THE MISSION
NKORA is an independent group of 9 speciality coffee shops, with a team of around 50 people.
As we grow, we want to make sure we keep the personal culture that has been an important part of NKORA from the beginning.
We are looking for someone to take ownership of People & Culture across NKORA. You do not necessarily need to come from a traditional HR background, and you do not need to have been a Head of People before.
What matters more to us is that you are naturally good with people, organised, confident and interested in what makes a team work well. You might currently be in a people, recruitment, operations, hospitality or multi-site management role and feel ready to take on something bigger.
We want someone who will get to know the teams properly, spend time in the shops and become someone our managers and employees know and trust. At the same time, you need to be comfortable bringing structure, following things through and dealing with difficult situations when they arise.
This is a senior role reporting directly to the founders and working closely with the Operations team.
1. CULTURE & COMMUNITY
- Connecting the shops: helping our 9 locations feel part of one business rather than operating independently from one another.
- Events: organising staff socials, latte art throwdowns, team meet-ups, supplier cuppings, store openings and other occasions that bring people together.
- Culture: helping us maintain a working environment that is warm, professional and welcoming, and making sure that is consistent across the business.
2. THE STAFF JOURNEY
- Recruitment: taking responsibility for recruitment across the business and finding good people who are suited to NKORA and the way we work, rather than simply filling vacancies.
- Onboarding: owning the first stages of a new employee's time with us, making sure people are welcomed properly and have the training, information and support they need.
- Retention and progression: creating clearer routes for people to develop from barista to supervisor, manager and beyond, and helping us retain good people for longer.
- Manager development: supporting and coaching our site managers so they become confident dealing with people issues themselves and handle them fairly and consistently.
3. PEOPLE DATA & REPORTING
We want this role to have a good understanding of what is actually happening across the business, rather than relying only on anecdotal feedback.
- Monthly people report: producing a clear monthly view of attrition, sickness, lateness, starters, leavers and other useful people measures, together with your view on anything we should be addressing.
- Labour cost: working with Operations to track labour as a percentage of sales by site and understanding the reasons behind any problems, whether that is rota structure, shift patterns, opening hours, staffing levels or something else.
- Systems: taking ownership of our rota and timesheet systems, including clock-in accuracy and the quality of the information we are getting from them.
4. HR & STRATEGY
- Working with Operations: working closely with our Head of Operations, with a clear division of responsibilities between the two roles. The People function should support the shops without making their operation unnecessarily complicated.
- Employee relations: leading disciplinary, grievance, absence, performance and other employee matters calmly and properly, involving the founders or external advisers where appropriate.
- HR administration: making sure contracts, right-to-work documentation, employee records, payroll information and staff queries are dealt with accurately and on time.
- Policy: keeping our handbook, policies and employment processes up to date, practical and useful to managers rather than simply having policies for the sake of it.
WHO WE ARE LOOKING FOR
We are open-minded about someone's exact background, but we think the right person will probably have:
- Experience in a people or HR role within a multi-site hospitality, retail or food and drink business. Speciality coffee experience would be useful but is not essential.
- The confidence to work directly with founders, managers and employees at every level of the business.
- A practical understanding of recruitment, employee relations, performance management and the day-to-day realities of running a people function.
- A good working knowledge of UK employment practice, with the judgement to recognise when external advice is needed.
- Confidence with numbers. You do not need to be a finance person, but you should be comfortable looking at labour percentages, absence, attrition and other people data and forming a view from it.
- The ability to deal with difficult conversations fairly, calmly and directly.
- Experience managing an external supplier or agency and making sure agreed work is delivered.
- Good judgement about NKORA as a brand and business. You should be able to tell when something is right for us and when it is not.
- Strong organisation. There will often be several very different things happening at once, from recruitment and manager support to an employee issue or a photo shoot.
- A willingness to spend time in the shops. This is not primarily a desk-based role. We expect the Head of People & Culture to know the teams and to be present across our locations.
WHAT WE OFFER
- Salary: £35,000–£45,000 depending on experience, plus up to 12% annual performance bonus.
- A senior role reporting directly to the founders, with significant responsibility for how the People function develops as NKORA grows.
- The opportunity to shape the way we recruit, develop and look after our teams
- An independent, privately owned business with 9 existing shops, further growth planned and a new product launching.
- 28 days inclusive of bank holidays
- Standard workplace pension scheme
- All machine-made drinks free when on shift
- Lunch on shift
APPLY
Please send your CV and a short note explaining why you are interested in joining NKORA to [email protected].
Pay: £35,000.00-£45,000.00 per year
Work Location: In person
