ER (Employee Relations) Partner

Employee Relations (ER) Partner 
£50,000 to £60,000 plus great benefits (work level 5) 
Hybrid (Manchester/Home), in this role you’ll work from home with occasional travel across the UK (business private mileage will be reimbursed)
11-month fixed-term contract

We’re looking for an ER Partner to support our Life Services teams (Funeralcare & Legal Services). You’ll lead a team of ER Investigators and work with the ER Operations Manager, our outsourced ER provider, and business leaders to keep processes strong, provide insights, and drive improvements.

You’ll partner with senior partners to understand business needs, use ER data to spot risks and trends, and help shape learning. If you’re ready to make an impact and bring your ER expertise, we’d love to hear from you.

What you’ll do

• Act as the strategic ER point of contact by partnering with the designated business area. 
• Provide challenge and support to senior colleagues on a range of ER related topics, from the application of ER policies and processes, and utilisation of our outsourced provider. 
• Bring ER data to life to tell the story behind ER issues, identify and share trends to aid continuous improvement and prevent recurring issues.
• Create and facilitate upskilling sessions with senior stakeholders in ER hot spots to prevent challenges and break down barriers. 
• Forge relationships with other teams across the business, leveraging and challenging their expertise as needed to achieve great results.
• Lead and develop a team of 3 ER Investigators whilst making sure they deliver high-quality, efficient and thorough ER investigations across the business, creating additional value and cost savings.  
• Use data driven insight to inform and support approaches to business and people strategies with senior colleagues.

This role would suit people who have

• Strong relationship-building skills, with experience influencing and partnering senior partners.
• ER expertise with an understanding of Employment Law, Early conciliation, and tribunal procedures.
• Proven leadership experience in managing and guiding teams.   
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, including the ability to explain complex ER topics to non-technical audiences.   
• Experience in interpreting complex data sets, turning this into insight and presenting this to senior colleagues.

Why Co-op?

At Co-op, we’re owned by our members. And because we’re owned by you, we can do right by you. So when you join us, you’re not just taking a job, you’re joining a movement. We’re an organisation that puts people and communities first, and we’re powered by purpose. We want this to be a place where you can thrive, so you’ll also receive:

• An annual bonus (based on personal and business performance)
• 28 days holiday (rising to 32 with service) plus bank holidays 
• A pension with up to 10% employer contributions
• Private healthcare 
• Access to a subsidised onsite gym (at our Manchester HQ)
• Coaching and training to support your career development
• Wagestream app – giving you access to a percentage of your pay as you earn

Building a diverse environment

We’re actively building diverse teams and we welcome applications from everyone. If you have a disability, we can make reasonable adjustments to our recruitment process according to your needs. We're also part of the Disability Confident scheme, meaning we'll always offer an interview to disabled candidates who apply through the scheme if they meet the minimum criteria for a job.

We'll ask whether you’d like to be considered under the Disability Confident scheme when you apply.

If we invite you to take part in the recruitment process for any of our jobs, we’ll ask you if you need any reasonable adjustments to enable you to participate.

You can find out more about our recruitment process at jobs.coop.co.uk/apply-process

You can find out more about the Disability Confident scheme at Disability Confident Scheme - Co-op Colleagues and more about our commitments to diversity and inclusion at Diversity and Inclusion

Please note that we may close applications for this role early.

As part of your application, you'll need to complete an online assessment. This assessment typically takes up to 50 minutes. If you're a current Co-op colleague, this does not need to be completed.