Women in HR please advise!!

[anne1985]

Women in HR please I need your advice!! I’m considering starting a Postgraduate course in HR management as I need a career change but I am not sure this is the right decision for me. I am 42 years old and would like a job that pays well and I could progress further. For women who are working or have worked in HR, do you enjoy it? Would you change it if you could? Thank you!!

CIPD is pretty controversial these days. Members leaving in droves. Showing a commitment to it isn’t a great thing anymore.

It’s only really since the Supreme Court judgement last year that a spotlight has been shone on the CIPD’s stance around related issues. So unless you have tried to change companies and roles recently, you wouldn’t have faced it.

@singthing what is CM exactly?

@BlackBean2023 could I please ask you what did you enjoy the most in your job? And what the least?

@MonicaGellerHyphenBing so do you think I can go straight into an entry HR level job with no experience at all, just my psychology degree?

Entry level, I think you could.

I've just left HR after 20 years. So burned out by it all.

But I did enjoy it for years.

You could and if you do that in a big co they might support you doing an apprenticeship.

I'm HRD level in a largish co, but my CEO doesn't believe in HR. I work one day a week and we have 3k employees. I have no "team", but I did manage to grab a guy who seemed good at recruitment (and who wasn't doing well with his then line manager) and he's now my recruitment manager and hive off a third of an Ops Admin person into HR, she's now doing an apprenticeship on my hours, so I don't get much work from her currently but she's doing really well with the studies (with a LOT of support from me, often on non work days) and I'm hoping I can get CEO to agree to make her full time HR when the studying ends next year.

But, anyway, that's all just to show that you can go in as one thing and create opportunities if you're good enough.

I freelance on the other days. If I was full time freelance my salary would be over c£150k. The actual salary for my employed job, if it was full time, is just under £100k.

Change management - it’s the theme of that post.

There are a lot of people trying to do this so be prepared for it to take a while.

HR isn’t particularly well paid unless you get to senior levels. Since you have a psychology degree you could do an MSc. in Occupational Psychology, Marketing (esp. AI/data driven marketing), UX design (which can be very lucrative and if I had my time over again I’d definitely do it) and of course teaching including in FE which, while not wildly lucrative, pays better than a lot of people think, and of course you get the good holidays.

Interesting.

Honestly, the bit I enjoyed the least was/is the people. The work shy, the lazy and the inept are protected by employment legislation to the same degree as those who genuinely need it.

I am a data, tech and policy nerd so have enjoyed transformative projects - that set me apart from lots of peers who would describe themselves as a ‘people person’.

@anne1985 I was a SAHM for 7 years. Previously I worked in the City, sales floor. No degree, no professional quals.

I decided my fastest way to professuonal quals was through HR. A local part-time job was advertised in 2003, entry level HR, 8k for half time hours. I got the job.

For two years I posted ads, produced recruitment packs, learnt to use the HR System (well), took on hourly paids and wrote procedures for them and pre-employment clearances.

They introduced a job for me, ywo grades up, as Assistant Adviser. I had to go full-time and get an au-pair but they agreed to sponsor my PG Dip in HRM. It was tough. I went to college 2pm to 9pm one day a week and had to do about 5 hours study pw and make-up my hours. But I did it, alongside: house, husband and two dc. God help my 20 something staff who did it when their mum cooked their dinner and did their ironing and whinged.

I worked my way through Adviser, Senior Adviser. I moved to another organisation in the public sector nine years after starting. Then worked my way up to Director of Service, and added MCIPD then FCIPD.

My specialist area is ER - unions, tribunals, change but am responsible for the department and all its functions.

I earn about £120k, public sector, and work about 50hpw.

Worth it, but I worked very hard and bit my tongue many times. I approach it commercially due to my earlier career.

Numeracy is very important to be able to go all the way, alongside good project management, analytical skills and managing expectations.

In HR twenty-odd (sometimes very odd, lol) years. Director level, chartered Fellow. My opinion would be don’t bother with a Masters if you have no actual HR experience. Up against people for jobs who have experience but no Masters, the people with experience will get the interview every time. Go for something more practical, and maybe focus on a specific area of HR you find interesting. With the psychology quads you have, could you do something in wellbeing, or engagement. I’m public sector, and EDI is very important here too. I love HR but it has got harder since Covid ime. You need to be seriously resilient.

Quite, some of Cheese’s decisions have been massively questionable.

But do you have a link to your claim about 10%? I haven’t seen that data anywhere.

It’s not a published stat. It’s very much anecdata from my built-over-20-years network. Seems that people trying to move around finding it much harder to get even sideways moves, and much moreso than those without. Few years back you could get £20k-30k per jump easily. Not so now.

Can you get a job as an HR assistant to get some experience, or does the course include a placement?
Practically, if you have no experience you will go in on an entry-level salary. This is the problem with career changes.

What are you basing that on? I work in a very large HR team and we pride ourselves on using AI to help us do our jobs but it’s definitely not going to lead to job losses. Our recruitment team for example will never be replaced by AI. Contrary to popular belief on MN we use humans to screen every single application and deal with every single issue. I do wish people would stop scaremongering about AI. It’s a tool! Instructed by humans.

Interesting.

I’ve not seen the same thing.

My most recent jump took me to £160k and that was after securing FCIPD. Think most of my 25yr+ network are the same in terms of being able to get decent increases.

So anecdotally, I’d still see Fellowship as a big advantage. Definitely seeing the requirement for a minimum of Chartered for most senior vacancies these days.

@BuffaloCauliflower it is CIPD accredited, although not sure if it’s L7. It is a full time PG course so I assumed so. I might be wrong

I haven’t had a job that required CIPD qualifications for about 25 years. I work at a senior level and haven’t been asked since my first job. I also don’t care if my team have it - it tells me nothing about your ability to do an HR job well

@HermioneWeasleythe problem is that I don’t have any experience at all, so I was hoping that doing a Master’s would give me a starting point and help me get the transition. In your opinion and from your experience, do you think doing a Masters would be a waste of time and I would be better off applying directly for entry-level roles instead?

@HermioneWeasleythe problem is that I don’t have any experience at all, so I was hoping that doing a Master’s would give me a starting point and help me get the transition. In your opinion and from your experience, do you think doing a Masters would be a waste of time and I would be better off applying directly for entry-level roles instead?

What do you enjoy doing, @anne1985?
You can get involved in all kinds of things as HR:
Recruitment and selection (incl psychometric testing)
Learning and development
Policy
Negotiations with unions
Dispute resolution (grievances, disciplinaries, complaints etc)
Culture change
Etc

I know of someone who fell into HR via a psychology degree. She specialises in recruitment of senior roles (she works for a large multinational company) and is particularly good at psychometric testing and headhunting internally and externally. She's well paid but more standard and generalist HR roles are not as well paid as finance roles for the equivalent experience and job title.

Like finance, HR lends itself to flexible working, specialisation, and progression - if you're in the right organisation.
However, also like finance, parts of HR are at risk of replacement by AI and/or contracting out and off-shoring

I don't think you need to do a masters. At this point, practical experience would help you more and obviously get your CIPD.