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Impossible with a capital 'i' to advance in the HR profession?

Andre

You have the CIPD 7, Associate Membership of the body, an MSc in International HRM, are considering a PhD in HR / Occupational Psychology and have four years experience working as an HR Administrator.

However, despite of all of that, you basically still can’t get above HR Administrator level to the next level or get an HR Advisor’s level role.

Part of the issue is that they don’t take on Trainee / Junior HR Advisor’s (or indeed Trainee / Junior HRBP’s) and you can’t get the necessary experience in an HR Administrator’s role to get the HR Advisor’s job.

You volunteer outside hours as an HR Advisor and as a CIPD Mentor, and attend all the events in your branch, but it still does not count or is officially recognised as a formal paid 9-5 role to make the cut.

It’s also one of those scenarios that it just does not ever happen for / to you how many applications you ever make, so are any of the following viable options to take instead:

(1) Come to terms with it and make a life long career as an HR Administrator instead, or as a Senior HR Administrator, aiming to be the very best that you can be at that;

(2) Pull completely out of the HR profession as a whole and change career sectors, professions and pathways, starting out again  from zero;

(3) Emigrate and see if you can get the role instead in another country in or outside the EU;

(4) Look at going self employed as an HR Consultant on the Peninsula model?

How would you personally deal with it if you faced a total brick wall blockage that despite your very best efforts, you just could not vertically progress, get on or up in the HR profession as a whole past HR Administrator?

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  • Hi Andre

    I think your issue is actually quite common.

    There are a lot of interesting opinions and advice here. Are you still employed as an administrator somewhere? Have you had discussions with your manager(s) about getting involved in non admin work? Have you considered project work where you could stretch yourself? Is there a way you could be mentored where you are now to help you build on your skills to help you make the transition into a broader HR role?

    In terms of studying I would say a PhD is not necessary unless you really want to pursue the academic route out of personal interest.

    If you are not working in HR admin at the moment I would suggest you try to find a role where you could get involved with initiatives outside the admin arena (or that are connected to it).

    I have worked overseas on and off for the last 15 years and was originally found by someone on LinkedIn and recruited for my change management experience and my qualifications were not actually that relevant. It came out of the blue so I was lucky there.

    Nowadays there are a lot of central services functions around that process the administrative stuff we need to have in organisations but often they also have HR advisors based centrally and working with different parts of the business. Getting in somewhere like that and clearly stating your desire to develop and progress might be an opportunity for you to build on your experience to date.

    Certainly discussing what you would like in appraisal and development discussions is an important issue. At the very beginning of my career I worked in finance functions but was studying my IPM diploma as I was interested in HR and worked part-time in a personnel function. At my appraisal I told my manager about my interests and she arranged for me to have a career interview with a senior HR person who assessed me and we worked together to get me a job in personnel as soon as was possible - it was a small personnel team but patience and finishing my diploma all helped.

    Try to stay positive and keep going. It's a marathon not a sprint!

    I wish you luck.
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  • Hi Andre

    I think your issue is actually quite common.

    There are a lot of interesting opinions and advice here. Are you still employed as an administrator somewhere? Have you had discussions with your manager(s) about getting involved in non admin work? Have you considered project work where you could stretch yourself? Is there a way you could be mentored where you are now to help you build on your skills to help you make the transition into a broader HR role?

    In terms of studying I would say a PhD is not necessary unless you really want to pursue the academic route out of personal interest.

    If you are not working in HR admin at the moment I would suggest you try to find a role where you could get involved with initiatives outside the admin arena (or that are connected to it).

    I have worked overseas on and off for the last 15 years and was originally found by someone on LinkedIn and recruited for my change management experience and my qualifications were not actually that relevant. It came out of the blue so I was lucky there.

    Nowadays there are a lot of central services functions around that process the administrative stuff we need to have in organisations but often they also have HR advisors based centrally and working with different parts of the business. Getting in somewhere like that and clearly stating your desire to develop and progress might be an opportunity for you to build on your experience to date.

    Certainly discussing what you would like in appraisal and development discussions is an important issue. At the very beginning of my career I worked in finance functions but was studying my IPM diploma as I was interested in HR and worked part-time in a personnel function. At my appraisal I told my manager about my interests and she arranged for me to have a career interview with a senior HR person who assessed me and we worked together to get me a job in personnel as soon as was possible - it was a small personnel team but patience and finishing my diploma all helped.

    Try to stay positive and keep going. It's a marathon not a sprint!

    I wish you luck.
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