Find Human Resources Schools near you.

Human Resources specialists are in demand! In a typical business, the human relations department takes care of handling the employee concerns, benefits, interviewing, recruiting, hiring, and management of the relationship between the employee and the company. Most companies prefer that their human resources staff graduate from human resources training and be certified in the field.

Within the human resources field, there are many opportunities to diversify and to work in different areas:

• Human resource generalists: work within small companies handling all of the human resource tasks.
• Director of human resources: often supervise a number of human resource areas including employment, recruitment, benefits, and interviewing.
• Employment and placement managers: are in charge of the finding, hiring, and placing of employees into departments in need of staff.
• Recruiters: spend time searching for job applicants and are able to promote the company to prospective employees.
• Labor relations manager: work with the staff and the corporation to implement fair labor relations practices and programs, and understand both labor law and collective bargaining protocols and trends.
• EEO officers and affirmative action coordinator: works with staff to investigate grievances, policies, and work on EEO reporting.

Many in human resources work in the benefits department of a company as compensation managers, working with the companies pay system, investigating the standard pay scale and comparing it to the various industries, and ensuring that employees are being paid fairly and within the law.

Another important position in the human resources field is the employee welfare manager. Again, this manager is trained to understand such things as occupational safety and health standards, staff counseling, career counseling, subsidies, and more. Many become training and development managers, and work in the field off staff training and development within a firm.

Human resource school graduates usually work a standard 40 hour work week. Some work travel is involved from time to time, as managers may need to attend meetings and conferences from time to time.

Training in human resources is important, with many education programs focusing on psychology, economics, statistics, business administration, labor law, computer usage, organizational development, human services, and more. A graduate with a basic degree in human resources may find themselves advancing their degree and/or taking further courses in order to advance their careers further, such as earning a Certified Employee Benefits Specialist (CEBP) certificate, or a Certified Compensation Professional (CCP).

In 2006 there were approximately 868,000 jobs in human resources in the United States, with approximately 9 out of 10 jobs in the private sector. The U.S. government employed 13% of all human resources managers and specialists. Between 2006 and 2016 this field is expected to grow by 17%. (Source: United States Department of Labor)