Senior HR Business Partner

Cambridge Design Partnership; Cambridge; Hybrid; GBP 68,000 - 83,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible working

Discretionary bonus

Learning and development opportunities

12% pension (non-contributory)

Private healthcare

EV salary sacrifice scheme

Share incentive plan

33 days holiday

Job summary

Cambridge Design Partnership is seeking a Senior HR Business Partner to support a pivotal transformation within an employee-owned business. The role focuses on partnering with leaders to embed performance management, employee relations, talent development and organisational effectiveness, ensuring the employee-owned values are central to daily operations.

Reporting to the Head of People, you will offer pragmatic, commercially focused advice, drive accountability and leadership capability, and

Qualifications

• Proven experience in a HR Business Partner role partnering with managers to embed people processes and drive accountability.
• Understanding of performance management frameworks and embedding them within teams.
• Strong business partnering skills with ability to build trusted relationships with leaders and employees.
• Experience in employee lifecycle HR support and organisational change.
• Experience of employee ownership is an advantage.

Responsibilities

• Partner with leaders to embed the People Strategy and ensure consistent people practices.
• Provide pragmatic, commercially focused people advice to support engagement and performance.
• Lead employee relations case management and respond to queries with a fair, policy-aligned approach.
• Roll out and embed performance management frameworks and drive meaningful conversations and development planning.
• Support workforce planning, recruitment, and capability development initiatives.
• Develop initiatives to strengthen employee ownership, engagement, and wellbeing.
• Support policy implementation and delivery of learning and development initiatives.
• Contribute to reward processes, data collection, and pay review activities.
• Build credible relationships with managers and employees and model company values.

Skills

People partnering

Coaching

Influencing

Performance management

Employee relations

Leadership capability

Education

CIPD Level 5

CIPD Level 7 desirable

Job description

As Senior HR Business Partner, you will play a key role in supporting the business through an exciting period of transformation, helping to embed a high performance culture while ensuring our employee owned values remain central to how we operate. The role will have a strong focus on partnering with leaders to embed and continually strengthen key people practices across performance management, employee relations, talent development and organisational effectiveness, within an employee owned business. You will play a critical role in translating the people agenda into day to day behaviours, ensuring these approaches are consistently adopted across the business.

Reporting to the Head of People, you will act as a trusted partner to leaders across the business, providing pragmatic and commercially focused people advice that supports both employee engagement and business performance. You will help drive accountability, strengthen leadership capability, and ensure our people practices attract, develop and retain talent.

This is a hybrid role requiring 3 days per week on site.

Responsibilities

• Partner closely with leaders to embed the People Strategy across the business, ensuring people practices are consistently implemented and aligned to culture, fostering the healthy culture of an employee owned business
• Act as a trusted advisor on all aspects of the employee lifecycle, providing coaching and practical support to improve performance, development, engagement and wellbeing
• Lead employee relations case management and employee queries, ensuring a consistent, fair and commercially pragmatic approach aligned to policy and best practice
• Support the rollout and embedding of the performance management framework, working with managers to drive meaningful performance conversations, objective setting, feedback and development planning
• Contribute to workforce planning activities, working with leaders to identify capability gaps, future resourcing needs and support recruitment planning
• Develop initiatives to strengthen employee ownership through employee engagement, experience and wellbeing, ensuring actions are implemented and impact is monitored and fed back
• Support the implementation of people policies by ensuring they are understood, applied consistently and embedded effectively
• Support the delivery of learning and development initiatives, helping to build capability and ensure uptake and application within teams
• Provide input into reward and remuneration processes, supporting data collection, benchmarking activity and the annual pay review cycle
• Develop strong, credible relationships with managers and employees, role-modelling company values and contributing to a high-performance, accountable and inclusive culture

Requirements

• Proven experience in a HR Business Partner role with success in partnering with managers to embed people processes and drive accountability and performance improvement
• Understanding of performance management frameworks and how to embed them effectively within teams
• Strong business partnering skills with the ability to build trusted relationships with leaders and employees
• Strong track record of delivering operational HR support, including performance management frameworks and employee relations
• Experience supporting organisational and culture change. Experience of employee ownership is an advantage.
• Exposure to workforce planning, talent development, and engagement initiatives
• Strong understanding of core HR practices across the employee lifecycle with relevant employment law and HR best practice
• Awareness of reward and remuneration principles (including benchmarking and pay review processes)
• Ability to influence and challenge constructively at all levels of the organisation
• Excellent coaching skills and experience of upskilling people managers
• Confident decision maker, not afraid to challenge the status quo
• Ability to prioritise, problem solve and work under pressure across competing priorities and multiple deadlines
• Ability to translate strategic plans into operational initiatives that impact business performance
• A self-starter, who is proactive, energetic and able to drive outputs using their own initiative
• High levels of integrity, discretion and professionalism
• CIPD qualified (Level 5 minimum, Level 7 desirable or working towards) or equivalent experience

CDP delivers product development services powered by deep expertise in science, engineering, design, and strategy. We help clients solve complex challenges, accelerate innovation, and bring products to market through integrated capabilities spanning early discovery to commercial launch. We work with organisations in complex, regulated, and fast-moving markets, whilst tailoring our product development approach to sector-specific challenges, regulations, and user needs. Supporting innovation from discovery through to commercial launch. CDP is one of a small number of companies that are 100% employee-owned and people are incentivised to succeed. Partnership and teamwork across disciplines are embedded deeply in our culture, because you never know where the best ideas will come from.

Benefits

• annual salary up to £75,000 depending on experience
• flexible working
• a discretionary bonus
• excellent learning and development opportunities
• a 12% non-contributory pension
• private healthcare
• electric vehicle lease salary sacrifice scheme
• share incentive plan
• 33 days holiday inclusive of bank holidays