Westminster Business School Blog Why We Are So Excited About Our New BA Honours In Human Resource Management, By Course Leader Caroline Bolam

Why We Are So Excited About Our New BA Honours In Human Resource Management, By Course Leader Caroline Bolam

June 16, 2016
Student Life
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This year, September marks the start of our new degree, the BA Honours in Human Resource Management (HRM). This is something that we are all very excited about here at Westminster and we are looking forward to further enhancing our thriving HRM department with this new programme. Presently, there is a HRM pathway on the Business Management degree and we also host a very successful CIPD (Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development) accredited Master’s in HRM. These are well established and have been running for a number of years.

CIPD Accreditation

The first thing to highlight is that the course will be CIPD accredited. Why does this matter? It matters because The CIPD is the professional body for Human Resource Management. It has 140,000 members (CIPD website) which is a substantial network of HR professionals. By undertaking the HRM BA Hons, you will automatically receive an invitation to join that network, enabling you to get your foot in the door with HR professionals as you study and learn the trade. This also gives you access to CIPD research and professional networking meetings. When you complete your degree you will have two qualifications, a University of Westminster degree (level 6) and a CIPD level 5 practitioners certificate. That’s two qualifications, not one!

Year 1

The first year of your degree, you will study an introduction not only to HRM, but also to many other aspects of business. It is important in HR to understand how your department/strategy/role, fits into the wider context. Your modules are designed to give you an give you an overall understanding of how a business operates, how employees are positioned and how they behave, as well as how to interpret information to make decisions in the business context.

Compulsory modules for the first year include:

Global Business Environment (this is for all business degrees)
Introduction to Human Resource Management
Introduction to Organisational Behaviour
Finance and Marketing
Analysing and Managing Information for HR

You also get to choose one elective module, the list of which you can find on our course page.

Business-Experience-Team-Westminster-Business-School — *Westminster Business School’s Business Experience Team*

Year 2

In the second year your compulsory modules will be:

HRM essentials
Reward Management
Resourcing and Talent Planning
Contemporary Employment Relations

These are all CIPD accredited modules, and essential for your CIPD qualification. You then get to choose two other modules, one from a small list (all HR related), one from a bigger list (including other subjects areas).

Westminster-Business-Consultants — *Look out for HR opportunities within Westminster Business Consultants!*

Placement Year?

As an undergraduate HRM student you then have the option to take a Placement Year. This is effectively where you can choose to take a year out in industry, something which is designed to help you to develop vital skills for your career. Previous organisations where students have worked include Warner Brothers, the NHS, IBM, Siemens and many more! The Placements are organised by our very own Business Experience Team; to find out more, visit their webpage, and why not take a look at this Placement Year video!

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzyvyjS1rQ4]

Final year

In your final year (which will be year 3 or 4 depending on whether or not you have taken a Placement), your compulsory modules will include:

Global Strategic Management (this is for all business degrees)
Contemporary Issues in HRM
Contemporary Developments in Human Resource Development
Employment Law

And again, you get to pick two elective modules of your own choosing, one from a small HR related list, and one from a bigger list. The first module will build your knowledge of business and the three other compulsory modules are all CIPD accredited (and help you to attain your CIPD qualification).

HRM-at-Westminster — *The annual Westminster HRM Conference*

What’s not to love?

The degree gets you qualified as a HR specialist and also gives you opportunities to interact with people already in the industry. You will get to work alongside other disciplines and learn valuable networking skills along the way. And on top of all the professional development you’ll gain, you’ll be in the heart of London, you can take advantage of the 100+ societies & sports clubs and enjoy our friendly campus…what’s not to love?!

london bridge — *Photo taken during a University of Westminster boat trip*

Thank you to Course Leader, Caroline Bolam for this blog and for sharing more about the new Human Resource Management BA Hons. If you would like to find out more about this course, please take a look on our course pages, visit us on one of our Open Days (the next one is 22 June 2016) or contact Caroline on C.Bolam@westminster.ac.uk.