When looking to fill human resources vacancies, it is important that you know exactly what it is you are looking for beforehand or the wealth of applicants may seem overwhelming. In today's climate there are more applicants per post than ever before and each will be trying to sell themselves to you as much as possible.

You will need to have an idea of the type of person that will fit into your organisation as well as the type of qualifications you are looking for from your candidate and this is where it can become difficult for many people. Do you want a candidate who is academically qualified or do you want someone who has experience in the role you are trying to fill?

Qualifications vs. experience is one of the more difficult decisions an employer must make as there are positives and negatives to each type of candidate and different posts may warrant a different attitude. Generally speaking, applicants with academic qualifications and little experience will be easier to train to your way of thinking whilst experienced applicants may come bursting with great ideas that they have used elsewhere to good effect. So, the question is, what do you want?

Look for experience
If your business is new it might be a good idea to take on someone with a wealth and variety of experience. You may have to pay them more money than you had originally intended but the benefit to your organisation will be worth it.

A widely experienced Human Resources professional will be able to assist you in setting up all the policies and procedures that your company will require to function. If you choose someone with recent experience, they should also have a good working knowledge of employment law and legislation that can save you time and money in the long run.

Experienced staff will also be able to help you manage the rest of your team and offer innovative advice based on their past experiences. In the context of new business, experience is often the best choice as they will be able to assist you with areas of the business that you are unsure of.

In established companies, experience is also often preferred over academic qualification and this is especially true when you are looking to fill a vacancy internally. Internal staff know your business best and, even if they have not been working within the HR department, they should be able to demonstrate at interview a wide working knowledge of the existing HR policies and guidelines.

Often, staff members who are moving in from other departments such as training and development, frontline management or administrative positions are ideally situated to identify any issues with the existing department. Their knowledge and experience of the culture and staff of the business can be invaluable in pushing forward and managing any situations that may arise.

If, however, you are looking to recruit an entirely new member of staff to an existing team, there are two things that you must consider; are you recruiting because of an existing issue or are you just in need of a new team member?

Tackling specific issues
If you are recruiting in order to get help for an on-going or existing issue, an experienced human resources professional may be the perfect solution. You can even use the situation as a hypothetical interview question in order to gauge in advance if there are any candidates with experience uniquely suited to tackling the problem.

If, however, you are looking for a supporting member of staff or a manager who you would like to merely take up the reins of an existing set of processes, a recently qualified professional with little experience would be your perfect choice.

Candidates with recent qualifications will be right up to date with employment laws and will be able to easily slot into their expected roles as they will bring no expectations from previous posts. This type of candidate can be ideal if you are looking for support for an existing department, as it will be very easy for the team to update them quickly.

Experience versus qualifications is a question that can really only be answered dependent on the circumstances under which you intend to hire. Think closely about what you require, taking the above into consideration and it should help you whittle down your interview list, making the choice that much easier for you.

Twenty-five years ago if you had significant technical skills you could count on a good, well-paying job, according to blogger Dan Erwin.

That was especially true in manufacturing. But even in other vocations, little more than a well-developed technology was all that was required to rise in the organization and get a good-paying job.

Of course the introduction of desk-top computing in the mid-1980s started to change that. Over the next ten years it became clear that everyone in business had to understand and be able to use the digital tools. The US economy was beginning to travel beyond the industrial age.

Visit danerwin.typepad.com to read the full article.

What are knowledge workers? Are they a new breed or just a variation of the 20th century professional class, asks Jarche.com. According to the site, Neal Gorenflo, co-founder and publisher of Shareable Magazine, has identified (a very preliminary idea) a certain type of knowledge worker:

- Knowledge workers understand information as currency. Sharing is a core strategy for success even in a corporate context. This can bring knowledge workers to the commons.

- Their worldview is informed by systems thinking or is polyglot. It’s not informed by a single political ideology.

Visit the jarche.com website for the full article.

A shocking 91% of recruiters screen applicants via social networks, according to online reputation manager Reppler.

Reppler has included that data point in an infographic created in time to plug the latest upgrade of the vendor’s reputation monitoring service, which has expanded to include LinkedIn and Twitter in addition to Facebook profiles.

Reppler evaluates profiles based on the tone and appropriateness of their content, as well as the consistency of their information across social networks.

Visit the Allfacebook.com website to read the full article.

A recent amendment to the law pertaining to unfair dismissal is courting controversy as unions argue that workers' rights have been subjugated in an effort to placate business. Earlier this month, Chancellor George Osborne announced the controversial change at the Conservative Party Conference in Manchester. Claiming that businesses would save up to £6 million a year, the Chancellor extolled the development as a victory for the economy and a saviour of the unemployed, but what exactly is this miraculous change?

As of April 2012, no employee in the UK will be able to claim unfair dismissal unless they have worked for their employer for at least two calendar years. The previous law affecting unfair dismissal set the minimum term of employment at one year; thus, employees are now required to work a further 12 months before they can rely on the law in the event of them being unfairly dismissed.

The impact of the Chancellor's decision has been strongly felt in many quarters. Rather than afford greater rights to workers, Mr Osborne has handed companies the opportunity to unfairly dismiss staff at little risk in a legal context. Whilst other aspects of employment and contract law will continue to govern the relations between employers and their workers, extending the qualifying period for unfair dismissal is clearly not in the best interests of workers.

Mr Osborne, however, has championed the decision as a victory for the unemployed. After all, if more workers are unfairly dismissed in their second year of employment, more vacancies will arise for the unemployed. Logical, perhaps. Fair, just and reasonable - perhaps not. Addressing his fellow Tories, Mr Osborne said, "I know it's important to respect employment rights, but we also respect the right of the unemployed to get a job." He went on to talk about the need to not overprice the employment market and to avoid employment tribunals. Unfair dismissal claims, he explained, would not be pursued until two years' employment had come to pass and this will assure business owners.

The Government has also chosen to change the employment tribunal system, which will soon be subject to fees. Taking effect from April 2013, the tribunal fee system will require workers to pay £250 to apply for a tribunal and a further £1,000 if the application leads to a hearing. The fees are repaid only if the claim is upheld. The change is expected to reduce the number of employment tribunals in the UK by approximately 2,000 a year.

Business Secretary, Vince Cable supported the move to change unfair dismissal laws, stating, "the priority of this Government is to increase growth in our economy." Mr Cable feels that the present dismissal rules discourage businesspeople to hire new staff.

Unfortunately, there is very little workers can do to change the Government's policy on the issue, not least because unfair dismissal is one area of employment law that is not subject to a European directive. With this in mind, workers perhaps ought to brace themselves for further change.

Human resources is a business-strategy aligned function of corporations, designed to assist the organisation in achieving its goals through effective recruitment, development and retention of staff. A good HR function can help a company gain competitive advantage in the market through these practices. In more recent times the function has increased to take on additional areas such as well-being, safeguarding, internal communications, community involvement and corporate social responsibility amongst other areas.

It remains a valuable area for aspiring professionals to move into and to have a rewarding and challenging career. Jobs within HR tend to be very transferable and many roles have acreditations attached that facilitate this. The roles within HR can be generalist or focused into specialist areas, particularly as an individual's career and experience develops.

A starting role will generally operate at the administrative side of HR. This might involve preparing and sending out contracts, administrative paperwork, internal forms, pay reviews and other activities. Employee databases are kept updated and the team will work closely with other functions such as payroll.

HR administrators will also typically deal with administrative processes for new starters, such as paperwork and induction processes. They will deal with leavers, sickness, disciplinary issues, bonus and pay reviews, maternity, development and other HR areas in similar ways. They will probably be expected to work within an SLA, responding to queries within established timeframes and following strict procedures for administrative records, paper trails and database updating.

As the HR practitioner develops, they will likely start advising managerial staff on staffing issues, disciplinaries, grievances and more. Trade Union involvement may be a factor, along with changes to HR legislation, involvement with internal communications programmes, internal change programmes and more.

The usual path is that a new entrant will work as an HR assistant for two to three years, whilst studying for their CIPD professional qualifications. Ideally, that person will be partly qualified when they become an HR advisor. After three years, a good advisor should be in a position to progress to a managerial role. Some people enter the profession via the university route and large companies will take on graduate trainees within the function to fast track to senior roles. At the most senior HR positions, the role will take on a strong strategic focus, including disciplines such as long term skills and workforce planning, succession planning, corporate and cultural change programmes, high level union involvement and strategic advice and direction to company boards.

Many practitioners also choose to specialise in certain areas as their career develops, for example into training, consultancy, culture change programme development and implementation, psychometric testing and specialist recruitment, mentoring and coaching or systems development. Regardless of what level you're at in your HR career, certain skills and abilities are essential across roles and these include great communication skills, good attention to detail, an approachable manner and the ability to remain confident in difficult situations.

It can be worth looking at building a career within a smaller company if you are unsure which particular area of HR you are interested in. A smaller business with a tight HR team will probably offer the best opportunities for getting involved in a wide range of issues and tasks and getting hands-on experience with many different scenarios, from bulk recruitment through to strike action, TUPE transfers and legislation change implementation.

In a larger company, a good tip can be to get a mentor within the field to advise and guide you, especially in the earlier days of your career. Also, learn as much about the business as you can. A good HR practitioner will understand the role of HR clearly within the wider business context and eventually be able to advise you on good HR practice from the point of view of the wider business benefit, keeping logistical, financial and operational considerations in mind.

There is no doubt that a career in HR is challenging, rewarding and mentally stimulating. It offers great opportunities for development, employment across a range of industries and even countries and good earning potential too, particularly through accreditation and experience.

Over the years I’ve seen a lot of CVs and have noticed patterns in people’s attitudes and approaches to writing their CV. However, there is one issue that stands out above all others and it manifests itself in the conversations I have with prospective customers.

Their typical questions are often along the lines of: “Can you make my CV look better?” Or: “I need my CV to be more eye catching.” While many often ask: “Can you make my CV look more professional?”

Now you might be wondering what is wrong with these questions! The point is, they focus purely on aesthetics. What a CV looks like is of course important, but it’s completely secondary to the content of the CV.

A nice looking CV full of waffle is going to be less effective than an average looking CV with great content. What makes your CV effective is providing compelling evidence that you have the skills and experience to do the job you’re applying for.

The CV must capture your ‘value proposition’ and ‘value-added’ skills that are aligned with the ‘hot’ skills in your market place. Too many job seekers are unaware of the ‘hot’ skills employers are searching for and resort to listing behavioural traits such as working in a team, working under pressure, and having good communications skills, etc.

When we write CVs we make a point of researching and defining the ‘hot’ skills that are in demand in each profession. We also spell out how these skills might benefit a future employer if they were to hire you. We make sure these skills are pushed in the CV and backed up with tangible evidence.

For example:

• If you work in marketing you may want to talk about your ability to create low-cost, recession-busting marketing strategies that deliver superior return on investment (ROI).
• If you are an operations manager, your skills might include being able to lead cost-rationalisation programmes to reduce cost and drive profit.
• If you are an HR manager you might highlight the fact that you can develop robust succession planning and performance management frameworks to drive superior workforce productivity.
• If you compare these with the behavioural traits we mentioned above, they are clearly better aligned to the market place and much more powerful. Understanding what the ‘hot’ skills are for your industry and ensuring they are included in the content of your CV is paramount to success.

Matt Craven is Managing Director of CV & Interview Advisors. Matt has seven years’ experience in the CV writing industry. For a free CV appraisal visit the CV & Interview Advisors website.

Photo by Laffy

The promotion of wellbeing in the workplace is the main objective of the Liberal Democrats’ new policy paper; A New Purpose for Politics: Quality of life.

The party wants to make the promotion of quality of life a part of public policy making. In the paper, the Liberal Democrats call for company directors to make their workplaces healthier, and also measure the effects of initiatives that are put in place.

Liberal Democrat MP for East Dunbartonshire, Jo Swinson, said: "We all recognise that our quality of life matters but large scale studies show that levels of reported life satisfaction in the UK have been roughly static for decades.”

The paper looks to introduce practical changes to address, for example, long commutes to work.

Swinson said: “We know that people who have moderately long commutes tend to be less happy than those who can commute quickly. This is especially true for those with childcare responsibilities. The paper proposes changing zoning policy to create mixes of business and residential land use could help cut commuting times for many people.”

Critics may see this paper as another nanny-state policy attempt, but there is also an argument that steps could be taken to help hard working people enjoy a better standard of living in terms of job enjoyment and general well being.

Image by Moritz Hager courtesy of the World Economic Forum.

Although it is a legal requirement for men and women to receive equal pay when performing the same role, the reality is that on average women are still paid less than men. Many well meaning organisations struggle with identifying or rectifying issues in this area.

Acas (which is an acronym for Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service) launched their guidance on Voluntary Gender Equality Reporting on 14 September, 2011. This guidance is there to help identify and address gender gap problems.

According to a report by Acas, women in the public sector earn, on average, 10 per cent less than their male counterparts and in the private sector the gap grows to 19.8 per cent. These figures are reflective of full time employees only.

The guide on Voluntary Gender Equality Analysis and Reporting has been drawn up by Acas in order to help private sector and voluntary organisations that are interested in possible gender gabs, but are unsure of how to go about identifying and resolving problems.

Acas Head of Equality Steve Williams said: "Our new guidance provides advice for organisations whether they are already collecting, analysing and acting on information regarding gender, or whether they are starting to think about doing so.”

You can find out more about the guidance by visiting www.acas.org.uk/vger.

Photo by Mirimcfly.

Working in a company that organises a weekly game of football for staff to play, and has a gym downstairs, I certainly appreciate an employer that helps promote good health. As such, I was interested in reading about an award and framework for promoting this aspect of the workplace.

Investors in People has launched the award in 2010, off the back of research into the importance of promoting health and wellbeing in the workplace. It was found that business performance can be improved through increased productivity, a reduction in absenteeism and improved employee retention as the result of better health and wellbeing at a company.

The name of the award is the Health and Wellbeing Good Practice Award. Although this award was launched more than a year ago now, I think it is a valuable one to keep in mind for HR professionals.The framework for the award was developed with the help of over 400 organisations and the backing of the Department of Health. The framework of this award is worth looking into if you are interested in improving this aspect of your business.

The National Director for Health and Work, Dame Carol Black, awarded the accolade to Claridge’s, Kimberly-Clark and NHS Suffolk as three of the first recipients of the award last year. I imagine it would help a company attract higher quality applicants for vacancies if they held this award.

Jane Jones, acting Chief Executive of Investors and People UK, said in a press release, “Over the past five years we have worked with some of the UK’s leading employers to analyse the role of health and wellbeing in the workplace. This isn’t just about fruit and gym membership, and nor is it about perks or ‘nice to haves’. It’s about embedding health and wellbeing into the culture of the business to ensure everyone benefits. The organisations we have worked with recognise these benefits and we believe this new award will help others reap the same rewards.”

Investors in People is an organisation that aims to promote and assist business improvement. The organisation is celebrating their 20th anniversary this year.

Photo by Adria Richards.