Talent Development Strategy Lead

Ridge and Partners LLP; Birmingham; On-site; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

Ridge and Partners LLP is seeking a strategic Head of Talent Development to shape leadership, talent and organisational capability for sustainable growth. You’ll report to the Chief People Officer within the People Leadership team, translating needs into scalable solutions that improve performance and create clear career pathways.

You’ll lead a Talent Development function focused on leadership, early careers, learning culture, and inclusion, partnering with senior leaders and external partners

Qualifications

• Significant experience leading talent, learning, organisational development or capability activity within a complex and growing business.
• Proven success developing and delivering business wide talent and development strategies aligned to business priorities.
• Strong expertise across leadership development, talent development, career development, organisational learning and capability building.
• Experience developing career pathways, capability or skills frameworks and translating current and future workforce capability needs into practical, scalable development solutions.
• Experience of early careers development, including graduates, apprentices, professional qualifications or charterships.
• Strong understanding of modern learning approaches, including digital, blended and workplace-based development.
• Experience leading and developing a specialist team and managing significant programmes, budgets and external partners.
• Strong commercial acumen, with the ability to prioritise activity according to organisational need, impact and value.
• Credibility and confidence to advise, influence and constructively challenge senior leaders.
• Strong analytical skills, using data and insight to identify priorities, assess capability risks and evaluate impact.
• Experience shaping inclusive talent and development practices, and embedding inclusion and belonging across leadership, learning, careers and progression.
• Excellent communication, facilitation and relationship-building skills, with the ability to simplify complexity and turn strategic thinking into practical action.
• A relevant professional qualification or equivalent depth of experience in talent, learning, organisational development or a related discipline.
• Hogan certification or experience using Hogan assessments would be desirable.
• Resilience, sound judgement, pragmatism and a collaborative leadership style.

Responsibilities

• Shape and deliver Talent Development strategy, enabling growth within our business strategy and People strategy.
• Lead the evolution of manager, leadership and high-potential development, including coaching and mentoring.
• Establish a consistent, high-quality learning culture using digital learning, technology and AI.
• Develop career development framework with pathways, skills mapping and capability frameworks.
• Define business-wide learning approach across leadership, professional, technical and core development.
• Shape development aspects of the employee lifecycle, onboarding, qualifications and chartership.
• Oversee inclusion and belonging across leadership, learning, careers and succession.
• Advise the Chief People Officer and senior leaders on capability and development.
• Partner with People Advisory on talent identification and succession planning.
• Collaborate to enhance Career Conversations and annual performance cycle.
• Work with Head of Talent Acquisition on early careers and growth planning.
• Use data and insights to identify capability priorities and measure impact.
• Lead the Talent Development team, manage budgets and external partnerships.
• Shape awards and external recognition to showcase culture and employer brand.
• Maintain external perspective on emerging talent and development practice.

Skills

Talent development leadership

Leadership development

Career development

Organisational learning

Capability building

Career pathways

Skills frameworks

Capability mapping

Early careers

Digital learning

Blended learning

Team leadership

Program management

Budget management

External partnerships

Commercial acumen

Stakeholder management

Data analytics

Inclusion and belonging

Communication skills

Hogan assessments

Resilience

Job description

Ridge and Partners LLP is seeking a strategic Head of Talent Development to shape leadership, talent and organisational capability for sustainable growth. You’ll report to the Chief People Officer within the People Leadership team, translating needs into scalable solutions that improve performance and create clear career pathways.

You’ll lead a Talent Development function focused on leadership, early careers, learning culture, and inclusion, partnering with senior leaders and external partners