Senior People Business Partner (Part Time)

The Open University UK; Milton Keynes; Hybrid; GBP 59,000 - 67,000; Part time

Job summary

The Open University is seeking a Senior People Business Partner to lead HR initiatives across multiple faculties. This part-time role involves strategic workforce planning, driving employee engagement, and collaborating with leadership to align HR practices with organizational goals. The ideal candidate will have a strong background in HR management, excellent interpersonal skills, and the ability to influence and engage stakeholders effectively.

Benefits

Flexible working arrangements

Qualifications

• 5+ years relevant work experience in HR.
• Experience in strategic and operational HR management.
• Experience working in a matrix organization.

Responsibilities

• Lead development and execution of people plans across multiple units.
• Provide strategic HR support and advice to senior leadership.
• Drive engagement and performance management initiatives.

Skills

Interpersonal skills

Influencing skills

Analytical skills

Problem-solving skills

Communication skills

Collaboration skills

Education

Bachelor's degree in HR management, Law, or Economics

Tools

MS Office

Job description

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Language View profile Employee Login Job Description Senior People Business Partner (Part Time) Apply now Advert Reference Number: 856 Job Location: Milton Keynes Department: People Partnering Salary: £59,139 to £66,537 Pro Rata Closing Date: 27 June 2025 Weekly Working Hours: 22.2 Contract Type: Permanent Fixed Term Contract: End Date: Welsh Language: Not Applicable Job Description:

About the Role

The Open University is seeking a passionate and self-driven Lead People Business Partner to join our team. This role is pivotal and supports the delivery of The University People Plan and People Services activities to Faculty Professional Services departments within the university.
Working closely with Academic and Professional Services Units, and People Services teams, the Lead People Business Partner will take the strategic lead on designing and implementing people services initiatives and projects and local people plan delivery outcomes, that align with university goals, focusing on employee engagement, performance management, talent development, and organisational effectiveness.
Lead People Business Partners. advance the people strategy throughout the organisation. With responsibility for multiple Faculty or Professional Services units of significant complexity/strategic importance. The Lead People Business Partner will also chair multi-disciplinary virtual teams which will include colleagues from Faculties/PS Units as wider People Services colleagues from our communities of expertise (Coe)—and are responsible for driving the people agenda of these groups.

Key Responsibilities

•This is a leadership role where role-holders have co-ownership for the creation and execution of people plans for Multiple Faculties/ Units with a strong acumen and affinity across the units within your portfolio.
•Chairing Virtual teams managing multiple PS teams and resources to develop and deploy solutions to enable People Plan Delivery and enhancement of leadership capability.
•Acts as critical friend to senior leadership, providing HR support, challenge, and advice on complex issues, involving all relevant stakeholders and CoEs and in alignment with University strategic outcomes.
•Partners with business leaders in building strategic workforce plans and be responsible for driving and executing it, to ensure highly effective workforce to deploy the University strategy and University People Plan to meet future growth and economic challenges.
•Leading with People Data and insight, Deliver complex analyses of workforce data; identify key trends and contribute to the creation of people insights that enable the diagnosis of organisation issues, enhancement of employee engagement, and/or improvement of organisational performance.
•Manage relationships with internal clients and act as a business partner to them, building high levels of professional credibility and mutual trust, and managing the deployment of appropriate internal and/or external resources to support in delivering business strategy and plans.
•Driving strategic people decisions, such as talent acquisition, talent management, succession planning, people development, performance management as well as organisational design, to ensure workforce capital is optimally managed.
•Change & Organisation Development: acting as a change agent and applies relevant Organisation design expertise during business transformations.
•Diversity & Inclusion: acting as an ambassador of the diversity & inclusion-strategy.
•Engagement: supporting and coaching leaders to help them grow the engagement of our people. Partners with departments to drive employee engagement and Organisational Health

Skills and Experience

Personal Profile
•Bachelor / University degree in HR management, Law, or Economics or equivalent experience
•You have 5+ years relevant work experience in human resources, or are an experienced people manager in a business environment with an affinity and passion for HR/People , with built core capabilities in any of the HR/People functions in Partnering, Workforce , Talent & Leadership Development, Performance and Rewards, Change , and/or Employee relations.
•Used to working in a matrix Organisation.
•Excellent interpersonal and influencing skills, with the courage to take a stand when necessary.
•A proven change agent with a strong results orientation, determination, and tenacity, injects pace and focus.
•A team player, with strong communication, collaboration, and stakeholder management skills
•A strategic and commercial mindset coupled with strong execution skills.
•You have profound communication, convincing and advisory skills with the ability to influence business leaders.
•You can ‘get people on board’ and ensure necessary buy-in from stakeholders with a high level of gravitas and influence at senior level.
•You have a strong strategic focus and an ability to translate the people vision into improved organisational performance.
•Very good analytical and problem-solving skills
•Advanced user of MS Office (especially Power Point and Excel

Key Attributes:
•Anticipates and balances the needs of multiple stakeholders.
•Ensures that own efforts meet the needs and requirements of internal and external stakeholders.
•Works to identify all relevant issues and satisfy the interests of multiple stakeholders during the decision-making process.
•Sees ahead to future possibilities and translates them into breakthrough strategies.
•Knows what to prioritize for the greatest strategic impact on the Organisation. Takes industry and market trends into account in decisions.
•Explores possibilities that may impact the team or Organisation in the future.
•Builds partnerships and works collaboratively with others to meet shared objectives. Readily involves others to accomplish goals; stays in touch and shares information; discourages "us versus them" thinking; shows appreciation for others' ideas and input.
•Makes sense of complex, high quantity, and sometimes contradictory information to effectively solve problems.
•Looks at complex issues from multiple angles.
•Explores issues to uncover underlying issues and root causes.
•Sees the main consequences and implications of different options.
•Applies knowledge of organisation and sector to advance the Organisation's goals.
•Clearly understands how own activities relate to critical business drivers.
•monitors business news and market changes for impact on the business or on own expertise area; uses this to shape decisions.
•Holds self and others accountable to meet commitments.
•Accepts responsibility for own work, both successes and failures.
•Handles fair share and does not make excuses for problems. Usually meets commitments to others.
•Builds strong-identity teams that apply their diverse skills and perspectives to achieve common goals.
•Holds constructive dialogue with the team regularly; takes multiple perspectives into account when making decisions.
•Commits to and prioritizes the team's decisions in most situations; conveys team spirit.

Essential Requirements

As part of the application process, you will be expected to submit your CV and a Supporting Statement (maximum of 1000 words) that demonstrates why this role and demonstrates your experience of working within multi disciplinary HR or people services teams

Interview Dates:

1st stage, 16th- 18th July and 2nd stage w/c 21st July – This will involve pre interview assessment work

We are open to discussions about flexible working. Whether it’s a job share, part time, compressed hours or another working arrangement. Please reach out to us to discuss what may work for you and the role.

Early closing date notification

We may close this job advert earlier than the published closing date where a satisfactory number of applications are received. We would therefore encourage early applications.

It is anticipated that a hybrid working pattern can be adopted for this role, where the successful candidate can work from home and the office. However, as this role is contractually aligned to our Milton Keynes office it is expected that some attendance in the office will be required when necessary and in response to business needs. We anticipate this being once a month for regular teams days, then as required depending work activities, not usually more than twice a month.

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