Leader - People Success Partner

Zinnov; Chennai District; On-site; INR 4,000,000 - 7,000,000; Full time

Job summary

Zinnov is seeking a Director – HR Business Partnerships to lead the HRBP function for Global Operations in India and globally. You will partner with the Global Head of Operations to translate business priorities into workforce, leadership, and culture strategies.

This hands-on leadership role requires enterprise-level strategy, executive partnership, and team development, building a high-performing HRBP team with strong influence on operating models and organizational effectiveness.

Qualifications

• Proven experience leading HRBP teams in a global/complex operating model.
• Strong capability in designing organization structures and workforce planning.
• Track record of implementing talent management and succession processes.
• Ability to coach senior leaders and drive culture change.
• Analytical mindset with data-driven decision making.

Responsibilities

• Lead the HRBP team supporting Global Operations with strategic partnerships.
• Establish a consistent HRBP operating model aligned with business goals.
• Develop partnerships between HRBPs and business leaders for impact.
• Translate business priorities into organization design, workforce planning, and leadership strategies.
• Coach senior leaders on leadership effectiveness, accountability, and change management.
• Drive talent management, succession planning, and leadership development.
• Monitor engagement and organizational health and partner with cross-functional teams.

Skills

HRBP Leadership

Organization Design

Talent Management

Change Leadership

People Analytics

Job description

About Zinnov

Zinnov is a global management consulting firm that helps organizations make decisions that actually get used — and deliver results that matter. For over two decades, we’ve partnered with leading enterprises, high-growth technology companies, and investors to answer some of the toughest questions they face:

• Where should we invest?
• How do we scale globally?
• What capabilities will win in the next decade?

Our work shapes market entry strategies, global operating models, M&A decisions, and long-term growth bets. We’re known for being data-led, execution-focused, and outcome-driven — not opinion-heavy slideware.

At Zinnov, how you work matters as much as what you deliver. We value independent thinking, crisp communication, and early ownership. With 450+ professionals across 10 global offices, we work across industries including Digital Services, ER&D, Enterprise Software, Semiconductors, Healthcare, BFSI, Automotive, Media & Telecom, and Private Equity.

Zinnov isn’t for everyone. It’s for people who want steep learning curves, honest feedback, and the chance to see their work influence real business decisions — not just presentations.

Why Globalisation Excellence (GE)

Zinnov’s Globalisation Excellence (GE) practice helps enterprises build and scale Global CapabilityCenters(GCCs) end-to-end — from Design & Discovery to Build, Scale, and Run.

In GE, youdon’twork in silos. You:

• Own complex, end-to-end client journeys
• Work across GCC advisory, managed services, and BOT / outsourcing models
• Influence leadership decisions that shape long-term talent and operating strategies

This is where strategy meets execution — and where people leadership plays a defining role.

About the Role

As Director – HR Business Partnerships , you will lead the HR Business Partnering function for a Global Operations organization, serving as a strategic advisor to senior leadership and driving high-impact people strategies across India and global teams.

You will partner closely with the Global Head of Operations and the broader Operations leadership team to translate business priorities into effective workforce, talent, leadership, organizational, and culture strategies.

This is a hands-on leadership role that requires the ability to move seamlessly between enterprise-level strategy, executive partnership, team leadership, and practical execution. You will lead and develop a high-performing HRBP team while strengthening the function’s strategic influence, operating model, and effectiveness.

WhatYou’llDo

HRBP Leadership & Capability Building

• Lead, coach, develop, and hold accountable the HRBP team supporting Global Operations.
• Establish a consistent HRBP operating model focused on strategic partnership, business acumen, proactive problem-solving, and measurable impact.
• Build strong partnership cadences between HRBPs and the business leaders they support.
• Review HRBP priorities, workloads, business coverage, and effectiveness to ensure resourcesremainaligned with organizational needs.
• Establish clear individual and team goals across strategic partnership, talent management, engagement, leadership development, people analytics, and cross-functional collaboration.
• Identifycapability gaps and create targeted development plans to strengthen HRBP effectiveness and strategic contribution.
• Build a culture where HRBPs operate as proactive people strategists and trusted advisors rather than transactional or reactive HR resources.

Executive Partnership & Business Advisory

• Serve as the primary HR Business Partner and trusted advisor to the Global Head of Operations and broader Operations leadership team.
• Develop a deep understanding of business strategy, financial and performanceobjectives, operating metrics, workforce model, client commitments, and future growth requirements.
• Translate business priorities into integrated people strategies covering organization design, workforce capacity, leadership capability, talent, engagement, retention, change, and culture.
• Participate in leadership meetings, business reviews, planning discussions, and major organizational decisions.
• Provide candid, thoughtful, and evidence-based counsel, including challenging assumptions and proposed decisions whenrequired.
• Anticipate workforce, talent, leadership, and organisational risks before theyimpactbusiness performance.
• Coach senior leaders on leadership effectiveness, accountability, communication, performance, team health, and organisational change.

Organization Design & Workforce Planning

• Lead organization design and workforce planning in partnership with business leadership, Finance, Talent Acquisition, and other key stakeholders.
• Assess organizational structures, reporting relationships, spans of control, decision rights, roles, and capabilities against business strategy.
• Identifyorganizational gaps, role duplication, unnecessary complexity, unclear accountability, and barriers to effective decision-making.
• Support reorganisations, integrations, growth initiatives, operating-model changes, and workforce transitions from diagnosis through implementation and stabilization.
• Develop workforce plans thatanticipatefuture volume, capacity, skills, locations, technology, and leadership requirements.
• Use business forecasts, attrition data, productivity information, and talent insights toidentifyfuture workforce needs.
• Help leadersdeterminewhether business needs should be addressed through hiring, development, process improvement, technology, restructuring, or changes in work allocation.

Talent Management & Succession Planning

• Lead consistent talent-review and succession-planning practices across the organization.
• Partner with leaders toidentifycritical roles, high-potential talent, succession risks, readiness gaps, and development priorities.
• Facilitateobjectiveandevidence-based talent calibration discussions while challenging bias and inconsistent standards.
• Ensure succession plans translate into meaningful development actions, stretch assignments, mentoring, and measurable follow-through.
• Partner with Learning & Development to address leadership and capability needsidentifiedthrough talent reviews and business planning.
• Monitor bench strength and talent readiness for critical roles.
• Support career paths and talent movement across geographies, functions, and operational teams.
• Help leaders distinguish between performance, potential, readiness, and role fit when making talent decisions.

Leadership Coaching & Capability Building

• Serve as a coach and advisor to senior leaders, strengthening self-awareness, judgement, communication, accountability, team effectiveness, and people leadership.
• Build leader capability to independently manage people, performance, engagement, and organisational challenges.
• Establish coaching approaches that create leader ownership rather than dependence on HR.
• Identifyrecurring leadership capability gaps and partner with Learning & Development to develop practical solutions.
• Support onboarding and integration of new senior leaders and leaders moving into expanded roles.
• Facilitate leadership discussions, talent conversations, team-effectiveness sessions, and development experiences.
• Reinforce learning through coaching, action planning, and accountability, with a focus ondemonstratedbehaviorchange and business impact.

Engagement, Culture & Organizational Health

• Translate Zinnov’s purpose and values into everyday leadership practices, decisions, andbehaviors.
• Serve as a visible culture champion and ensure consistent reinforcement of organisational values.
• Analyzeengagement surveys, employee feedback, retention information, and other listening data toidentifymeaningful themes and opportunities.
• Guide leaders in developing focused and measurable engagement and organisational-health action plans.
• Coach leaders through difficult feedback and help move conversations from explanation to ownership and action.
• Monitor differences in employee experience across locations, teams, leaders, and workforce populations.
• Identifygaps between stated values and actual leadershipbehaviorsand address them directly and constructively.
• Promote recognition, inclusion, psychological safety, collaboration, and meaningful connection across a global and geographically dispersed workforce.

People Analytics & Business Insights

• Use people data toidentifypatterns, explain business impact, forecast risk, and influence leadership decisions.
• Integrate insights from HR systems, engagement surveys, performance processes, productivity information, attrition, employee relations, and other relevant sources.
• Translate people data into clear, decision-ready narratives covering what is happening, why it matters, what may happen next, and what action isrequired.
• Monitor key workforce indicators including turnover, retention, vacancies, attendance, performance, leadership effectiveness, engagement, employee relations, internal movement, and talent readiness.
• Establish consistent monthly and quarterly people reporting and review routines.
• Identifypredictive trends and early warning signals before they become larger talent, engagement, capacity, or performance concerns.
• Ensure people data is handled appropriately, ethically, objectively, and confidentially.

Change Leadership

• Lead the people agenda for major organizational, operational, workforce, technology, and cultural changes.
• Assess people impact, stakeholder needs, leadership readiness, risks, and communication requirements associated withsignificant change.
• Apply structured change-management approaches to support adoption and sustainedbehaviorchange.
• Coach leaders to communicate change clearly, consistently, and empathetically.
• Identifyresistance, capability gaps, confusion, and adoption barriers and developappropriate interventions.
• Ensure HRBP involvement begins early in changes affecting the workforce.
• Establish feedback loops and measures to evaluate change readiness, adoption, employee sentiment, and reinforcement.

Cross-Functional HR Leadership

• Act as the primary connector between business leaders, HRBPs, and HRCentersof Excellence.
• Partner closely with Talent Acquisition, Learning & Development, Total Rewards, People Operations, Employee Experience, Compliance, Legal, Finance, and other functions.
• Ensure leaders experience HR as one coordinated and aligned team.
• Translate business needs into clear priorities for HRCentersof Excellence.
• Provide feedback on business needs, implementation challenges, and program effectiveness.
• Support enterprise HR initiatives and contribute to the continued development ofZinnov’speople strategy.
• Promote consistency in global people practices while recognizingappropriate localcultural, legal, and workforce considerations.
• Escalate material business, people, compliance, or employee-relations risks appropriately andin a timely manner.

What You Bring