What have I done wrong when coding this array of objects in C++? -

i have 2 classes, personnellists , employee. create instance of personnellists in main, so:

int main() {     personnellists example; //make personnel list ... } 

personnellists uses constructor member initialisation of list of employees, number of employees, , size of array:

personnellists::personnellists(): list(new employee[size]), numemployees(0), arraysize(size){ } 

this results in null empty employees being created (i think?):

employee::employee(): employeenumber(0), name(null), department(null) { } 

it @ line invalid null pointer error.

i new c++, fresh off boat java programming. i'm still novice pointers, i'm not quite sure i'm doing wrong here.

update: requested, here class definition of employee:

#include <iostream>  class employee {     public:         employee(); //constructor         employee(std::string name, std::string deparment);         void print() const; //print employee's details         void setemployeeno(int employeenum);      private:         int employeenumber;         std::string name;         std::string department; }; 

in java, new employee[size] creates array of null references.

in c++, new employee[size] creates array of default-constructed instances of employee. default constructor tries set name , department null. attempting initialize std::string null give error describe.

there's no "null" string in c++, default-construct name , department, set them empty strings:

employee::employee(): employeenumber(0), name(), department() { 

finally, if list can contain variable number of elements, recommend use std::vector<employee> (which similar arraylist<employee> in java).