What does a human resources (HR) officer do?

In this episode, we chat with Lauren Pickles, an HR systems assistant at Jisc. After completing two weeks work experience in human resources aged 16, Lauren went on to study sociology at the University of Bristol before landing a HR role. Listen for advice on how to further your knowledge of HR systems and how to enter the industry

Participants

• Emily Slade - podcast producer and host, Prospects
• Lauren Pickles - HR systems assistant, JISC

Transcript

Lauren Pickles: The work is constantly fresh, but the work is constantly fresh. So you're learning all the time. But I think, well, sometimes some weeks I think that as a negative and then some weeks I'm like, oh, this is great. I'm continually learning in this role.

Emily Slade: Hello and welcome back to Future You, the podcast brought to you by graduate careers experts, Prospects. I’m your host Emily Slade and in this episode we see what it takes to work in human resources.

Lauren Pickles: Hi. My name's Lauren. I'm 23 years old, based in Bristol. I've worked at Jisc now for two and a half years. Currently a HR systems and MI assistant, but I've also worked in HR operations as well. I'm studying for my level five CIPD at the moment, which is the like intermediate HR qualification. And I'm also a network co chair for the LGBTQIA+ network.

Emily Slade: What's CIPD?

Lauren Pickles: So it's the professional body for HR. You're gonna test me here. I'm not gonna be able to Chartered Institute of people and development Personnel and Development I'm pretty sure that's it.

Emily Slade: That sounds right, yeah i'll allow it. Nice. So did you go to university?

Lauren Pickles: I did go to university. I went to the University of Bristol and studied sociology. And I finished in 2022.

Emily Slade: Could you study HR at university?

Lauren Pickles: You can. So like I said, I'm doing the CIPD level five at the moment. You can do them integrated with degrees. So there's loads of different HR systems and management courses that you can do at undergrad and Masters level. So that definitely is an option. And I do know people who have done it at university and then come straight in. So there are loads of different routes you can take. It doesn't have to be you get experience in HR. You then go and do the qualification. You can start with the qualification and then come into HR.

Emily Slade: It's kind of nice as well, though, that you can have a foundation of something else and still get into HR.

Lauren Pickles: Yeah, exactly. So I feel like my degree with sociology has sort of helped with that. Specifically with diversity and inclusion, it's part of HR. It really, well, I think it's the biggest part that links in with my degree, so it's been really helpful there to see links between stuff that you've learned.

Emily Slade: Brilliant.

Lauren Pickles: I did HR, you know they made everyone do, like, work experience in sixth form? I worked in the HR department two weeks, and really enjoyed it, but didn't really think that this was where I was going to end up. I love my parents dearly, but when I finished university, or was nearly finished, I didn't want to go back to living at home. I really liked the independence from university. So I was looking for jobs. This one came up, and I thought, well, this does sort of align, well definitely does align with my degree, because sociology can apply to literally anything. Yeah. So yeah, I saw the job come up, and it was just perfect timing really.

Emily Slade: What was the interview process like on that?

Lauren Pickles: Pretty straightforward. There was competency based questions, and then there was also, I want to say, a sort of quiz where they gave us tasks, and you basically had to, like, prioritise which tasks you would do first, and give an explanation for that.

Emily Slade: Was it specifically a graduate role?

Lauren Pickles: No, it was just an HR administrator role, was the one I was applying for. But I applied for it on Prospects, so I guess in that sense it was, it was targeted towards graduates.

Emily Slade: Yeah, nice. What does a day in the life of HR look like?

Lauren Pickles: Well, HR is so broad, so I'm in HR systems, but HR could be anything from employee relations to HR operations, which involves, like hiring employees and off boarding them, stuff like that. We also have learning and development our rewards team, talent team. So it's such a big like profession to work in. I specifically work in HR systems. So that's the management of our HR system Dayforce, and also to do with all employee data that we have. So my team works in an agile methodology, which is basically we work in two weeks sprints. So we'll get work well, we'll have a meeting, a sprint planning meeting at the start of the sprint, and assign out work for the whole two weeks. And essentially, as long as you get the work complete by the end of the two weeks, you're good to go. But it's really nice because it really helps with, like, prioritisation, you know what's coming up in the pipelines. So my day looks like going through my sprint board actions, deciding what today's priorities are going to be, planning that out in my calendar, and then we have a team meeting around like 9.15 I think it is just to discuss our progress from yesterday and what today is going to look like. And then for the rest of the day, I'm just working through my tasks.

Emily Slade: Nice, that's pretty cool. What hard skills do you rely on for your job?

Lauren Pickles: I would say knowledge of HR systems. So I worked as a HR administrator before I worked before I started as in the systems team, which gave me a real good background today, for so HR system which has definitely been really helpful, a very good transferable skill that I've got. So I'd say knowledge on HR systems, knowledge on other software, such as Excel and Microsoft Power BI, that's really helpful. And then just generally, like data analysts, like analysis, yeah, skills are helpful for the role.

Emily Slade: And what about soft skills?

Lauren Pickles: A lot of the things that come through, we have to often, like, deem the requirements for the data that we're providing. So you've got to speak to loads of different stakeholders. So communication is definitely one. And then I would also say prioritisation, because we obviously work in a two week sprint. You have to get everything done within the two weeks. So yeah, definitely being able to, like, prioritise your work and make sure that you hit those deadlines every two weeks.

Emily Slade: What's the best piece of advice you've ever been given?

Lauren Pickles: Best piece of advice? I'd say don't be afraid to ask questions. I think I found this when I first started, because I was pretty much, I had two weeks of experience in HR, so it was pretty little so I was finding myself asking a lot of questions to people who've been in the team for longer. And every time I would say, I'm so sorry, they'd be like, No, don't don't be sorry. Everyone goes through this stage, and they'd much prefer me asking a question than not asking, making a mistake and then asking them how to fix it. So yeah, just don't be afraid to ask questions, even though it does feel so awkward, constantly badgering someone, but it's just the best way to learn. Yeah, better in the long run.

Emily Slade: Yeah, and there's no such thing as a stupid question.

Lauren Pickles: Exactly.

Emily Slade: Love that. What's your favorite thing about working in HR?

Lauren Pickles: Oh, every day is different. I think that's what I really like. In the systems team or in the HR operations team. I've never had a boring day or where I've logged on and been like, oh, same old, same old. It's always different, fresh. You get to talk to a lot of different people. So yeah, I get to speak to people all across just that I probably wouldn't have been able to speak to otherwise. So getting to know about the business and stuff like that. But yeah, I would say it's just so varied what we do every day. When working in the HR operations team, you work behind the service desk, so answering any employee queries that come in. So every day, you're getting a flux of new things coming in, new people to help. So, yeah, just say the amount of variance there is in the work.

Emily Slade: And any cons?

Lauren Pickles: There's a lot of variants in the work, yeah. So there's always stuff to learn, which is obviously great. I found that specifically in this team, because a lot of our tasks come up through ad hoc requests. So you could see something once and then not see it again for a few years. Which means, yeah, which means that the work is constantly fresh, but the work is constantly fresh. So you're, can, you're you're learning all the time, yeah. But I think, well, sometimes some weeks I think that as a negative and then some weeks I'm like, Oh, this is great. I'm continually learning in this role. So little double edged sword. It's positive and negative.

Emily Slade: Yeah, that makes sense. Amazing. What advice do you have for someone that wants to enter the industry?

Lauren Pickles: There are so many resources available about HR, so I would say, definitely explore that the CIPD website have a lot of like, free articles resources available, which would be good to read. Networking. There's a Facebook group called HR Ninjas, which I absolutely love. And essentially, people put in questions about what they have coming up in their work, and people respond. And you get to see a lot of different perspectives to things. That's one of the biggest things I've learned about in HR, is, as long as you're within, like employment law standards, everyone can have varying opinions. So it's really interesting to go through and see what different people in the industry are thinking and opinions wise. So definitely say, utilise all of the resources that are out there get on LinkedIn, add loads of people get to see what they're doing. Just make the most of what you can really Yeah.

Emily Slade: What does progression look like for you?

Lauren Pickles: In my role specifically?

Emily Slade: Yeah

Lauren Pickles: Well, there are various different ways you can progress in HR. So there is the, quote, unquote, traditional route, where you can go from HR administration up to an advisor role, partnership team, and progress from there. But because there's so many different functions in HR, you can basically go any route you want to. I thought I was always going to follow this traditional path of administrator, advisor, but the systems role came up, and I'm having a great time. So you can go wherever you want in HR. That's what I've learned. And I've always asked colleagues in the team what their like career background looks like, and they always say the pretty much the same thing, everyone's career is going to look differently. And that's completely okay, because HR is so vast, so so vast, I think at the moment, just has been a great place for me to develop, because I started in one area of HR, I moved not to put myself up, but I have had quite a lot of career progression in the two and a half years I've been here. I started as an administrator, then I moved up to senior administrator, and now I'm in HR systems. So it's shown me this company has been a place where I can definitely grow and learn as well. They've, like, my qualification that I'm doing at the moment is an apprenticeship, and they've fully supported me doing that in my role, which has been really great

Emily Slade: like, financially supported it as well?

Lauren Pickles: Yeah.

Emily Slade: So you could see yourself staying in it for a while?

Lauren Pickles: Oh, yeah, for sure. This is my career. I think I'm gonna stay in, unless I win the lottery for the rest of my career.

Emily Slade: Yeah, amazing. Well thank you so much for your time today.

Lauren Pickles: Thank you.

Emily Slade: Thanks again to Lauren  for their time. For more information on HR and how to ge into it you can head to prospects.ac.uk. or check out the show notes below. If you enjoyed the episode feel free to leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Thank you as always for listening and good luck on your journey to future you.

Notes on transcript

This transcript was produced using a combination of automated software and human transcribers and may contain errors. The audio version is definitive and should be checked before quoting.

Find out more

• Read about being a human resources officer.
• Explore human resources jobs.
• Discover more about Lauren's role in HR.
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