How to make a career change into HR

If you value people, enjoy variety and are good at dealing with situations, HR could be a great career path for you.

And for people who are also mindful of job security and future career development, HR is not a bad bet – It is a growing and developing profession too!

As the below article describes, the HR profession grew 4 times faster than the UK workforce did over the last decade.

https://www.hrmagazine.co.uk/content/news/hr-profession-grew-four-times-faster-than-uk-workforce-in-past-decade/

However, as many will have experienced, it is extremely competitive to get into HR and unfortunately, getting the first break is often the hardest. If you are switching into HR from another career, then it can be particularly difficult.

The CIPD itself describes the common routes into the profession as being through apprenticeships, graduate programmes, or through volunteering.

https://www.cipd.org/uk/the-people-profession/careers/routes-into-profession/

And for those lucky enough to be in a position to volunteer, or to have clarity over their professional path at an early stage in their life, that is great.

But, where does that leave more experienced workers, who have identified HR as their path, later on in their career?

It is important for me to be clear at this stage, that helping people to make a career change into HR, is not something that we are able to do as a business commonly. But you are HR Recruiter I hear you say?

Yes we are, and as much as I would love to help people to make the switch into HR from other professions,  that is an important first take away for any reader of this piece. For anyone looking to move into HR for the first time, HR Specialist Recruitment agencies will unfortunately, unlikely be able to help you to do this.

Why?

Put simply, clients will not ask us to hire people without HR experience when they engage us to fill their vacancies. In today’s world, businesses come to HR recruitment agencies when they have made a conscious decision to spend a fee, because have a specific experience need, require hard to find HR skills, or, are wanting to invest in outsourcing a process that will deliver them the best HR experience and cultural match available to their role.

But, whilst it is not something that I can necessarily facilitate, I have worked with HR professionals for more than two decades, so I have some insight into how some have managed to switch into HR after gaining experience previously in other areas.

The first thing I would encourage people to do is to thoroughly consider whether a career change is feasible. It will involve an initial drop in earnings and  it will likely involve study. If it is planned, considered and the right thing for you to do then:

Study for the CIPD.

Most departments and employers will want their HR teams to have CIPD qualification, so broadly speaking, at whatever level, it is a good idea to study and get qualified. Applications to HR Administrator and Advisor roles are better received when someone is CIPD qualified. I have discovered that sometimes people make connections through their study groups which helps them too to land roles in the future. Completing the CIPD also demonstrates to an employer that you are truly invested in the career changed and are committed to your new path. Arguably it also gives you a level of technical understanding and theoretical base which will really help you to make the switch and perform well in interviews.

Focus your applications to SME’s.

Large corporations and blue chip businesses have often outsourced HR service functions and they have well developed graduate and apprentice schemes. This leads to a regular intake of new people into their departments. SME’s on the other hand do not typically have those programmes in place and are more likely to hire externally and not through a graduate or apprentice programme into their entry level up to advisor roles.

Transferring into a role that includes aspects of HR.

I have seen many people start their HR career by landing roles that involve HR aswell as other responsibilities in small business (office management, administration, facilities etc). As those SME’s, grow, that individual can develop in the HR area as the specialisms detach from each other. It should be noted that CIPD study as covered in point 1 is usually important here too.

Relating to the above two points, I am aware of several HR professionals in my network who secured their first HR roles after qualifying, landing stand alone and start up roles within small businesses.

At this point, a newly qualified HR professionals wider experience can often be really valued by the SME. Particularly if you have had team management, supervisory or leadership experience, the feeling is that handling things like recruitment, disciplinaries and grievances are potentially not as daunting to you as you will have had exposure from your previous roles.

Ask your current employer to make the switch into HR
It may seem obvious, but have you talked to your current employer about moving into HR? A large proportion of HR professionals made their first move into HR this way. If you are lucky enough to be in a business that has a department, make it known to your manager and the Head of the HR department that it is your wish.

And finally, how about recruitment as a stepping stone?

This one may come as a surprise, but I can’t escape the fact that a percentage of people working in HR, started their careers in Recruitment, often in recruitment consultancy. Recruitment consultancy seems to offer a good stepping stone into HR. It offers a good grounding in some aspects of employment law and gives you exposure to recruitment processes. It also typically gives you exposure to working with HR professionals as clients. Recruitment consultancy as a sector is also very good at giving people an opportunity and some firms have great training in place.  Of course there is the need to work to targets, and recruitment consultancy involves a lot of sales. But the communication skills and the commercial grounding that it offers, is a great base to then move on and be successful in internal talent acquisition and HR.

Aside from that, there is no magic solution – it is just about applying to as many things that you see as possible and developing a thick skin. Recognise that it will be competitive and hard so get as many applications going as you can.

When you get to interview stage it is well worth doing all you can to be prepared for that. HR teams look for people who have genuine insight into what HR work is about. Take any opportunity you can to talk to HR people, work shadow, volunteer etc just to get some insight and that precious first bit of experience. This does make a difference!

I hope that helps. I get asked the question a lot and it is hard, but focus on activity and keep on going!