People Partner
Location: Cardale Park, Harrogate. A hybrid working option is available but it’s important to us to have our team together on site for most of the week.
Hours: 37.5 hours per week although part time hours with a minimum of 30 hours per week across 4 days may be considered.
Salary: Up to £50,000 per annum FTE depending on experience
Make a Difference Every Day
At Oakdale, we believe in care that changes lives. For over 25 years, we’ve been delivering trusted, evidence-based therapies and assessments for children, young people, and adults. As a values-driven organisation, we work with the NHS, schools, local authorities, and private clients, always putting people first.
Now, we’re looking for a People Partner to lead employee engagement and employee relations across the Group.
If you’re passionate about the employee experience, wellbeing, and making a genuine impact, we’d love to hear from you.
The Role – What You’ll Do
Key Responsibilities:
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Contribute significantly to Oakdale’s employee engagement strategy, including engagement surveys, listening groups and action planning.
- Champion Oakdale’s values and culture, designing initiatives that strengthen colleague voice, recognition and wellbeing.
- Lead and manage employee relations casework, including disciplinary, grievance, capability, absence management and dispute resolution, in line with the Acas Code of Practice and UK employment law.
- Provide expert advice, coaching and support to managers to help them handle ER matters fairly, confidently and consistently.
- Chair or advise on formal meetings and hearings as required, ensuring procedural fairness and appropriate documentation.
- Own the review, development and continuous improvement of HR policies and processes, ensuring they reflect best practice and current legislation.
- Contribute to the annual payroll budgeting process and annual pay review process.
- Ensure People function policies and processes meet CQC requirements, contributing to self-evaluation and inspection readiness.
- Line-manage a People Adviser, People Projects Coordinator and People Administrator, allocating work and supporting their development.
- Act as a trusted, credible partner to managers and senior leaders, providing pragmatic, commercially and legally sound HR advice.
About You:
We are looking to recruit an experienced HR professional with a strong track record in employee relations and engagement, ideally gained within health, social care or another regulated sector, who is confident coaching and influencing managers through difficult conversations and passionate about continuously improving how people experience work.
Qualifications
Essential:
CIPD qualification (Level 5 or above), or equivalent experience.
Experience
Essential:
-
Substantial experience in an HR Partner role, with a strong track record of leading complex employee relations casework.
- Sound, up-to-date knowledge of UK employment law and the Acas Code of Practice.
- Experience designing and delivering employee engagement initiatives that lead to measurable improvement.
- Experience owning HR policy development and ensuring compliance and best practice.
- Experience of contributing to payroll budgeting and calculating annual pay review options.
- Experience line-managing and mentoring HR professionals.
Desirable:
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Experience working in a health, social care or other CQC-regulated sector.
- Experience partnering through organisational change, restructure or TUPE.
Knowledge & Skills
Essential:
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Skilled in analysing data and using data to support business decision making.
- Confident coaching and influencing managers at all levels, including in difficult conversations.
- Strong working knowledge of employment law application in practice.
Desirable:
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Familiarity with Employment Hero or a similar cloud-based HRIS platform.
Mobility & Flexibility
Essential:
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Ability and willingness to travel between Oakdale centres as required by service needs.
- Desirable
- Full UK driving licence and access to a vehicle for work purposes
Why Join Oakdale?
At Oakdale, your well-being and growth matter as much as the clients you support. We offer a package designed for balance, flexibility, and long-term career satisfaction, including:
-
33 days’ annual leave (including bank holidays), increasing with service
- Flexible and agile working from day one
- SimplyHealth: 24/7 GP access, counselling, physiotherapy, and more
- Exclusive, heavily discounted rates for you and your family on private ADHD and autism neurodevelopmental assessments, through our own expert service.*
- Fully funded flu vaccines
- Employee Wellbeing Initiative with trained mental health champions
- Smart Pension & Rewards: plan for your future with discounts and cashback
- Enhanced Occupational Sick Pay
- Cycle to Work & Technology Salary Sacrifice schemes
- Employee discount scheme
- Protected CPD days, annual away days, and high-quality training
- Professional registration fees covered (where applicable)
- Opportunities to influence service improvement and innovation
- Laptop, monitor, keyboard, and any additional equipment you need to do your best work
- Discounts apply to dependents living within the same household.
At Oakdale, a leading private mental health service provider, our people are at the heart of everything we do. We’re more than a team - we’re a community of passionate, talented professionals committed to delivering excellence in mental health care, case management and service development
