Senior HR Business Partner

Senior HR Business Partner

Band: UKRI Band F • Salary: £58,589 gross per annum • Location: Swindon • Hybrid Working (average 2/3 days in office) • Contract: Fixed Term/Contractor for 9 months • Reports to: Deputy Director HR - Innovate UK • Application Deadline: 24 July 2026

Job Overview

An experienced HR Business Partner will build excellent relationships with leaders across the organization, lead a team providing a full HR service, and deliver key initiatives supporting the UKRI People Strategy with a focus on organisational change.

Key Responsibilities and Accountabilities

• Support the development of a local people strategy to deploy appropriate processes and solutions throughout the business (including workforce planning, reward and performance management, culture and values).
• Deliver local people change management, organisation design, and restructuring programmes.
• Work with HR and Innovate UK colleagues to ensure that HR initiatives and proposed changes are prioritised, appropriate, well planned, and well delivered, working closely with senior leadership as required.
• Provide expert advice and guidance on Employee Relations, HR queries and ER casework.
• Act as deputy for the Deputy Director of HR to ensure appropriate levels of support and management are available to the Innovate UK HR team at all times.
• Develop trusted partnering relationships with leaders and managers, building professional credibility and mutual trust.
• Support leaders in navigating business transformation and culture change activities through advice, challenge, coaching, and being a critical friend.
• Ensure effective HR service delivery to managers and employees, reviewing themes arising from queries, requests, casework, and initiatives, addressing issues and developing appropriate solutions.
• Co develop and deliver a programme of interventions to capture and prioritise current and future skill/capability requirements as part of the Talent and Skills strategy, incorporated into learning and development programmes.
• Provide challenge, proposals, and interventions for organisational design and restructuring, improved ways of working, team effectiveness, productivity, morale, and changing working practices.
• Support the rollout of new initiatives (e.g., workforce planning, performance management, leadership, and learning), engaging leaders to secure buy in and delivery against UKRI and Innovate UK objectives.
• Oversee development and delivery of people related planning initiatives (e.g., workforce and budget plans, risk registers) to ensure agenda is understood and debated by managers and leaders.
• With Resourcing, other HR Business Partners and HR colleagues, support the employee life cycle - effective attraction/selection/hiring, appointment, redeployment, secondment, exit and termination as needed.
• Support the delivery and local implementation of the annual HR business lifecycle and manage the local deployment of reward and performance management.
• Support the development of local people management capability, encouraging adoption of self service.
• Analyse and gather insight from HR data, surveys and other feedback to monitor and report on KPIs, and EDI, diagnosing issues and escalations as necessary.
• Maintain oversight of the IUK casework portfolio, identifying risks, themes, and interventions.
• Provide end to end casework support, embedding best practice methodologies for all types of case work across the HR team.
• Coach and support the team managing cases, ensuring consistent and appropriate handling.
• Lead more complex casework within business areas, leading investigations and coaching managers through processes with higher risk or potential legal challenge.
• Deliver and support HR programmes to embed initiatives, support cultural and behavioural change and deliver transformation projects of varying scope, providing risk assurance to stakeholders.
• Support the local delivery of a range of HR projects and programmes, prioritising and delivering with impact and pace, following recognised portfolio, programme and project management methods.

Person Specification

• Essential: University degree in HR or Organisation Development or equivalent professional experience.
• Essential: CIPD membership and/or equivalent professional experience.
• Essential: Demonstrable experience of successfully leading in complex organisational environments with organisational development and people change experience.
• Essential: Experience in developing local people focused interventions within an overarching HR strategy and frameworks (performance management, talent, leadership, culture change).
• Preferred: Demonstrable collaboration skills and experience of influencing stakeholders and decision makers.
• Preferred: Experience in using data and analytics to demonstrate impact and return on investment.
• Preferred: Strong influencing and communication skills, empowering diverse teams to drive change, engagement, capability development, inclusion and diversity.
• Preferred: Experience managing and prioritising multiple change management and project management workstreams.
• Competencies: Thinking and problem solving, stakeholder management, communication, influencing, self awareness / self management, strategic awareness, working with others, project management.

Travel Requirements

Swindon/London based with occasional national travel.

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

InnovateUK is a diverse workforce. We encourage applications from everyone and are committed to treating all candidates fairly, respectfully and with dignity. We are an equal opportunities employer. Applicants requiring reasonable adjustments for disabilities or special needs may request support during the application and assessment process.

Benefits

30 days' annual leave, 10.5 public and privilege days, flexible working hours, an exceptional defined benefit pension scheme, and access to support networks and discount schemes.