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Personnel Today

16 top tips for finding the right HR job

by Personnel Today 26 Sep 2002
by Personnel Today 26 Sep 2002

Finding
the ideal job in HR can sometimes seem an overwhelming task Fiona Brady offers
a checklist for the least stressful route to the right career move..

1.
Explore all options
within your current organisation first, are they going
to be implementing her? If a re-structure were to happen what opportunities may
come out of it? Too many walk away from uncertainty to miss opportunities of a
life time to be given to an outsider with no internal credibility.

2.
Improve relations whether you stay or go
. 
Have you really blown it with your boss or could a conscious week of ego
stroking and positive vibes put you back in the race.

3.
No race to be won.
Acknowledge and accept when there is no race for
promotion to be won as it can be soul destroying to sit out the ten year
sentence for good behaviour only to find out you could of achieved more in
five?

4.
Stick with what you really want, what you really really want and are good at?

Complete your CPD log to visilise where you are going and where you want to be,
putting pen to paper is often the first step in the process of committing to a
personal objectives.

5.
Contact old friends
and colleagues to remind you of how good you are and
easy to work  with. Not only will you
pick up knowledge it will refresh that flagging self esteem.

6.
Start with the end in mind
if you want to be a HR Manager, research the
role and check that it is the type of role and responsibilities you would enjoy
and be good.

7.
Wanting and hating.
Dodging political pressure can reduce quality of life
not improve it.

8.
Align your CV as you would a proposal
. Look on line prepare three CVs one
for industry one for position and one generalist to please all palates.

9.
Keep it factual explaining
what you really want not only will it rule you
out but will rule you in on the opportunities you are really interested in and
eliminate those ones for dire emergency.

10.
Read the advert!
Phone the agency to find out more it you think you can do
it and have the experience prepare a list of five benefits on why you should be
put forward highlighting them off the job description, email it with your CV.
You won’t always get a Yes but at least you will have been considered.

11.
Keep it to yourself
– Network with HR colleagues but do not tell them the
company you are about to get that guaranteed interview for unless you enjoy
stiffer competition.

12.
Survivor alliances?
Network within the CIPD branch and at events there may
not be immediate jobs but more alliances.

13.
Don’t wait for a job to come to you
go out and find the company you have
always fancied working for through referral, press or feedback from friends and
family. Speculative applications do work it is all part of an agency toolkit.

14.
Why wait for a crisis until you look for a job?
Be resilient keep up activity
levels on job hunting once a month even if you are having a good run as it
could be the right opportunity at the wrong time.

15.
Be careful of spurious recruiters?
How often have you joined a company to
find lots of personal problems that were kindly not mentioned, inhumane
political enemies ready for their next victim or an over enthusiastic
organisation whom forgot to tell you that sales turnover has halved but staff
turnover has doubled. In fact in 1997 government figures showed that 70% of new
unemployed people had been made redundant in 
the first three months of employment.

16.
Go with your instinct.
Start as you mean to go on, listen to your inner
feelings, impressions its like any relationship if you look for the potential
rather than role you could end up divorcing yourself from the role.
Psychological contract can be band aided but can often be broken with the
mistrust of misunderstanding never to be repaired.

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Fiona
Bradyis a recruitment consultant at hrhr Ltd www.hrhrpersonnelservices.com

 

Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

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