People Pathways: HR Generalist

We're continuing our People Pathway series with a classic HR position: Generalist. This is a very valuable role that organizations use for a variety of purposes from strategy to payroll. Now, let's take a deep dive into the world of HR Generalist and what they contribute to organizations overall.

What is an HR Generalist?

An HR Generalist is a role that operates most often in smaller organizations with fewer distinct subparts of HR. Someone in this role would handle a wide range of responsibilities from compensation to engagement to analytics. Because they are often found in smaller organizations, they usually play a larger part of the day-to-day HR operations and a key to the department function.

What’s the difference between and HR generalist and specialist? What are the benefits and drawbacks of each?

While an HR Generalists handles a wide range of responsibilities, HR Specialists handle more niche demands. Specialists are typically found in larger organizations with more employees for the HR department to manage. HR Specialists handle specifics like benefits or leaves of absence, but would usually require specific experience, certifications, or education to justify why your background qualifies you to manage one specific area of HR. Generalists on the other hand get a little bit of everything in terms of experience. It’s a great way to start out your career if you are unsure of where you want to be in HR and want to explore your options and have the opportunity to join different teams/projects within your organization.

What KSAO’s are required for this role?

This ability requires handling a lot of different moving parts, so communication and organization are going to be key to finding success in this role. Organizational development competencies will also be important since this type of HR professional plays an important role in the culture at the individual and organizational level. Because this role often operates with a small team, extensive knowledge of employment law and interpersonal skills would be major advantages.

How do you become an HR Generalist?

As with most roles in HR, a generalist position can be attained with a variety of experiences or backgrounds. A bachelor’s degree would be a crucial place to start. If you are seeking this role after completing a 4-year degree, you may also want to seek out some internship experiences throughout your educational career since most organizations want to show interns a variety of components that make up the HR department. If you want a more competitive edge, you can opt for a master’s degree and seek out the widest range of classes you can to get the best overall look at what HR Generalists handle.