My Griffith Story: I liked how the Business (HRM) course is industry-focused
Sarah-Jane Priestley is a third-year BA (Hons) in Business (HRM) full-time student who is currently preparing for her final year exams. The BA (Hons) in Business (HRM) is a business degree with a focus on Human Resource Management, enabling students to learn about several vital areas of business. In this blog, Sarah-Jane speaks about her experience studying at Griffith College and how she hopes to pursue a career in Human Resources after graduating.
"Following secondary school, I enrolled in the full-time BA Hon in Business (HRM) course at Griffith College. When I was in Transition Year, I completed work experience at Dell, where I gained an insight into several different roles within a company. It was there that I discovered Human Resources and thought this is a career I’d like to work in. I enjoy working with people and am sociable so I thought HR would compliment my skills.
I discovered Griffith College in sixth year as I participated in the Leaving Certificate Maths Revision course. I really liked the campus, it felt very welcoming from the start. I liked how Griffith offered smaller class sizes and the campus wasn’t too big and daunting. Likewise, it wasn’t too small, considering it is situated so close to Dublin City Centre. For me, the location of the campus was really accessible from my home in Naas.
The Business HR degree at Griffith College is great and the lectures are very industry-focused. The Business Faculty are available to help every step of the way. They make students feel important in the class by allowing us to ask questions and knowing that our voice is heard. While Covid was challenging from a student experience perspective, the Business Faculty was very understanding and helpful with the transition to online study.
With this degree, I studied Business for the first two years and then in my final year I specialised in Human Resource Management. I liked this structure because it gave me a good base knowledge of general business and then the opportunity to focus on HR, where I envision my future career. It also provides the freedom to branch out to another area of business in my future career if I don’t like working in HR. At the minute, I'm enjoying the Contemporary Employment Relations module as I like the case studies and the class discussion.
In the final year of the BA (Hons) in Business (HRM), we complete a Business Plan module over two semesters. It is a 12,000-word project and is like a dissertation however it’s a lot more industry-focused. It is an independent module where we come up with a business idea and address all the stages of setting up a business, from the initial research to the launch and management of the business. I really like this module as we get to use all the theories we learned over the three years, considering HR, marketing, accounting, and finance topics. Throughout the module, we are supported by a supervisor, who provides feedback on our business plan submissions. There is also a 15-minute Dragon’s Den style video, where we must convince the faculty about our business idea. For my business plan, I am creating a business plan for a pressed flower business. I like the idea of preserving special moments like wedding flowers or christening flowers and turning them into something you can keep for life.
I was the Student Class Representative in first and second year. In the first year, I decided to volunteer to challenge myself and gain experience. In second year, my class peers nominated me which was great to see that they were happy with my performance the previous year. The responsibility was great and the role helped me to prepare for a career in HR, being the liaison between my class peers and the lecturers. I organised one night out just before Covid to help the class bond, however unfortunately the pandemic occurred after that.
I really enjoyed studying the BA (Hons) in Business (HRM) at Griffith College. I am looking forward to completing my final year exams and starting my career in HR."