Being a far-reaching field with an extensive scope, the human resources job market can be pretty tricky and frustrating to navigate as both a recruiter and a candidate.
With a wide range of responsibilities and roles, HR can be prone to significant inconsistency concerning job titles, levels and salaries.
These inconsistencies can make it increasingly challenging to identify your next hire or, if you’re a candidate, where and when those opportunities most appropriate to your level present themselves.
Both company size and scope can often explain the inconsistencies that can come hand-in-hand with these roles, some of which are the result of companies wishing to elevate their status through flashier job titles.
What is often the case is that a company may offer an inflated job title in an attempt to attract a candidate motivated by a more glamorous job title. Whereas, in a harsh reality, the role usually comes with a higher workload for a relatively lower salary. This process may also have the benefit of presenting the illusion of a company having a progressive HR function, both internally and externally.
The simple reality and fact of the matter are that there are many different types of roles that fall under the HR umbrella. With such a large range of job titles, there is bound to be role overlap, and this is where the problem that plagues both employers and candidates is created, as many of the jobs in human resources require advanced, sometimes niche expertise knowledge.
Outlined below is our definitive guide through some of the most popular job titles, including the different levels and salaries you can expect for each:
HR Directors: (Salary Level: £80-120K)
- have overall control of the HR function and is responsible for the company’s personnel and training strategy. Their job is to guide, manage and provide strategy.
HR Generalists (Senior): (Salary Level: £70-100K)
- a person with many years of experience in HR. They will have a broad range of responsibilities instead of a specialised line of work. Hence, they cover most of the HR functions – including hiring, compensation and benefits, admin etc.
HR Generalists (Mid): (Salary Level: £50-70K)
- a person with a good amount of experience in HR. They will have a broad range of responsibilities instead of a specialised line of work. Hence, they cover most of the HR functions – including hiring, compensation and benefits, admin etc.
HR Generalists (Junior): (Salary Level: £35-50K)
- a person with a smaller but still significant amount of experience in HR. They will have a broad range of responsibilities instead of a specialised line of work. Hence, they cover most of the HR functions – including hiring, compensation and benefits, admin etc.
Talent Acquisition: (Salary Level: £40K+)
- recruiting, tracking and interviewing job candidates, and onboarding and training new employees. The development of ongoing strategies to find specialists, leaders and/or future executives for your company. Focused on long-term HR planning and searching.
HR Learning and Development: (Salary Level: £40K+)
- aims to improve group and individual performance by increasing and honing skills and knowledge in accordance with the organisation’s goals and requirements.
HR Reward: (Salary Level: £40K+)
- covers all financial provisions made to employees, including cash pay and benefits (pensions, paid leave etc.) Aligns pay and benefits with context, culture and market.
HR Specialists: (Salary Level: £40K+)
- responsible for a specific sector of human resource work. Below are some examples among many certain areas of expertise that would fall under the HR Specialist role:
Below are some specific HR Specialist roles:
- Employee Relations (ER) (prevent and resolve problems/disputes between employees and management by creating and enforcing fairness policies).
- Systems (dealing mainly in hr management systems. Primarily the recording of data and analysis of it).
- Global Mobility (refers to a multinational corporation’s ability to move its people to offices in different countries – manage international employees and handles various immigration-related issues as well as their ability to navigate the unfamiliar legislative environments they work in).
- Organisational Development (OD) (oversee the changes and improvement of the processes and structures that form the basis of HR. Their role is to develop ideas with a systematic mindset, aligning the company’s goals and activities in an intentional way to improve the overall performance of their company as a whole).
HR Interims: (Salary Level: £400-700+ per day)
- Usually hired on short notice and for a limited period, the primary function of their role is to provide extra management resources or fulfil a specific assignment. Designed to slot in and integrate into a business quickly, hitting the ground running.
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This article shows you that it is essential to be weary when applying or hiring for various HR roles.
Increasingly, we are seeing many candidates come through and admit they have made a mistake in joining their new company simply because they have been put in the wrong role. This can be fixed and easily avoided by taking the proper precautions and ensuring that you do your research, question and challenge when necessary.
