Working in HR? If you could start again, would you?

I can think of nothing polite to say to that Steve. But thank you, and all the colleagues who share their own knowledge and insights here.

Damn, that thing you got in your eye yesterday seems to have migrated to mine......

@Peter - now I know who to get in touch with for future maintenance of my 1965 Fender Princeton tube amp.....
:-)

I am another one of the "HR chose me" team but I do not regret it in the slightest. If I had known earlier what HR really means and entails, I would have chosen my career path differently though and studied something HR-related right away. Even if "common sense" seems to be the main skill to guide you through all the HR challenges.

It's fascinating to see how the role and perception of HR has changed over the years.

Ah, yes! A sound like no other, and can warm your hands at a cold gig too! :-)

I used to have a twin reverb solid-state and a Vox AC30 tube, unfortunately traded both many years ago. 'Seemed like a good idea at the time :-) Now use a little Champion solid-state. Not the same, but not a bad sound for home and practice. Miss the sound of the Strat' through the AC30 though: That was a match made in heaven (or somewhere) :-)

I always wanted to work in HR and feel very lucky that I managed to get a 'Personnel Trainee' role in retail not long after I left High School without having to go to university first. My managers at that role were fantastic and really made me enjoy working in HR.

Looking back, I wish I hadn't been so demanding - I wanted to do everything right away, I needed experience first!

Having only worked in HR for a few years, I am really grateful that I can always look through these discussions and read some really good advice and read different opinions from people much more experienced than I am (especially now that I am standalone!).

Like many others, I just happened to drift into HR and liked it and stayed and got given more responsibility and joined CIPD and suppose did well and largely enjoyed it all.

So part of me emphatically says ‘ no regrets ‘ but part of me does speculate about what might have been.

With hindsight / knowing what I know now but didn’t all those years ago, I think I’d have done okay in academia or the law and perhaps had to endure far less work-related stress. My late mother always said I was far too sensitive to be happy as a ‘Personnel Manager’ and with hindsight again she was probably at least partially right - she was very clever and perceptive herself and rather well-placed to know about such things.

Having to be instrumental in changing - and very often (eg via the incessant redundancies) shattering the lives of so many colleagues never came easy to me and took its toll in all kinds of ways. But at the same time I suppose I enjoyed it and derived great satisfaction from getting pretty adept at damage-limitation in this regard. However, in reality / if truth be known I was probably happier as a solitary thinker, planner and problem-solver but seemed always to get caught in, swept along and buffeted by the turbuent currents of industrial and workplace change.

In danger maybe of killing the plant by pulling it out of the pot and trying to inspect its roots, so I’ll stop rambling now....

"Even if "common sense" seems to be the main skill to guide you through all the HR challenges.

It's fascinating to see how the role and perception of HR has changed over the years."

You are so right, Debora. Common sense, empathy, consistency...

Yes, Nicola... I know many many people here use the forums to validate or get a different perspective on their own views - especially those of you in standalone roles.

I'll actually be showcasing our community to a few dozen CIPD colleagues later today. I'll tell them how the discussions often call out the worst in employers... but bring out the best of HR!

20,000+ posts later... the rest is community history. Thank you, David.

I do not regret getting into Personnel but with hindsight I would have been better off financially had I become an Accountant or a solicitor.

Hopefully I would have escaped finance and got into HR later on and I would hope I developed an Employment practice rather than any other area of the law, albeit I suspect some partners in legal practices make more money than their partners specialising in employment law.