Whew. Things have been very busy here in South Florida. Just to recap, I managed to make up some ground this semester, hired a coordinator (who was a huge help in making up the ground), dealing with my sometimes challenging family, trying to keep in touch with friends and other peeps, and have been generally dealing with whole ton of work related crap.
I know, totally boring.
However, throughout all the crazy, I managed to get tapped to teach a portion of the PHR/SPHR certification classes and let’s just say the experience is, well, it’s interesting.
See about three years ago, I was on the other side of the desk, taking the classes to prep for the exam. I was part of a team that was energetic, idealistic, hardworking, and politically savvy. Let’s just say there was no room for failure because the peer pressure to pass was enormous.
Fast forward to two weeks ago and I’m nervously prepping for my first class. I had been assigned module one, strategic business.
Now I wanted to approach the material as a business person, not as an HR person. Why? Well because that’s my background. For years, I’ve been saying that our HR brethren need to understand business first and foremost. I mean how else will we earn our seat at the proverbial “table”?
I started the class with a series of questions: How many are taking the “P” as opposed to the “S”?, How many are currently working in HR?, and the kicker question How many have business degrees?
Let’s just say the numbers for the first two questions were higher than the last one.
Undaunted, we all slogged through the material and you know what? I’m happy to say that there’s hope. Eyes were opened, topics were discussed, points were made, and I even tried to explain lean six sigma in less than five minutes.
Sure it was a lot of material to digest, but this group gets it. They ask good questions, they challenge each other and they share relevant and pertinent information.
So for the jaded, cynics out there (and at times I include myself in that group) it may be time to stop being soooo jaded. These peeps get it, and they’re going to be amazing professionals and make their employers and the overall profession proud.
Now I hope they all pass the damn test.
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John – I’m totally liking this post because I too am taking a study group through Module 1 in May. I’ve been scribbling notes and working on my discussion plan – because I surely want it to be a discsussion (learn-from-each-other) as oppossed to a ‘lesson.’ I’m totally looking forward to it!