanks!

What kind of HR role is it?

It's in a school within recruitment. Dealing with staff absence, annual leave, employment maternity etc

Exciting
staff will complain about HR, not helpful, too many policies to follow. Too slow at dealing with issues. If you can bear that and know it’s anyone in HR and not just you they are moaning about it’s a great job

My last role was HR within a school. Honestly I think it depends on the culture, at the school I was at it was very poor so absence levels were always high. Recruitment somewhat busy, in schools you practice safer recruitment so things are a bit stricter particularly in terms of pre employment checks. Annual leave was managed by managers not HR.

You can definitely build a career in HR. It's interesting and every day is different. You need to have thick skin as if you do something that managers don't agree with they won't be happy and will tell you that! 😅

Yes you can make a career in HR. If you want to progress you'll probably need to do your CIPD qualification. HR is a Chartered profession in it's own right with a lot of specialist knowledge. It's not something to go into if you want to make friends, you will have to be comfortable handling some very difficult situations, dismissals, long term ill health, investigations etc

You say you're passionate about working with kids, HR would be very different. I work in an FE College and have precisely zero interaction with the students. You would have to be sure you have the commitment to make what would be a marked career change.

If you're passion is to work with kids, don't go into HR.

*your

Thanks everyone. Are there any pros? What's the pay like?

I mean, I would prefer to continue working with kids, but I'm not opposed to something new if the pros outweigh the cons

HR and Recruitment are extremely different kettles of fish so basically your role in HR is to protect the company against the employees.
I think a lot of people go into the role thinking it to be fluffy and helping people and actually your role can be completely shafting employees picking holes in their perfectly legitimate claims finding a way of getting out of paying them on a technicality.

Oh there’s definitely a similarities between working in HR and with kids but not necessarily good comparisons.

You can pursue a career in HR but there's lots of competition. But there are varied and interesting pathways and roles within HR.

I worked in HR before teaching. It was an admin role but I still found the employment law side relatively interesting and as pps have said there’s plenty of opportunity to progress with further qualifications/experiences. There’s then plenty of avenues to go down including advisor, payroll, learning and development and rewards. If you like problem solving, a varied workload and applying procedures it could be a good fit

Hmmm, thanks all.

In my current role, the day goes by really quickly. Would you say it's the same in HR? That's one of my favourite things about working in a school setting, the day passes by so quickly - I don't feel like I'm clock watching much

I think it’s really tricky to say, you’re gonna have a lot of variety in the role yes but you’re not gonna be level seven CIPD qualified overnight are you doing the interesting stuff, so there will be quite a lot of basic admin like checking the DBS’s I would imagine.

your role sounds very much like a HR assistant role.

I work in HR and love it. Never a dull day.

School HR is pretty unique. You'll need to get clued up on teachers T&Cs.

You'll need a thick skin and I'd agree that working in HR and working with kids can be very similar sometimes, but not in a good way.

Well at least anywhere that employs people needs someone to ensure that all the 'employing people' rules are met and that the 'employees' know their 'terms' then you will always be 'employable' yourself.

So for job security and career-wise, probably a smart move OP. If you feel passionately about kids, not so much.

I went from annoying to HR and often liken it to working with adult children

Fuck sake from nannying to HR!

One of my best friends is a HR director and honestly he could write a book with the shit he’s seen over 25 years. He’d have to change all the names though to protect the guilty.