If we were to take a quick poll among SHRM’s 250,000 members and ask… did you choose HR, or did you fall into HR as a career? I wonder what the breakdown in responses would be. What’s your guess?
Like a lot of other HR pros I know, I fell into HR. Here’s the quick version of my story. In college, I wanted an “office” job to get exposure to the business world. It just so happened that I found a part-time job for a healthcare company doing admin work for their HR team. The position evolved and grew over time and then four years later, I was in a generalist role. I would say that classifies as falling into HR. I’ve chosen to stick with it though.
In thinking about “falling” into HR though – I started to wonder… why do so many HR people fall into this career? And maybe more importantly, why HR is so easy for people to fall into? Taking a quick Twitter poll on the topic, some interesting comments came through including these included here…
Good stuff (And see! The lovely things you can learn through Twitter! I love using Twitter for a call and response…). You might ask yourself why we should even care about this issue in the first place; that’s fair. Here’s my argument – it absolutely matters that people constantly fall into HR, or rather, they don’t choose HR, for two reasons -
- HR’s not seen as interesting enough, it’s not seen as attractive
enough, and it’s not viewed as a rewarding enough path for people to pursue en mass. (And rewarding from a monetary perspective, too…)
- HR related responsibilities are carelessly handed over to a seemingly responsible and organized person who has demonstrated an ability to manage process and pays attention to details… or who is silly enough to be willing to take on some new “high level” admin responsibilities.
Ugh. HR can be easy to manage and do at times – even I’ll admit that. This isn’t science so much as I think it’s art… but that doesn’t mean anyone can and should do it, right?. I wrote about a similar theme a while ago when we were interviewing HR intern candidates and the disappointment I felt with HR not being the career of choice for these candidates. I know the HR profession has some image issues… but could part of the solution be that we stop letting people fall into HR?
It might be a little hypocritical of me to say it, I realize this… but what if we continued working towards improving the profession and the caliber of our own talent… and really worked toward making it a career of choice, and we ourselves were a bit more choosy about who we let in? Or maybe I’m just dreaming again… but it’s something I’ve been thinking about of late. Hit us in the comments and share your thoughts. Did you fall into HR? And why is HR so easy to fall into? Are things changing for the better though?
I was initially pushed into HR. I had applied for an Accounting position that was also a payroll specialist position. I asked the CFO if we could move the payroll position to somewhere else because I had no desire to do payroll; it was small company. The CFO, not surprisingly, said no take it as is or leave it. So I took it. I tell people for me payroll was a gateway drug, one hit of it and I was hooked and looking for something stronger. Five years later and I’m a full fledged addict. I love HR and I’ve made a choice to make a career out of it. Having attended college specifically for HR and met some of the other students in the same courses, I can agree with you Jessica, it is sad to see those are not cut out for it. I could almost pick the ones that wouldn’t be back next semester, those with a passion for the field stood out; those that were doing it because they thought it would be easy struggled. I think it’ll be up to those that are currently in the field to help ‘the newbie’s’ evolve into stars or show them they aren’t cut out for HR.
That was much shorter in my head….
I started off my career in HR in Labor Relations in a Steel Mill in Youngstown Ohio. My degree was in Labor Relations, which was the predecessor to HR. Growing up, HR and Labor Relations was where all the action was and still is. Just try to get a job without the great people in HR to pave the way. HR professionals are the highway to all the key decision makers, when they are motivated. Perhaps we just need to have HR people be more motivated and see how influential they can be?
I chose HR as my career choice, well second choice. A long time ago I was an intern at National Semiconductor in the industrial recreation group. We were asked where else would our skills would work. I had a business minor and had some assignments in employee relations, so I chose to stay in HR. I do not care for those who “fall in” and do nothing to educate themselves in the areas of HR. I agree it is more an art than science but to be effective and affective you need to know about compliance and handling employee issues.
I am one of those “rare” HR people who chose HR straight out of college some 20+ years ago !! It was the best thing that ever happened to me professionally.
I loved the article and know that the majority of my peers “fell into HR.” I wish they could see that it is one of the few professions that truly does evolve. The challenges we face now are vastly different than the workplace landscape offered even 5 years ago !!
Would really like to see HR professionals be like Jessica (and some great others that I know) get people passionate about what HR does and how it can be integrated throughout organizations.
Would also love to see people choose this great profession intentionally !! They will only benefit from it !!
Believe it or not, it doesn’t just happen in HR. I fell into IT more than 10 years ago. One of the biggest problems with “falling into” a career path is what you have to do when you finally figure out what you want to do when you grow up.
I’ve been building HR applications and working with HR people for a good portion of my career. I’ve learned a lot about HR along the way and I love what HR does! That’s why I keep finding ways to work with them. It’s also why I go out of my way to work my training department every chance I get.
I may not have fallen into an HR career, but how do you worm your way in after you’ve spent a long time in the career you did fall into?
I actually wanted to be a recruiter/scout when I was young when I knew I didn’t have the athletic ability and I saw the General Manager for the Washington Redskins at the time, Charlie Casserly worked as an intern with the Redskins and 20 years later, became the GM with the team. Casserly was my inspiration to be a GM in DC sports.
Later on, I discover that a GM job in sports is 24/7/365 a year job, so I was exploring other options. Then, in my junior year in college, my career counselor forward me to this SHRM group and then I realize I can forward my dream job as a GM to other organizations.
In a sense, I love HR in a more indirectly way and it took some years to realize you can be a GM with a company…without the long hours and phones ringing every minute.
I think times are a-changing. There is major factor that may be about to change this chose or be chosen career: the recession.
The assumption here is people get into HR at administrative/entry level roles that don’t require a lot of HR-specific skills. In Canada we have lots of folks taking HR in school who are now looking for jobs. With the recession, applications for each HR entry level role job has just shot up to 100-200 applications per job. Who is more likely to get pushed to the top of the resume pile? The ones with a desire to be in HR and the education.
And for the record, I chose HR.
Short answer – NO. But as I pointed out on the Maine HR Cafe @ http://mainehrcafe.com/2009/04/25/falling-into-hr/ not all falling is down with gravity. We should look at HR careers as an advancement upward, not and never a descent.
To quote China Gorman’s SHRMcoo tweet on this post, “@jessica_lee’s post at http://tinyurl.com/3ofsud validates the case for #SHRM’s current work with academia, standards and certification.”
Remember this, most folks fall forward with momentum. We need to welcome them into HR, work with academia, develop standards, and advance certification into needed and necessary licensure.
What have you done to advance our collective today?
I definitely fell into HR and made my share of mistakes as a result. I would like to see the quality of HR pros increase, even if it means preventing someone like who I was from having an opportunity.
Here are a few suggestions:
1. Require certification at your organization from candidates and existing staff (and stick with it).
2. Create more school based HR programs at the high school and college level. Make them competitive courses which require our best and brightest students to work hard for their degrees.
3. Support organizations that support HR. Too often when we fall into these roles because it’s the job that no one wants to do. So we should be applauded, recognized, and rewarded for doing it (and doing it well). If it’s not happening, find a better place to work and make sure other HR pros don’t make your mistake.
I absolutely fell UP into HR. I’ll explain: I majored in Communications in college (insert joke here), mostly because I wasn’t entirely sure what it was I wanted to do for a career. Somehow, during my college years, I was given a few internships not in HR, but in Marketing. Naive college student as I was, I figured I’d give the field a shot being how I had some experience in it, limited as it was. After college I worked in a Marketing position for two years. After year one, I realized I HATED Marketing. Not good. So, I did my research and took some career evaluations, and lo and behold, HR kept showing up. I left Marketing in the dust, and I celebrated my one-year anniversary with my company’s HR department back on March 31st. As windy as the road was, I’m happy to see where it led me.
Unfortunately HR is seen as a cost center and the supply of talent within the HR field expands and contracts with the broader economy. While the notion of a separated and distinctly autonomous Sourcing Function was a bubble per se’, I would say that HR is more like a balloon – as the economy is strong, there is more air let in; as the economy is poor, air is pushed out. As a result, HR does not (and will arguably never) attract “top talent” in the first place. Plus, did I mention there is little to no money in HR unless you’re at the VP level? In fact, most VPs don’t earn as much as a mid-career Executive Recruiter.
Personally, I think Organizational Development is now where it’s at. Well, unless you’re handling critical/pivotal Talent Acquisition. If that’s the case, then you should be safe . . . however, even then, the need for supremely talented Talent Mgmt Pros falls during rough times.
I fell into HR. Right out of school, I was working for a state organization recruiting volunteers into the organization and doing PR as well (Without a PhD, you do what you can with that Psych degree)
I thought one day, what if I was paying people and recruiting them? I mean, these people worked for me for FREE. (see bronzed lightbulb on mantle that “went off”)
I became a recruiter in both the agency and corp side, and love what I do. Sometimes it feels like the opposite of rocket science, but most days I know based on my social nature, my need for competition and my Type A personality, that this was the perfect “fall” for me. Viva la Recuiters & HR!
One reason HR might get a bad rap is the difficulty getting into the field. I love the HR/OD world and have been a trainer for the last 6 years. I am also currently trying to move into HR. It seems that some people in HR have a tough time spotting transferable skills from other departments and thus miss out on opportunities for top talent.
Like I said, I have 6 years of training and an MBA with a focus on HR/OD and have been offered several jobs outside of HR. I have CHOSEN HR as my career path, however, and have noticed that other fields (marketing, operations, finance) do a better job spotting and utilizing talent rather than worrying about if someone has done this exact job for a different company for last 5 years.
We always speak of HR as a partner with other business segments. Maybe we can learn from them like they learn from us. Then, it will seem a little less like a teacher/student and a little more like a partnership.
I have been trying to get back into HR for several years. Now that I have a MBA with a concentration in HR it seems to be harder not easier.
Big part of HR is being able to deal with confidential information, being punctual and have great intrest in people and in what is happening in the world and being eager to learn. All skills that you cannot really learn, but will show when you start working.
Still I think it is important to have as business eduction background to be a good HR advisor