College of Business Offers HR Series

The NMU College of Business just completed a five-part professional development seminar series for area human resource managers. It was designed to prepare HR professionals for the certification examination offered by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM).

“This is an excellent example of how the university can share its intellectual resources to benefit the business and professional community,” said Rajib Sanyal (Business).

NMU worked with Superiorland Human Resources Professionals, the local chapter of SHRM, to promote the series to Upper Peninsula HR professionals and organize a program that would suit the needs of its members. Twenty-one HR professionals enrolled in the program.

The series covered recruitment, selection, performance appraisal, strategic human resource planning, training and development, employment law, compensation, and labor relations. NMU faculty and local business practitioners facilitated the program.

Bruce Sherony (Business) taught the first session on strategic HR planning.

“This is a very tough program — an extremely challenging examination with about a 59 percent pass rate nationwide,” Sherony said. “I call it stressful training because these people want to get certified and the exam is not easy. It is a stretch. It is a lot of work to pass the test.”

His colleague Gary Stark (Business) focused on questions the SHRM exam is likely to ask. “I’ve taught lots of different HR classes, including one whole semester on the topic I condensed for a Saturday session,” Stark said. “I had an advantage having taught this before. I didn’t have to start from scratch.”

The seminar series was held on Saturdays from Feb. 18 to March 18.