Change of career - Marketing or Human Resources?

[Stumpy81]

Hi,

looking for advice, Im in such a quandary!

I am trying to decide on a new direction and I just don’t know which would be right for me, so I was hoping people who work in the industry could give me some advice?

I have a bachelors degree in sociology and law from some time ago now.

For the last 10 years we have been running a wedding venue from home on the farm we rent so I have gained skills from the role, albeit self taught.

Sadly our tenancy is looking fragile for the future when the farm changes hands 😭

Therefore I am looking for a new direction to help build on my experience and allow me to apply for jobs when the time comes.

I have looked at courses with CIPD for HR roles and also courses with CIM for marketing roles. With my current commitments I don’t feel well placed to do a full times masters but if people think it is worth it I could consider a part time one. My thoughts behind the accredited courses were they could be done part time per module.

So my question is, how hard is it to get into marketing roles/HR roles from my position? Ie some industry experience and say a level 5 qualification? What are the roles like and do people recommend them?

TIA!

What sort of industry would you be interested in - do you want to get out of hospitality altogether?

I’d say you have a lot of the marketing based skills already, assuming you’ve used social media and PR to attract business, organised the events and so on. I work in marketing and would employ someone with the right attitude without specific qualifications.
It would depend upon the sector though as I work in financial services and need someone that can also write relevant copy etc as we are a tiny team. But how about an agency or similar. I’d update your CV and LinkedIn and see what the feedback is. Good luck!

Given you have some academic law qualifications I’d tend to HR. There are so many marketeers out there salaries are low unless specific product or domain experience and it’s not a great job market with chat-gpt and increased automation and less events many contracting marketing departments. HR is always busy even when layoffs happening and qualifications much rarer skill.

All I know is hospitality, and I enjoy it, but I’m also happy to go into new areas.

I'd say that your experience is more in line with marketing, and there would be more natural cross over from that perspective. Unless of course you were hiring and firing people a lot as part of the wedding business.

Have considered getting a job in events management - it's a sub sector of marketing and would naturally play to your skills and experience? I've met people in events management working for agencies, working for big venues, working for corporates... there are a lot of different opportunities.

@Stumpy81 Not sure where you live, but local authorities will often train people in HR. My LA also has training places for lawyers. There are also apprenticeships.

I would say HR for job security and financial prospects. Marketing starting salaries are fairly low and while you can have a fantastic career in marketing and it can be creative and fun, I would be a bit nervous to be starting out in this right now unless it was a real dream or I was outstandingly creative and well connected or super ambitious with a fire in my belly.

Our HR team seems to be constantly desperate for new starters so it seems to be somewhere with ample opportunities. A lot of people in HR are also incompetent - so if you have a law and sociology background you might be amazing and find success quickly. An actually competent and passionate HR person would be snapped up anywhere.

You could also get into more internal event planning/staff engagement stuff as well which might draw on your enjoyment of hospitality and be a specialty for you.

Our head of HR is on mid 6 figures so if you can hack it it’s a solid career path and just seems a lot easier to get into and get a nice safe job (albeit boring and rife with office politics) compared to marketing which is a bit sexier so is stiffer competition.

Thanks! Still hard to decide, differing advice on here. Might be worth adding I live in a very rural area, so whatever I do, a commute will be 45 minutes, unless I work remotely.

What about digital marketing? Thats where marketing is headed, it seems.