Where Dreams Come True

What job did you dream of as a kid? A doctor? Lawyer? Astronaut? Ballerina? I had those dreams too, and I even dreamed of being a marketing director. That's what I started going to school for in 2009, through UoP. However, when I took my first HR class as part of my Associates of Business, I fell in love. I immediately switched my major to include a concentration in HR for my Bachelors, and haven't looked back.

While in school, I've spent the past few years as a licensed massage therapist. From all of my HR reading and research (my absolute favorite HR blogger is the Evil HR Lady), I knew that I needed a job with an actual boss if I ever wanted to break into the business world as an HR professional. So a couple of months ago I took a job as a B2B telemarketer for a small financial consulting and accounting firm. As it turns out, this was the best job ever.

As most job descriptions are, mine was accurate for about five minutes. After a couple of weeks doing what I was hired to do, my boss discovered my ability to write and let me copy-edit his website. A few weeks after that, he discovered that I can design marketing materials - and so on and so forth. So now I'm in Marketing, which is cool, because that's what I originally set out to do. We're working to grow the company, and as we grow we will be hiring additional employees to take on some of the technical work (read The E-Myth Revisited to get an idea of what we're doing with the company). Since recruiting for those positions, reviewing resumes, setting up payroll, etc are all HR functions, I readily volunteered. I like that my boss is kind of allowing me to create my own position within the company based on my knowledge and skills. Really, this is the best job I could have taken.

While taking on these new responsibilities, I had my first experience being the EHRL today. I've been tasked with recruiting candidates to fill a few open positions in the company, and had received a few resumes since posting the job. I emailed one I thought was qualified, clarifying a few of her skills. As it turns out, she did not meet the qualifications we were looking for. I wanted to be nice and not leave her hanging, so I notified her - I don't think she was thrilled. Civil about it, but I still felt bad. It was weird - I've spent the past two years dreaming about being an HR professional, and when I finally got my chance to do something, it wasn't as easy as it seemed. I'm over it now, because I know that I was polite about it and did the right thing, but still...ugh. Hopefully it will get easier with practice, although seriously, what is wrong with me. Heaven forbid I ever have to fire someone...

Until next time, I'll keep thinking up more HR functions for me to take on. Keep the dream alive!