HR Business Partner

15x roles open Locations: London, Manchester, Northampton, Glasgow

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About Workforce Change & Restructuring

The Workforce Change & Restructuring (WFC&R) function manages global change and restructuring programmes across multiple employing entities. The team supports organisations in shaping their workforce to meet long–term strategic objectives, improve business performance, optimise costs, and ensure compliance with legal and regulatory requirements.

The function aims to provide a simple, efficient and insight–led Workforce Change & Restructuring service, supporting organisations through complex workforce changes while effectively managing risk and employee relations.

Overall Purpose of the Role

The role holder will support the delivery of Workforce Change and Restructuring programmes across multiple business entities and geographical locations.

The successful candidate will be responsible for driving and supporting allocated change programmes, providing specialist Employee Relations and Workforce Change expertise throughout the programme lifecycle.

Key responsibilities will include:

• Driving and supporting allocated workforce change and restructuring programmes.
• Leading and supporting the HR workstream for change programmes, including:
• Restructuring and organisational change
• Large–scale workforce change
• TUPE transfers
• Outsourcing and insourcing programmes
• New site or location set–ups
• Cross–entity transformation programmes
• International workforce change initiatives
• Working closely with HR Business Partners, Employee Relations specialists and other HR functions to deliver effective change programmes.
• Providing specialist advice and guidance on employee relations, consultation and workforce change matters.
• Ensuring change programmes are delivered effectively, consistently and in line with relevant employment legislation and regulatory requirements.

Key Accountabilities

The role holder will be responsible for delivering the following key activities across Employee Relations and Workforce Change:

• Project Initiation – supporting the planning, mobilisation and structuring of workforce change programmes.
• Due Diligence – assessing employee, organisational and workforce information to support decision–making.
• Consultation – planning and leading employee, union and works council consultation processes.
• Implementation – supporting the effective delivery of workforce change and restructuring activity.
• Communication Planning – developing clear and effective communication strategies for impacted employees and stakeholders.
• Governance & Risk – identifying, managing and escalating workforce change risks while maintaining appropriate governance and documentation.
• Centre of Excellence (COE) – providing specialist Employee Relations and Workforce Change expertise, guidance and best practice.

Key Skills & Experience

The successful candidate will demonstrate:

• Strong and demonstrable experience in Workforce Change and Restructuring , with multiple examples clearly evidenced throughout their CV.
• Experience managing, liaising with or working alongside trade unions and union representatives , ideally within a heavily unionised environment.
• Experience leading union and/or works council consultation processes .
• Strong experience in employee and workforce consultation , including redundancy programmes.
• Proven experience delivering TUPE projects and programmes .
• Experience leading large–scale and/or multiple concurrent change programmes.
• Experience delivering workforce change programmes across international or multi–country environments .
• A strong understanding of current employment legislation and its application to workforce change.
• Strong project management, change management and stakeholder management capabilities.
• Experience working within a highly matrixed organisation .
• A strong appreciation of cultural, geographical and regulatory sensitivities when delivering international workforce change.
• Excellent analytical and data management skills, with confidence working with large and complex employee datasets.
• Intermediate–to–advanced Microsoft Excel skills, including:
• Merging and manipulating data
• Data management and quality checking
• Pivot tables
• VLOOKUPs/XLOOKUPs
• Managing large datasets
• Using formulas to validate and quality–check data

Essential Experience

Candidates should have demonstrable experience across the following areas:

• Workforce Change and Restructuring
• Employee Relations
• Redundancy and consultation programmes
• Trade union and/or works council engagement
• TUPE
• Relevant employment legislation and legal requirements
• Project and programme management
• Change management
• Stakeholder management
• Working within complex, matrixed organisations
• Delivering workforce change across multiple locations and/or jurisdictions
• Strong Microsoft Excel and data management capabilities

Candidates should be able to clearly demonstrate on their CV how they structure, manage and deliver workforce change programmes , including how they track key activities, risks, stakeholders, consultation processes and implementation milestones.

Working Environment

This is a role within a complex, international organisation where the successful candidate will work collaboratively with HR Business Partners, Employee Relations specialists, senior stakeholders and other business functions.

The role requires someone who is comfortable operating in a fast–paced and highly matrixed environment, managing multiple priorities and navigating complex employee relations and workforce change situations.