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‘Employee champion’ or ‘business partner’? The views of aspirant HR professionals Dennis Nickson, Scott Hurrell, Chris Warhurst, Kirsty Newsome, Dora Scholarios, Jo Commander and Anne Preston
University of Strathclyde Abstract This paper focuses on the perceptions, expectations and experiences of full-time students studying a CIPD-accredited Postgraduate Diploma/MSc in Human Resource Management. Drawing on survey, focus group and interview data the paper considers students perceptions of the role of HR, how their views changed during the course of the academic year, their initial thoughts on pursuing an HR career and early experiences as HR practitioners. The results suggest that at the point of exiting the course students tended to view the HR function in a more strategic manner, as opposed to the employee champion role, and this strategic orientation was also apparent in the views of the nascent HR professionals. In considering pedagogy and practice the paper seeks to engage with debates emerging about the nature of CIPD‟s „professional project‟, whilst also signalling the need for further longitudinal research to assess continuity and change in the HR profession. Contact details Dennis Nickson Scottish Centre for Employment Research Department of Human Resource Management University of Strathclyde Glasgow G1 1XU e-mail: [e-mail]

„Employee champion‟ or „business partner‟? The views of aspirant HR professionals

Introduction This paper focuses on the perceptions, expectations and experiences of full-time students regarding the study and practice of the CIPD-accredited Postgraduate Diploma/MSc in Human Resource Management at the University of Strathclyde. Specifically, it reports on-going longitudinal research with three cohorts of students (2005/06, 2006/07 and 2007/08). The project examines why students want to become HR practitioners, what they expect of human resource management (HRM) education, the applicability of that education to

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