If you have read my previous blog you will know that I am currently living and learning in LONDON! It is a very exciting place full of wonder and magic that has opened my eyes to the possibilities. The possibilities of being an information professional and not working in a library. It kind of just happened, I didn’t mean for it but I am not sorry. My main career aspirations have always been to do something that I like (such as organising) and to help and interact with people. Because of this when I first started my course in Information and Library studies and started working on the L&R Desk at Gardens Point Library I thought I had found IT. The perfect job for me. But as I left that job behind and went exploring the world outside of Brisbane I discovered another job that met my career aspirations to a T. Human Resources.

I have been working in this department as a HR Data Administrator for nearly 10 months now and LOVE it. Not only do I work with amazing people but I get to utilise my information skills on a daily basis, organise a lot of information AND help all the employees that work for the company. This new career direction is seriously testing my loyalty to libraries, but is that a bad thing? I don’t think so.

From working in HR I have learnt a million and one new skills and really developed my information skills. Some of the new skills I have developed and continue to develop are –

HR Generalist skills –

• Developing knowledge of  HR, what it is, what is does and what the UK employee policies are regarding: sickness & absence, disciplinary, recruitment, maternity & paternity and long service etc
• Helping employees with queries including payroll, benefits and recruitment
• Liaising with management regarding their staff and their HR needs
• Providing support with the disciplinary process including note taking and advice of disciplinary procedures
• Supporting the HR Manager and others of the HR team

Recruitment skills

• Assisting the Recruitment Specialist with recruitment administration including CV sifting, communicating with candidates & organising new starters
• Successfully implementing new recruitment procedures including onboarding & scheduling centres as per company guidelines in order to streamline the recruitment process
• Keeping employees up to date with current internal vacancies
• Assisting in interviews and assessment centres
• Note taking for interviews and assessment centres
• Managing background screenings on new starters and liaising with third party company who runs them

Administrative skills

• Inputting all new starter information into data base accurately
• Maintaining all employee files and keeping them up to date
• Carrying out regular audits on employee files to keep information up to date and compliant
• Managing other employee databases relating to online STAR system
• Inputting large quantities of comments onto STAR system
• Managing and inputting any employee changes including leavers onto data base
• Creating documents and letters for employees and their files

Information programs used successfully

• Ciphr – employee database including all payroll information
• Taleo – online recruitment system that allows you to interact with candidates via email
• ADP Freedom – records employee sickness & absence and allows access to payslips
• STAR – online employee benefit scheme
• Agenda – online screening system

Working as a HR Data Administrator has really opened me up to a world of new information and what I can do with it. I utilise and store information for the business everyday whether that be paper filing it or inputting the data into one of the many HR systems we use. I can definitely see how important (and confidential!) this information is to the  business and that by inputting it correctly we are able to track employee records accurately. This is important for employees so they can see what training they have done, their career progression and get correspondence from the company in a timely manner. I can also see how it is important for the business as it allows the high ups (directors and general managers) to see who they employ, how many people they employ, track their departments sickness and other things that affect the business. The information that I help create and maintain is important and can affect employees and the business so I must be accurate!

Whilst in this role I have undertaken various projects, all to do with information management. One of the main ones was a file audit on all of our employees proof of right to work in the UK. By creating a list of all current employees who did not have a passport noted on the employee system, Ciphr, and going through their files I was able to identify which employees we either needed to update our database with the information within their file or contact the employee so they could provide us with their proof of right. I then contacted via letter all the employees who needed to provide their proof of right, advised them of what they had to show me and recorded and filed the information they provided me. I had to carefully manage the information coming in to make sure that I received the correct and valid documents from ALL of the people I needed.  I also had to liaise with managers in order to get the correct information on time. It was a big task with over 100 people to be contacted and managed however I successfully completed it.

From working in HR I can really see how an information professional could fit in and really contribute to a team. There is so much information coming in and out that there are ample opportunities to improve my information management, information retrieval , information programs and  information organisation skills and develop further as an information professional. I really hope I can continue on this career path of an information professional within HR as it is really worthwhile and exciting!

 

Go back to Part D – Professional at Work