Manchester Metropolitan University Business School launched the Centre for Professional Personnel and Development at today.
The new centre, specialising in people management and development opened by two leading HR professionals: David Fairhurst, McDonald’s vice-president of people, and Geoff Armstrong, director-general of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.
The centre will link HR academics and professionals in the North West and offer training, continuing professional development, consultancy and short courses.
Fairhurst, who will chair the centre’s advisory board, said: “For most organisations today the primary source of competitive advantage is people, but, unlike machinery and processes, they must be inspired and developed and treated with respect and dignity.
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“Just as engineers, process specialists and IT professionals have had their turn at the forefront of organisational change, it is now HR professionals who hold the key to success or failure. That’s why it is so important to build links between academia and the profession.”
The centre is lead by Sue Shaw, head of the business school’s human resource management and organisational behaviour division.
