People Operations Manager

The People Operations Manager is responsible for ensuring our people processes, systems and policies run smoothly, efficiently and at scale. This role owns the end-to-end employee lifecycle, drives operational excellence across the People function, and partners closely with Talent, People Partners, Finance and wider business stakeholders to deliver an exceptional employee experience.

What you'll do

Operational Excellence & Process Ownership

• Own and optimise the end-to-end People lifecycle processes (onboarding, offboarding, changes, probations, contract changes, references, etc.).
• Lead ongoing process improvement initiatives
• Ensure all compliance requirements and regulatory expectations (i.e. SMCR) are met.
• Review and evolve internal People workflows ensuring they are scalable, simple, and employee-centric.
• Maintain robust documentation and knowledge bases for all People Ops processes.
• Partner closely with Finance and Payroll to ensure accurate, timely data flows and strengthen end-to-end pay-related processes.

People Technology & Data

• Act as system expert for HRIS (HiBob) and related People Tech (ATS, performance systems, integrations).

Employee Experience & Service Delivery

• Oversee the People inbox/service desk and ensure timely, high-quality support to employees and managers.
• Lead People Operations service delivery, identifying bottlenecks and proactively improving turnaround times.
• Ensure onboarding and offboarding experiences are consistent, inclusive and aligned with our culture.
• Work with the Office Team to ensure a seamless operational experience for employees.

Reward & Benefits

• Partner with Payroll and People Partners on the execution of pay cycles.
• Implement changes and updates made to our compensation and benefits structure.
• Monitor benefits take-up and keep up-to-date with external market trends.
• Collaborate with Reward on biannual salary benchmarking, develop recommendations on employee salary bands and update where appropriate in our compensation tool.

People Team Collaboration

• Line manage and develop People Coordinator, fostering high performance and operational excellence.
• Act as a trusted partner to People and Talent Partners and wider organisation on People processes and policy interpretation.
• Support People Team initiatives, People Ops roadmap delivery and wider cultural/engagement initiatives.
• Contribute to broader People Team project work such

Who you are

• 5+ years’ experience as an owner in the People Operations space, ideally within a fast-paced scale-up or similar environment.
• You consider your skill level with excel/google sheets advanced
• You have a good level of core analytical skills
• Demonstrable experience owning and improving People processes at scale.
• Strong HRIS experience (HiBob preferred; experience with workflows, automations or integrations is a plus).
• Solid understanding of UK employment law, compliance requirements and best-practice People Ops governance.
• Experience managing or coaching junior team members.

Experience and skills

• Highly organised, process-driven and able to simplify complexity.
• A continuous improvement mindset with proven ability to streamline, automate and optimise workflows.
• Strong data literacy - comfortable working with reports, dashboards and People metrics.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills.
• Thrives in a fast paced, evolving environment with shifting priorities.
• A proactive, low-ego team player who drives clarity and operational excellence and is keen to collaborate with other team members.