Primary Task Response: Within the Discussion Board area, write 400–600 words that respond to the following questions with your thoughts, ideas, and comments. This will be the foundation for future discussions by your classmates. Be substantive and clear, and use examples to reinforce your ideas:

In the past decade, the human resources (HR) function gained strategic positioning within organizations as the need for professional competencies in managing human talent became recognized. Within the field of HR, disciplines, also called specialties, provide critical skills to the organization. These disciplines/specialties include training and development, recruiting, compensation, benefits, labor relations, employee and organizational development, etc.

1. For this assignment you will need to identify an HR discipline that interests you and/or closely aligns with your current or future career goals. For example, you may already be working in training and development or that discipline may align with your future career goals or, you may be in management and want to learn more about the recruiting process because you are involved with hiring new candidates. After you have identified your HR discipline of interest, you will need to explore and describe your chosen discipline in your discussion board response. Below are some links to visit to help with your research and exploration:

   To learn more about where to explore and research your chosen discipline, please watch the following tutorial: http://breeze.careeredonline.com/p19833573/

   Now that you have watched this tutorial, you should have a better idea about how to research career fields within Human Resources that are of interest to you. Below you will find links, some require a paid membership WHICH IS NOT CLASS REQUIREMENT, that will further define for you the parameters of certain HR specialties. These are optional, however they are an excellent resource so consider using them to help answer the course questions.

2. Now that you have learned more about your chosen discipline respond to the following set of questions that best apply to you (You only need to respond to one set of questions).

Currently working in chosen discipline:

1. What is one new thing you learned by researching this area?
2. Describe what you do at your current position that matches the information you found?
3. Share something you do at your current position that you did not discover during your research, which you feel would be beneficial to share with your classmates?

Chosen discipline is your future career goal:

1. What did you learn from your exploration that you did not know before?
2. After your research, is this still an area that interests you? Include why or why not?
3. After learning more about this field, do you feel you have the skills and experience required for this field? Why or Why not?

Currently working in a field outside of HR or planning on pursuing a field outside of HR:

1. What did you discover from your exploration
2. Has learning about this discipline changed how you view your current or future career? Why or Why not?
3. What is one thing you learned from your exploration that can be applied to your current or future career?