HR - what's in it for me?
To consider the career options for the HR professional we must first understand what is HR? This is not as simple a question as one would first imagine. Over the last 40 years, the administrative and industrial relations brief of the "old school" Personnel Manager, has been broadened to a "new school" of HR professional (the Institute of Personnel and Development gained Chartered status on 1st July 2000). This "new school" is a very broad school indeed with a much wider range of skills, influence and presence across all organisations of any size.
Overall Human Resources Management can be defined as a "strategic and coherent approach to the management of an organisations most valued assets - the people working there who individually and collectively contribute to the achievement of its goals" (from A Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice - Michael Armstrong - 2000 revised edition).
