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Job summary

Main area
Employee Relations
Grade
Band 8a
Contract
Permanent
Hours
Full time - 37.5 hours per week
Job ref
275-0109-PEOPBP
Employer
Medway NHS Foundation Trust
Employer type
NHS
Site
Medway Maritime Hospital
Town
Gillingham
Salary
per annum/pro rata
Closing
16/09/2025 23:59

Employer heading

Medway NHS Foundation Trust logo

People Business Partner

Band 8a

Do you have the ambition and vision to deliver the Best of Care by the Best People?

Here at Medway, we pride ourselves on working together as one to ensure that our shared vision of Better, Best, Brilliant is achieved

Our Trust is a great choice for people who want to develop their career in an ambitious and dynamic environment; our employees are able to choose the coverage and supplemental benefits that best fit their needs and those of their families. This includes the promotion of flexible working opportunities across the Trust, we are able to give our employees flexibility on where, when and the hours they work.

Our culture and values are what drives Medway NHS Foundation Trust and is the heartbeat of who we are as an organisation. It is important that you understand and to refer to our values when you are completing your application and always reflect our values throughout your employment with the Trust.

Job overview

To provide a professional strategic HR service, ensuring up to date expert, consistent advice, support and practice covering all staff.

The People Business Partner (PBP) will be an integral member of the divisional team, supporting all workforce issues and ensuring that the workforce is aligned to achieve the business priorities and objectives;

The PBP will drive the development of and monitor divisional level workforce plans that support the delivery of strategic objectives both internal and external to the organisation; leading on supporting senior leaders in division and business areas in developing and implementing divisional workforce strategies;

Working in partnership with key customers and Stakeholders to develop and deliver HR and OD plans to enhance how we efficiently and effectively attract, select, recruit, develop, retain and performance manage our people. This includes, talent management, performance, resourcing, engagement, capability development and supporting leaders and managers to deliver enhanced and sustained HR and OD performance.

The PBP will play a proactive and essential part in identifying and delivering interventions needed to support cultural transformation within business areas, to improve employee experience and service delivery in line with the Trust People strategy.   

Main duties of the job

  • Business Strategy and objectives; working in partnership with senior leaders to deliver business strategy
  • Improving People Management Capability, develop and oversee plans to improve people management skills 
  • Workforce Performance Productivity, ensure accurate provision of workforce data and lead on development of workforce plans 
  • Lead of on the development of Workforce and Succession Planning
  • Lead and deliver change management programmes 
  • General Employee Relations advice 
  • Cultural transformation; proactively work to identify and support divisions to improve culture. Including delivery of interventions such as facilitation, coaching and listening events 

Working for our organisation

Do you have the ambition and vision to deliver our mission of the Best of Care by the Best of People providing excellent care, every time?

Here at Medway, we pride ourselves on working together as one to ensure that our shared vision is achieved for our patients.

As a key partner in the healthcare of our local population, we are keen to deliver this as an outcome of our Trust-wide strategy – Patient First. Using an Operational Excellence approach to align our priorities and operational management structures, we are just over a year and half into our Patient First deployment. We are looking for creative, skilled people to join our Transformation Team and further support us on this journey.

Our culture and values define us here at Medway NHS Foundation Trust and are the heartbeat of who we are as an organisation.

Our BEST values underpin Patient First and are at the core of the care we give to our patients, the support we offer to our staff and our overall leadership approach:

B – Bold

E – Every person counts

S – Sharing and open

T - Together

Our Trust is a great choice for people who want to develop their career in an ambitious and dynamic environment; our employees are able to choose the coverage and supplemental benefits that best fit their needs and those of their families. This includes the promotion of flexible working opportunities across the Trust.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

 

Business Strategy and Objectives

 

·         Work in partnership with senior leaders in the divisions to deliver Trust and divisional business strategy and objectives by:

 

·         Ensuring that workforce issues are fully considered in business strategy;

 

·         Developing divisional workforce strategy in line with the Trust’s Workforce Strategy, vision and priorities. This will include supporting and driving; business planning, business critical posts, talent management, succession planning, effective and appropriate use of temporary workforce etc.

 

·         Support divisional management teams on identifying and delivering workforce related cost improvement programs (CIP) across the Division, resulting in the associated savings;

 

·         Supporting divisional teams in developing and implementing plans to improve performance and productivity to achieve delivery of high quality patient services, operational and financial targets in conjunction with divisional management teams.

 

Workforce Performance and Productivity

 

·         To ensure the effective provision of accurate and timely workforce data and support managers to interpret and analyse data to enable productivity gains including leading on the development of local plans/strategies to target and improve performance.

 

·         Actively contribute to the development of strategies to improve motivation, engagement and attendance of staff.

 

·         Develop and maintain divisional Workforce Intelligence dashboards (data systems) which will be presented to the divisions on a regular basis and at Trust wide performance review meetings. The data systems development will be ongoing and will incorporate a number of HR and Finance data sources.

 

·         To lead on the development of annual workforce plans that are reflective of business planning by working closely with the senior leaders in the divisions and business areas. Monitor trends in relation to workforce resourcing and take appropriate action by commissioning the resourcing teams to undertake recruitment campaigns where relevant etc.

 

 

Cultural Transformation

 

·         Proactively work to diagnositically identify and support the division with creating action plans where interventions are needed to improve culture, values and behaviours in business areas; including triangulating various information sources such as staff survey results, pulse surveys, ER casework themes and workforce data

·         In conjunction with OD and Well-being colleagues to design and implement appropriate interventions to improve culture and staff behaviours in identified business areas

·         Provide direct support to business area to improve culture and performance, which may include listening events and facilitation; and in turn work closely with OD colleagues to commission interventions for more complex issues

 

 

 

 

 

Improving People Management Capability

 

·         Develop and oversee the implementation of plans within directorates to improve the people management skills of senior leaders and managers by:

 

·         Using measurements of performance, effectiveness and staff engagement to assess management capability within directorates;

 

·         Lead and manage the HR interface with managers and staff in the organisation, providing expert advice and support on employee relations issues, offering terms and conditions advice, providing expert advice on complex HR cases to managers

 

·         Identifying appropriate support and measures aimed at improving capability;

 

·         Coaching leaders and managers to develop skills and competencies for effective people management necessary for them to fulfil their operational roles. Work in collaboration with education and Training department to design and deliver training and development programmes and briefing update sessions in matters of HR policy and practice at all levels in the organisation.

 

 

Change Management

 

·         To lead and deliver on the TUPE of services, coordinating all aspects of the programme, liasing with external and internal stakeholders.

 

·         To deliver key HR initiatives and change programmes ensuring that they are delivered in accordance with agreed requirements and in line with required best practice and associated legislative drivers. Where relevant benefits realisation exercise should be conducted and introduction of new ways of working supported by use of technology.

 

·         To work with workforce and wider HR colleagues on organisation-wide change programmes.

 

·         To act as an advocate of change and support managers in identifying and implementing workforce modernisation including identification of new ways of working role redesign and improved performance measurement systems which are patient focused and improve service delivery.

 

Employee Relations

 

 

·         To support the ER agenda by overseeing specific ER activity across the division and business areas, working with the Head of ER and ER Team to review casework as necessary and provide support in addressing issues within their divisions.

 

·         To advise and sit on formal  hearings for ER cases when required and assist with the preparation and delivery of management reports.

 

·         Liaise with the ER team on Employee Relations matters and Resolutions & Investigations Team on managing complex ER cases through advice and coaching, ensuring the approach is pragmatic, providing necessary development and coaching to the ER Advisors where appropriate

 

·         Interpret and advise business areas on employment legislation and best practice on Employee Relation matters, working closely with the ER Team to ensure efficient and prompt resolution of ER casework

 

·         To ensure ER Performance indicators are in place to monitor activity and quality and take action as required.

 

 

Corporate Duties

 

·         Work closely with the Organisational development team, Equality Leads and other HR & OD collleagues to identify and create appropriate development initiatives to improve management capabilities and embed positive workforce cultures.

 

·         Champion the provision of an HR service to the Trust which is focused on supporting directorates and managers to achieve outcomes based on the provision of a quality service to patients and is line with the vision, purpose, priorities and objectives of the Trust.

 

·         Provide line-managers and staff with professional, comprehensive and timely HR advice and support on complex, sensitive and contentious HR issues, management of change and TUPE, ensuring that organisational and legislative requirements are met and standards of good practice are maintained.

·         To produce reports for designated area and for the HR department when required.

 

·         Support as necessary the implementation of Trust HR initiatives (National Staff Survey, Staff Friends and Family Test, Flu Vaccination Programme etc. NHS people promise);

 

·         Participate in regional HR related forums/events, as appropriate, in order to provide the Trust’s perspective and obtain information for sharing and dissemination;

 

·         To actively promote the Trust’s inclusion strategy acting as a role model for diversity issues and ensuring that these are routinely considered as business as usual;

 

·         Support the development and review of HR policies ensuring all existing, new or amended policies are implemented in a timely fashion across the Trust and managers coached / trained as required;

 

·         Involve and engage HR colleagues to provide operational support for directorates.

 

·         Direct managers and staff to the intranet and/or first call advisory team for advice on terms, conditions, trust policies, and procedures.

 

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria
  • Educated to Masters Level, or equivalent
  • CIPD Member
  • Postgrad Diploma in HRM (level 7 or equivalent)
  • Coaching or conflict resolution, or commitment to undertake
Desirable criteria
  • Project Management

Knowledge

Essential criteria
  • Up to date knowledge of TUPE and change management processes
  • Up to date knowledge of Employment Legislation
  • Knowledge of NHS T&Cs

Experience

Essential criteria
  • Experience of Coordinating Change programmes, including TUPE, or delivering change
  • Experience of working within the business to improve performance and productivity
  • Experience providing a range of HR advice around application of policies
  • Working with a range of data to support workforce intelligence and improvements
  • Business or Workforce Planning
  • Supporting managers with applying ER policies

Employer certification / accreditation badges

No smoking policyPositive about disabled peopleAge positiveDefence Employer Recognition Scheme (ERS) - BronzeDefence Employer Recognition Scheme (ERS) - SilverDisability confident employerNHS Rainbow badgeStep into health

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post will require a submission for Disclosure to be made to check for any unspent criminal convictions.

Documents to download

Apply online now

Further details / informal visits contact

Name
Emma Wilson
Job title
Head of Employee Relations & Business Partnering
Email address
[email protected]
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