Overview Working in Personnel Roles
I would love to tell you that I had a sudden urge years ago to work in Personnel and it was my blinding desire to enter this industry. But I'd be lying. I got into Personnel quite by accident.
I'd been temping for several years and my agency had placed me with a very nice company where someone from Personnel was due to go on maternity leave and I was asked if I would like to cover the role.
I was given some on the job training to help me get into the role. I had a natural affinity with picking up new IT systems, so I easily caught on to how to use the Personnel database. It needed to be kept up to date with employee names, addresses, dates of birth, national insurance numbers, bank details, next of kin details, department, salary, job titles, etc. Keeping accurate employee information on the database was only part of the job.
I was sent on a three-day course on Personnel Administration to give me a more formal introduction to the world of Personnel. There was a good mixture of people on the course, some with little Personnel experience (similar to myself) and some with 6 12 months experience in the industry and of varying ages as well as from small, medium and large organisations.
I learned a lot of things that hadn't been covered on my on-the-job training and was raring to get back to the office and put it into practice. One of the most important things covered on the course was the need for discretion. Knowing all of your colleagues' salary details, dates of birth, etc, you need to be very careful about keeping this information to yourself and not discuss any of it with your fellow colleagues under any circumstances, no matter how good pals you might be with them. I enjoyed the responsibility that came with the role but also sometimes it was quite demoralising to know how much more money your colleagues were earning in other departments.
WHAT DOES ONE DO?
I'm listing below some key areas of responsibility a Personnel Officer would typically have and then below that. Some of the tasks towards the bottom of the list are ad hoc duties which may or not be assigned to the Personnel department.
Depending on the size of the company some of the tasks might be carried out by a more junior Personnel team member, say a Personnel Assistant or Personnel Administrator.
1. Answering queries from management and staff on pay and benefits2. Be fully conversant with Employment Law3. Advise management on staffing issues4. Issuing of company handbook and/or procedures5. Recruitment process from placing adverts in press or with agencies to carrying out the actual interviews6. Issuing offer letters to potential employees and issuing contracts of employment7. Absence monitoring8. Ensuring all personal details are recorded accurately, including bank details9. Planning induction for new staff, sometimes delivering induction sessions10. Recording details of staff training and development11. Recording grievances12. Advising on disciplinary action13. Payroll administration14. Developing Personnel and corporate strategies with senior management15. Highlighting staff retention issues with senior management16. Keeping diary of Personnel Manager or Director17. Processing expenses18. Company car administration19. Issuing of staff ID cards20. Arranging travel for senior Personnel staff
Some of the above could be dealt with by a senior member of Personnel such as interviews for senior managers, developing corporate strategies, etc.
WHAT DOES IT PAY? (NB: salaries quoted in Pounds Sterling)
Jobs in Personnel can pay quite well depending on where you're based and the size of company you're working for.
For a Personnel Officer, I would say you can expect to earn a starting salary of about 18,000 up to 30,000 or more depending on your experience and qualifications.
For a Personnel Assistant salaries can start as low as 12,000 and can go up to 23,000.
For a Personnel Manager, you can expect to earn anything from 22,000 up to 45,000 or even more.
The above quoted salaries are estimates only and (as I said previously) can vary depending on the location and size of the company.
WHAT QUALIFICATIONS DO YOU NEED?
Well when I got into Personnel in the early 90s it was somewhat easier to enter the field and work your way up to a certain level before having to take industry specific qualifications. Nowadays it's a different story. In an ever increasingly competitive field where people really have to know their stuff (what with Employment Law being so very important, you really have to be careful you don't end up at Employment Tribunals every other day) more and more companies are reluctant to take people on in Personnel roles unless they have a relevant qualification.
A good qualification to gain to get you into Personnel is the CIPD (Chartered Institute of Personnel Development) Certificate of Personnel Practice. You can do this part time evenings or day release depending on what your local universities are offering. This course covers several key elements essential in Personnel and HR, such as: Recruitment and Selection, Training, Performance Reviews (more commonly known as appraisals) and Employment Law. Qualifications required for Personnel or Human Resource Practitioners obviously vary depending on which country you're based in (the qualifications I've mentioned apply to the UK).
I did the course several years ago and attended evening classes 2 evenings a week. Even though I passed with flying colours, I have to admit it was hard-going. There's a lot of reading to do on top of attending college twice a week and various assignments to do as well to pass the course. You have to do presentations to the rest of the class throughout the course, and it's quite daunting if you're painfully shy and get palpitations at the thought of speaking in public. Saying that, we had a girl in our class who was painfully shy at the start of the course and by the end she had come out of her shell a great deal.
For more information on Personnel related qualifications and courses see www.cipd.co.uk
TO CONCLUDE
In my role in Personnel no two days were ever the same. You could spend a good part of one day updating the database with lots of amendment forms and one day processing payroll, another day dealing with lots of telephone queries about a new procedure which has been rolled out. One day you could be having a confidential chat about the personal problems of an employee which has led to their performance levels being lower than usual or someone being pulled up for consistently poor time-keeping. You day could be spent sending out reject letters to people who've applied for a job who've not been selected for interview, or issuing letters to people inviting them to come in for an interview, or re-arranging diaries as people have canceled interviews and want to reschedule.
All in all, I'd rate being a Personnel Officer as a high 8 out of 10 when it comes to job satisfaction. It's busy and fulfilling and can lead on to bigger and better things. It's not one of those jobs where you can get away with saying "That's not in my job description!" but then again these days, I'd be surprised to see anyone refusing to do any reasonable tasks requested by their line manager.
For more information on Personnel issues here are a few sites you can have a look at:
www.personneltoday.comwww.hrmguide.co.ukwww.hrzone.co.ukwww.humanresourcesmagazine.comwww.employeebenefits.co.uk
I hope the above has given you some insight into what a Personnel Officer role involves. Maybe it's even made you want to work in the industry?
