Ellen Bies Feature Story
Professional education student uses HR mastery certificate for career advancement.
Ellen Bies
By Megan Rocker
In 2005, Ellen Bies was working as the executive administrative assistant to the company president, HR director, and chief financial officer/vice president of finance of the Plymouth, Minnesota, office of Buhler Inc.
Buhler Inc. is the U.S. subsidiary of Buhler AG of Uzwil, Switzerland. Buhler Group is a $1.5 billion company and an internationally recognized leader in the research and development, manufacture, and distribution of capital equipment and processing systems serving both the food and non-food industry.
Buhler encourages continuing education for its employees—something Bies was well aware of. So, when she saw a flyer advertising professional development short courses for HR professionals at the U of M, she signed up right away.
Because Bies’ background was in sales and marketing, she thought the HR courses would give her some additional training outside of the every day HR work she was doing on the job.
“Around the time I started taking courses, the company began succession planning for our HR director, who was looking to retire in a few years. Taking some professional education courses in HR was a perfect opportunity to position myself for advancement,” she says.
Together with the HR director, Bies sat down and selected a grouping of courses that would complement her future role, and fill in some of the gaps in her background. “Since my supervisor knew me, and he knew the role I would be stepping in to, he was definitely able to point to certain courses that I would need to take or would find interesting.”
Bies completed both the HR Generalist I and II certificates—each certificate is a grouping of select short courses totaling 30 contact hours. When the HR Mastery certificate was announced, she decided to complete that as well. The Mastery certificate builds on the other HR certificates, as well as other business courses, and is a total of 120 hours. “I had a large portion of the hours done for it, so I added the Interpersonal Effectiveness classes, as well as some electives, and was able to complete the Mastery certificate.”
She was the first graduate of the HR Mastery program, and considers it a worthy investment. “I took classes so I could get some schooling to go along with my practical, day-to-day learning. The classes were truly enjoyable--the instructors do a great job of holding your attention and keeping you interested. That’s no small feat considering a lot of us had spent the whole day at work before coming to class in some cases,” she says.
