Human Resource Business Partner

About the team we are recruiting to

The HR Service provides support to approx. 4,300 employees located throughout Coventry which serves a diverse population of approx. 300,000.

At the centre of all we do is The People Plan, which details the contribution HR makes to the residents of Coventry, making it a great place to live and work.

As a service we offer value-add, creative relevant and timely advice and support to meet the service and people needs. Strong and positive engagement is a central element in helping to foster, productive relationships with leaders, managers, employees, TU officials, external partners and suppliers in providing an excellent and rated service.

What is the job role?

This is a new role in a new service, so a real opportunity for you to shape and develop a new HR provision and make a real impact on the service we deliver as a council. You will need to use your business partner expertise to gain credibility from day one, solutions-focused, able to deliver at pace and confident to challenge at senior levels.

The role offers the full HRBP remit, ranging from strategic workforce planning, advising on organisational and structural change and performance and senior talent management activities, translating business needs into HR solutions. You will use business data and insight to inform the design, development and implementation of HR activities.

A key focus of this role will be to work very closely and in collaboration with our Trade Union colleagues. You will be able to enhance your employee relations skills and experience, to build and maintain good working relationships to sustain, achieve and enhance the people and organisational needs.

Highly business and service-focused, you will have a proven track record of establishing personal credibility through effective delivery. You will also be able to demonstrate excellent relationship management skills and have the ability to coach and influence at senior levels.

You’ll be excited by the range of services that we provide to the citizens of Coventry and have ideas on how we can support and improve them going forward. You’ll have a great sense of how to use HR policies and interventions to deliver the best outcomes and be able to build strong and trusted relationships with the directors who lead those areas. You will therefore be confident in championing these across the organisation, working collectively with colleagues.

You will employ strong analytical skills, undertake research and liaise with colleagues, specialists and stakeholders from across the Council and wider, to ensure Coventry City Council is able to utilise modern HR practices and systems to increase efficiency and effectiveness. You’ll regularly present management meetings and training courses; so be comfortable in speaking in front of groups of people is essential.

It is a great opportunity to be able to successfully implement a business partnering model, develop true collaboration working across HR and really influence the culture of the organisation by progressing the employee relations agenda.

The key areas of responsibility for this role are:

- Driving the delivery of business and corporate plans for your own areas of responsibility.
- Bringing people expertise and developing solutions to help the business area to deliver its strategy.
- Influencing and building relationships with people in and around the business.
- Providing expert HR advice and guidance to leaders on HR matters.
- Coach and build the capability of senior leaders to anticipate and pre-empt organisational issues.
- Use data and analytics to measure the effectiveness of tools and policies and understand the landscape for further improvement.
- Drive consistency of approach across the Coventry City Council (CCC) in attracting, managing and developing talent to support current and future organisational needs.
- Taking a proactive approach to risk management, ensuring risks and issues are identified, addressed and reported and, where appropriate, escalated.
- Build relationships and form alliances with external counterparts, communities of practice and stakeholders to scan for innovations and opportunities to form partnerships.
- Managing individuals or teams through line management and/or matrix management arrangements as required, ensuring under performance is managed and adequate resourcing is planned to meet objectives.

Who are we looking for?

We are looking for an experienced HR professional working at a senior level.

The successfully appointed colleague should be able to demonstrate:

- CIPD qualified
- Experience of working in partnership with a range of stakeholders including managers, trade unions, employees and external partners
- Relevant HR experience (generalist or specialist) gained in large complex organisation(s) with multiple stakeholders; including employee relations experience covering complex disciplinary, grievance, organisational change, TUPE etc.
- Practical e