The Northern Collective
Head of People
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HEAD OF PEOPLE
Talent, Learning, and Progression
Location: Hathersage head office, with regular travel across Sheffield, North Derbyshire and the Peak District
Contract: Permanent, full-time
Reporting to: Operations Director / executive leadership team
Scope: Group-wide across hospitality, retail and leisure venues
Working pattern: Primarily site-based and visible, with flexibility around operational needs
WE ARE PEOPLE. WE ARE PASSION. WE ARE PROUD.
About The Northern Collective
The Northern Collective is an independent hospitality, retail and leisure group based across Sheffield and the Peak District. Across its venues, the shared ambition is simple: great service, exceptional experiences and memorable moments for every guest. As the group grows and develops more venues, its people capability must grow with it.
The opportunity
This is a build-and-lead role for a commercial, hands-on people specialist who can create a dependable talent engine and turn learning into visible career progression. Our Head of People will make it easier to attract excellent people, help them become confident and capable quickly, and give high performers compelling reasons to build their careers within the Collective.
Working closely with venue leaders and the executive team, you will translate growth plans into workforce plans, hiring priorities, structured onboarding, practical training and a stronger internal leadership pipeline. You will also provide pragmatic oversight of the wider people agenda, ensuring that culture, systems and employment practice support consistent delivery.
Role purpose
To build the people capability that enables The Northern Collective to grow and maintain the character, service standards and local pride that make its venues distinctive - with particular accountability for talent recruitment, internal training and career progression.
Indicative focus of the role
- Talent acquisition & workforce planning (45%)
- The right people hired predictably into priority roles
- Learning, development & progression (35%)
- People gain skills faster and can see a future in the group
- People leadership, operations & culture (20%)
- Managers are equipped and core people practices are consistent
The percentages signal priority, not fixed timesheets.
What you will own
1. Talent acquisition & workforce planning
- Turn venue plans, seasonal trading patterns and group growth priorities into an integrated workforce and recruitment plan, with clear role, timing and budget assumptions.
- Own recruitment end to end for critical operational, specialist and leadership roles - from role design and sourcing through assessment, offer, onboarding hand-off and early-retention review.
- Build proactive talent pools for recurring and hard-to-fill roles across front of house, kitchens, coffee, bakery, retail, venue management and head office functions.
- Develop a distinctive employer proposition and careers experience that reflects the Collective's independence, variety, local roots and genuine opportunities to progress.
- Create productive routes to talent through local networks, hospitality and culinary education, apprenticeships, referrals, community partnerships, social channels and specialist search where needed.
- Introduce consistent, inclusive and evidence-based selection: strong job briefs, structured interviews, practical assessment and disciplined candidate communication.
- Coach hiring managers to make faster, better and fairer decisions while maintaining a warm, high-quality candidate experience.
- Use an applicant tracking system and clear reporting to understand time to fill, cost and source quality, offer acceptance, candidate experience and retention at 30, 90 and 180 days.
- Personally lead priority searches when the business needs pace, discretion or specialist market reach; use agencies selectively and manage value and performance tightly.
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2. Learning, development & progression
- Create a practical group learning strategy that connects role capability directly to guest experience, service standards, commercial performance and safe, confident operations.
- Build a consistent 30/60/90-day onboarding journey, while preserving the local personality of each venue and tailoring skills content by role.
- Define clear skill and behaviour standards for key roles, supported by role-based learning pathways, on-the-job practice, observation and sign-off.
- Establish The Northern Collectives manager pathway for aspiring supervisors, first-line managers and experienced venue leaders, with a strong emphasis on coaching, performance, communication and commercial ownership.
- Create transparent career pathways so colleagues can understand the skills, behaviours and experiences required for their next step across venues, brands and functions.
- Embed talent reviews and succession planning for business-critical positions; identify ready-now and ready-later talent and agree purposeful development actions.
- Expand development through coaching, mentoring, cross-venue experience, secondments, apprenticeships and external qualifications where they add clear value.
- Equip venue managers to own everyday learning rather than relying on head office, with simple toolkits, train-the-trainer support and regular quality checks.
- Measure learning by capability and business outcomes - including time to competence, internal fill rate, progression, retention and leadership bench strength - not attendance alone.
The wider people agenda
- Act as a trusted, visible adviser to the executive team and venue leaders, balancing empathy with clear commercial judgement.
- Set a simple people operating rhythm: workforce reviews, recruitment priorities, talent reviews, manager capability actions and group-wide people reporting.
- Strengthen the quality and consistency of performance conversations, feedback, recognition, engagement and employee relations across the portfolio.
- Maintain fit-for-purpose people policies, processes, records and systems, working with specialist advisers where appropriate and keeping practices aligned with UK employment requirements.
- Use people data to identify risks and opportunities in turnover, absence, vacancy, labour capability, progression and engagement, then turn insight into practical action.
- Own the people budget and supplier relationships; build the internal team and external support model required as the group expands.
- Champion an inclusive, respectful culture in which high standards and a strong sense of belonging reinforce one another.
What success looks like in the first 12 months
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First 90 days
Listen, diagnose and stabilise
- A group workforce plan; agreed priority vacancies; baseline people metrics; critical-role risk map; clear manager and employee listening themes.
Months 3-6
Build the core talent system
- Consistent recruitment toolkit; improved careers story and sourcing mix; 30/60/90 onboarding; hiring-manager training; live recruitment dashboard.
Months 6-12
Embed learning and progression
- Role pathways and skill standards; manager development launched; first talent and succession review complete; internal moves visible; outcome measures improving.
About you
You are a credible people leader who enjoys being close to operations. You can move comfortably from a board-level workforce discussion to a hiring-manager coaching session or a venue-floor conversation. You combine warmth and curiosity with pace, follow-through and high standards.
Essential experience and capability
- Senior-level people, talent or organisational development experience in a multi-site, customer-facing or operational environment; hospitality, retail or leisure experience would be especially relevant.
- A strong personal track record in end-to-end recruitment, including high-volume or recurring operational hiring and harder-to-fill leadership or specialist searches.
- Evidence of building or materially improving a recruitment model, employer proposition, talent pipeline or candidate journey.
- Practical experience designing onboarding, role capability frameworks, leadership development and progression pathways that managers can use in real operations.
- Experience facilitating learning, coaching managers and building internal capability rather than relying solely on external training providers.
- Commercial judgement and data fluency: able to prioritise investment, diagnose people issues and show the operational value of recruitment and development work.
- Sound working knowledge of UK people practice and employment requirements, with the judgement to know when specialist advice is needed.
- Strong stakeholder skills, with the confidence to challenge constructively and the humility to listen before acting.
- A full willingness to travel regularly across the group's venues and to work flexibly when operational priorities require it.
Helpful, but not essential
- CIPD qualification at Level 5 or above, or equivalent professional experience.
- Experience of apprenticeships, hospitality education partnerships or early-career programmes.
- Confidence selecting and implementing an ATS, LMS or HR information system.
- Experience supporting new venue openings, rapid growth, organisational change or integration.
- A network across hospitality, food and beverage, retail or the Sheffield / Peak District talent market.
Your leadership style
- Visible and grounded - you learn the business where the work happens.
- Practical and inventive - you build simple solutions that managers actually use.
- Warm and direct - you care about people and are clear about standards.
- Inclusive and fair - you widen access to opportunity and make decisions consistently.
- Commercial and accountable - you focus effort where it will make the greatest difference.
- Proudly collaborative - you share credit, build trust and strengthen the Collective as a whole.
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