Human Resources Business Partner Support

Manchester, GB

OU HR Business Partner - North West G3

Network Rail operates and maintains the railway infrastructure 24/7 365 days a year. Our purpose is to connect people and goods with where they need to be and our vision is for a simpler, better, greener railway.

We're proud to be named as one of the Times Top 50 Employers for Gender Equity for the fourth year running. Find out more from our people here.

Our North West route covers Cheshire to Cumbria, including key cities like Liverpool and Manchester, and destinations such as Blackpool and the Lake District. Major stations include Crewe, Liverpool Lime Street, Preston, and Manchester Piccadilly and Victoria

This busy region sees 1.3 million daily passengers and moves 700,000 tonnes of freight weekly, with 571 stations making up a quarter of Britain's rail network.

What will you be doing?

We are searching for HRBP Support who is organised, driven, people-focussed and confident, who is keen to join our HR team for 12 months. If you're passionate about helping others, thrive in a busy friendly team and want to grow your career in HR, this could be just the role for you.

The role is based in Manchester Square One, but you will need to be able to work from different route locations as we love to spend time with our client groups. Our route colleagues are based across the North West; from Crewe in the south of the route to Carlisle and Barrow in the north and we are looking for a HRBP support who will be comfortable travelling between these locations for two and three days per week.

Day to day, you'll be working closely with our HR Business Partners, making sure our people get the support they need. It's a varied role; one day you might be helping with employee relations case, the next you could be supporting a change project or pulling together data to help us make better decisions.

Please note this is a 12 month secondment/fixed term contract.

What will you be doing?

• Supporting HRBPs with casework, reports, and project admin

• Being a go-to person for managers with HR questions

• Delivering engagement, wellbeing, and inclusion activities

• Keeping our systems and records up to date

• Pitching in wherever needed to help the team deliver great service

What are we looking for?

• Someone who's friendly, approachable and keen to learn

• You'll need great communication skills– we love to chat to our clients.

• HR experience or knowledge would be great, but we're open to people with transferable skills too.

• You'll be responsible for providing day to day support for our HRBP's, so you'll need to be comfortable using Excel, PowerPoint and Word.

• We are looking for someone who is comfortable at working with data – we don't need a computer whizz, but we love analysis and so will you.

• Our team regularly run training and development sessions – we are looking for someone who would be happy to get involved and present to a group.

In order to be successful in this role, we would like you to have/to be:

• Demonstrates strong customer service skills.

• Experience of working within a large, complex and fast moving organisation.

• High level of accuracy and attention to detail.

• Strong written and verbal communication skills.

• Strong time management, organisation and prioritisation skills and the ability to work under pressure and to deadlines.

• Resilient, Adaptable and Flexible.

• IT literate, strong excel, word and PowerPoint knowledge.

• Experience of event coordination and facilitation.

• Research and analytical skills.

• Strong relationship building skills.

• Experience of supporting the delivery of HR initiatives and projects.

If you have just finished university or college, or if you have completed your CIPD or are working on it now, we'd love to speak to you.

And what can we give you? You'll be part of a supportive, friendly team that's all about making a difference. We care about our people and we're big on development – so if you're looking to build your HR career, you'll have plenty of opportunities to grow and lots of people to support you.

Salary and benefits:

• Band 5, starting at £25,000
• Pro-rata annual leave entitlement (28 days)
• My benefits – our discounted online shopping site
• A range of discounted offers including, childcare vouchers, healthcare offers – cycle to work, healthcare club discounted membership and other benefits
• Subsidies of up to 75% on rail and underground season tickets
• 75% discount on leisure travel
• A choice of contributory pension schemes
• 2 weeks paid reserve leave for our Armed Forces community

Want to find out about what fantastic benefits we offer? Find out here

Network Rail adheres to a structured pay framework, any salary offered will be within the pay range advertised.

Closing date: 3 November 2025. Late applications will not be accepted.

Safe behaviour is a requirement of working for Network Rail. Applicants should be able to demonstrate their awareness of our safety vision.

We're continuing to build a more diverse and inclusive organisation representative of the passengers we serve. Applicants should be able to demonstrate their understanding of our Equity, Diversity & Inclusion vision Equity, diversity and inclusion - Network Rail.

We will endeavour to offer a diverse interview panel wherever possible.