HR Business Partner

About BII

British International Investment is the UK’s development finance institution, owned by the UK Government. With a mission to solve the biggest global development challenges, we aim to create a virtuous circle of investment and impact. Your contribution will be essential. 

It won’t be easy: we do the hardest work in the most complex markets. Be prepared to test your skills, get creative and say your piece as you take on high-profile work as part of a diverse team of exceptionally smart, passionate people. 

In return, you can take your career to all-new places in a culture that rewards curiosity and collaboration, and balances high performance with wellbeing.

BII at a glance

75 years supporting sustainable business growth in developing and emerging markets

£8.1 billion in net assets

1,400+ businesses invested in

950,000 workers in the businesses we support

£9 billion in new investments planned in the next 5 years

600+ people in our diverse global team

3 key development objectives: Productive | Sustainable | Inclusive

Team and role overview

The HR Business Partner team sits within the HRBP, L&D and HR Operations stream within Human Resources. There are two other streams within HR: Reward, Payroll and Benefits and Talent Acquisition Onboarding and Global Mobility. This role works across the various specialist teams.

Purpose

The HRBP role primarily focuses on three core areas: Business Partnering (including employee relations), HR Policy and compliance including the management of all HR templates and handbooks. People and Talent Management, working cohesively with the L&D team and global mobility.
It is a varied generalist role, each of the core areas are equally important in ensuring an effective and efficient business partnering function. Reporting to the Head of HR Business Partnering. The detailed responsibilities are listed below.

Responsibilities

Business Partnering

• Provide efficient, effective and data driven HR updates, advice and coaching to your departments within your client groups.
• Develop and maintain strong and credible stakeholder relationships with department heads, meet with the department heads on a quarterly basis to present HRBP dashboard/HRBP agenda and on an ad hoc basis as required in line with annual cyclical processes i.e. Performance Evaluation Development Programme
• Manage any queries/requests/concerns received from employees or line managers within the respective client group.
• Provide effective and timely updates to the business group (ExCo) head when requested to by the business/Head of HRBP and Director, HRBP and Talent Management.
• Support employee lifecycle processes to ensure organisational effectiveness and operational consistency, working closely with Talent Acquisition for hiring and the Operational teams in relation to resignations, absence management. Working with Talent Acquisition, preparing all job descriptions for new hires.
• Manage employee relation cases for your client group up to Director level, providing regular updates to the Head of HR Business Partnering. This is a key aspect of the role and can be busy at times. HRBPs will need to be able to work independently on these cases (escalating as appropriate) and prioritise effectively.
• Develop an understanding of each department you support, their priorities and challenges. Support L&D as required on department/group offsites/strategy days.
• Work with the business to create action plans following receipt of the bi-annual employee engagement survey.
• Support the business with organisational change/restructures, the HRBP will work with the department heads and business manager to create a business case for the org changes which will be submitted to the People Change Committee. Implement changes as agreed by the committee. Depending on the size and nature of the changes, HRBPs may be asked to support org change across the client groups.
• HRBPs are responsible for working with the business to create job descriptions for new roles, these may also be reviewed as part of the People Change Committee process.

Performance Management

Our PEDP program is designed to manage both performance and development across BII. The HRBP team are integral to the delivery of this program. Led by the Head of HR Business Partnering, the HRBP team are responsible for:

• The annual and midyear performance processes, supporting the business with goal setting, performance discussions, performance ratings and promotions/progressions.
• Run calibration meetings with client groups to ensure the process followed has been fair, to ensure ratings have been applied consistently and appropriately, to review promotion cases and volume of moves.
• At the conclusion of PEDP, ensure job description have been updated to reflect progression and promotion changes. Work with the Director HRBP team to prepare job descriptions for roles governed by SMCR.
• Proactively work with the business to address underperformance issues within their teams.
• The HRBP team will work closely with the L&D team to develop, coach, and assess talent across the organisation.
• HRBPs and L&D will work closely with L&D to develop learning content and support of PEDP and broader talent management.
• The HRBP and L&D team will work together to scope and where appropriate obtain sign off any requests for professional learning and development or coaching to ensure such requests are consistent and business led.

HR Policy

• The team are responsible for ensuring all policies and employee handbooks are up to date; ensuring policies cover BII’s current approach and are in line with legislation for that country.
• The HRBPs play a key role in ensuring we are compliant with local laws and will work with local employment lawyers, you will gain knowledge of employment law across our markets.
• HRBPs should regularly review policies to also check if they align with our Employee Value Proposition. HRBPs will work with the Head of HR Business Partnering to suggest changes to policies to the HRLT, carefully considering the external market trends and the constraints of working for a public organisation.
• Any new changes to policies will need to be communicated to line managers and/or employees; it is the role of the HR Business Partner to ensure their client groups are updated through team meetings /workshops/training as appropriate.
• The team have to make sure they deliver policy updates and handbook reviews on time, in line with audit requirements.

The candidate

Background, skills, aptitude

This role offers lots of variety and opportunity, it can be fast paced, and every day is different, so we are looking for individuals that:

• Thrive working in a busy environment and are able to manage competing priorities.
• Able to work independently on employee relation cases with solid experience managing performance improvement plans, complex absence management cases, disciplinaries and grievances.
• Experience/knowledge of handling employee redundancy cases.
•  Strong written and verbal communication skills to support stakeholder management and policy drafting.
• Experience of collaborating with a client group in a HRBP capacity
• Good MS Office skills
• Presentation skills – able to present confidently to business groups to support policy implementation and cyclical processes i.e. performance calibration meetings.

Our cultural values

We look for team members who aspire, as we do, to work at our best and to be:

• Impact-led, commercially rigorous
• Tenacious in the face of challenges
• Collaborative and caring

British International Investment is committed to diversity and inclusion and welcomes all applicants regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation or educational background.