HR Partner

About the role

Contract: Fixed term contract, 12 months, maternity leave cover

Hours: 30hrs per week (to be worked over 4 or 5 days), 52 weeks per year. Flexible working patterns will be considered but will need to balance operational support requirements.

Salary: FTE £40,000 - £47,000 per annum, plus a range of benefits. (Pro-rata to working hours)

Location: Hybrid working, consisting of remote working with the flexibility to work typically up to 2 days per week at our offices in Stevenage, Hertfordshire or in nearby locations.

Are you an HR generalist advisor looking for growth in your career - putting your skills to support our team within the education sector?

Are you looking for a varied role, in a constantly changing but rewarding environment, where no two days are the same?

Could this opportunity fulfill your next career move?

We are looking for an experienced HR generalist to join our Company HR team, who has worked in an advisory capacity to support internal teams and line managers. The HR Partner role is a key element within our provision, working closely with departmental leaders across the organisation to aid them to effectively undertake and enhance our continuing work supporting educational clients.

You are already a successful HR practitioner and have proven abilities to work collaboratively using your initiative to achieve positive business and team outcomes. You will be comfortable working with a varied range of managers and clients, understanding their needs and experience to add value through your practitioner guidance and recommendations. You manage your time and outputs well to deliver against deadlines, and with genuine credibility built through the experience of your current role.

This is an exciting time to join the team. The education sector is always evolving, and you will be supporting our teams deliver their priorities through the successful delivery of our People Plan.

Our ‘working from anywhere’ approach provides colleagues the opportunity to work flexibly in line with their role requirements. This consists of remote working and up to 2 days per week in our Head Office in Stevenage, Hertfordshire. As there is a permanent home working element to this role, you will need to ensure you are equipped for home working.

Benefits: a generous employer pension contribution, 28 days annual leave plus bank holidays (rising to 31 days after five-years) or the equivalent paid for Term Time employees, family-friendly policies, hybrid working, paid mileage, a cycle to work scheme, access to mental health and wellbeing support, professional development opportunities, benefit schemes for discounts and cashback offers, and more.

Would you like to know more information about this opportunity? If so, further information can be found in the job outline. You can also contact Louise Brace, Head of Company HR, who would be happy to chat to you via [email protected]

To apply, email [email protected] with an up-to-date CV along with a cover letter to include responses to the following:

• A concise summary of your practitioner experience gained within your most recent roles

• Why you are interested in becoming part of the HFL team.

• Please give an example of when you have provided partnering support to a manager on a complex employee relations matter

  • What approach did you take?

  • How did you support the manager to bring the matter to a successful conclusion?

• Please give an example of a HR project you have worked on with multiple stakeholders

  • How did you take into account and manage different opinions and views?

  • What was the outcome?

  • What did you learn from this process?

As part of our move towards eradicating unconscious bias within the recruitment process, we will be anonymising your forms.

For recruitment queries, our Central Recruitment Team can also be contacted on the hfl.recruitment email address above. We would love to hear from you.

Please note: the job advert may close as soon as sufficient applications have been received. To make sure you don’t miss out on this great opportunity, please submit your application as soon as you can.  

Interview Date: To be confirmed

We are committed towards becoming an anti-racist organisation, and our recruitment statement is set out below in support of this.

HFL is committed to being an equal opportunities employer. We insist on the equal treatment of all current and prospective colleagues and will never condone discrimination on the basis of age, disability, sex, sexual orientation, pregnancy and maternity, race or ethnicity, religion or belief, gender identity, or marriage and civil partnership.

HFL is also equally committed to becoming an anti-racist organisation and we encourage you to view our Anti-racist position statement which gives clarity on our anti-racist stance. In our relentless efforts to be an anti-racist organisation, we recognise the negative impacts of under representation and lack of diversity in our organisation, our education system and in all aspects of our society. Therefore, for recruitment into any HFL post, where we have 2 or more candidates of equal merit, candidates with protected characteristics will be given advantage over candidates without such characteristics. This is sometimes referred to as a ‘tie-breaker’ and is referred to as ‘positive action’ in the Equality Act 2010.

To help us meet our high standards and aspirations of a fully diverse and inclusive workplace, we strongly encourage suitably qualified applicants from all backgrounds to apply and to join us.

Please note that if you are invited to interview, we will expect you to be prepared to discuss unconscious bias with us; we find these conversations more than any others give us all a good idea of what working together will be like.