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LettersThe HR profession

HR will suffer because of its refusal to acknowledge transferable skills

by Personnel Today 8 May 2007
by Personnel Today 8 May 2007

Like Warren Broadbent (Letters, Personnel Today, 10 April), I, too, am finding it difficult to find work in a different sector.


I was a principal HR officer for a local authority and, while I also believe my skills and experience are transferable, I have been informed on a number of occasions that employers do not feel I have the necessary experience as I have not worked in manufacturing dealing with shop-floor employees. Do these organisations think they are the only ones with difficult employees or a highly unionised, militant environment?


I defy some of these private sector HR professionals to negotiate with militant waste management operatives (dustmen to the uninitiated) or 4,000-plus employees in a works department with any number of different terms and conditions, and four different trade unions – and then not feel aggrieved that, because of ‘sector snobbery’, their skills are not considered transferable.


Lorraine Smales, chartered member of the CIPD

Personnel Today
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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