personnel office
- noun
- /ˈpɜrsəˌnɛl ˈɔfɪs/
- I went to the personnel office.
- go to the personnel office
- call the personnel office
- ask the personnel office
Examples
-
Where's the personnel office?
Fiction book (1993) -
I arrived late that evening and reported to the personnel office at nine the next morning.
-
I called the personnel office every day and inquired about the jobs and the status of my application.
Fiction book (1995) -
Make sure your employer's personnel office contacts homeless programs when it hires.
Academic text (1999) -
I swear, when I was teaching English a few years ago, one student worked in the personnel office of a multinational company, and she was shocked—I mean really SHOCKED—that a US employee contract that had crossed her desk was only one page long.
Blog text (28) -
Could you tell me where the personnel office is located in this building?
-
May I suggest you just go back to the personnel office and ask for a different assignment?
Synonyms
The department that hires, trains and manages employees
A part of a company that hires, trains, and manages employees
A department that hires, trains, and manages employees
How Big
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'department responsible for hiring, training, and managing employees' is directly and compositionally derived from 'personnel' (staff/employees) + 'office' (administrative unit/place). This straightforward noun–noun construction is common in English and has clear parallels in other languages, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents should be able to infer the MWE meaning.
Etymology
Personnel office comes from personnel, meaning the company's people, and office, meaning a place for work. Imagine a room with staff files and people asking about jobs; that's why it means the department that 'hires', 'trains' and 'looks after' employees.