Arbex
HR Director UK and Ireland & Global Functions
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Job Description
Become part of the team powering household names like Andrex®, Kleenex®, Cottonelle®, Scott®, Viva®, and WypAll®. At Arbex, everything you need is right here—innovation, growth, and the chance to leave a real mark.
Settling for just any role isn't you, and it isn't us either. Being Unstoppable Together calls for a particular kind of person and teams who genuinely care about making a difference. Here, you'll channel your professional expertise, talent, and drive into building and managing a portfolio of iconic, ground-breaking brands. In this role, you'll help shape the future of tissue and hygiene for billions of people worldwide.
About The Role
As the HR Director UKI & Global Functions, you will be responsible for shaping and delivering the UK & Ireland people strategy, acting as a core member of the leadership team to enable business performance, organisational effectiveness, and sustainable growth. You will also be responsible for the people strategy across DTS (Digital & Technology Services), GBS (Global Business Services), Finance, and Technical (Supply Chain and R&D). The role provides strategic direction and operational leadership across all areas of HR, ensuring that the organisation has the capability, culture, and leadership required to deliver its commercial priorities.
The HR Director serves as a trusted advisor to senior leaders, translating business ambition into a clear and actionable people agenda, while providing insight, challenge, and coaching to strengthen leadership capability and decision-making. The role is accountable for building a high-performing, engaged, and inclusive organisation, with a strong focus on talent, performance, succession, and culture.
This is a pivotal moment in Arbex’s evolution. Formed through the strategic partnership between Kimberly-Clark and Suzano, Arbex is building a new global tissue and hygiene company that brings together iconic brands, commercial expertise, manufacturing scale, and deep fibre knowledge. The business is entering an intensive period of transformation as it establishes its standalone operating model, embeds new ways of working, accelerates value creation, and builds a distinct culture around empowerment, agility, bold thinking, and positive impact.
Within this context, UKI is the largest and most strategically important ABU, with a circa $700 million business, two manufacturing sites, a broad commercial footprint, and important global enabling functions. The HR Director will play a critical role in helping the UKI leadership team translate this business context into a clear people and organisation agenda, ensuring the ABU has the leadership capability, organisational design, talent depth, and cultural conditions required to deliver both near-term performance and longer-term transformation.
Operating across a complex, multi-site environment, the role ensures excellence in the end-to-end delivery of HR, including employee relations, reward, organisational design, workforce planning, and leadership development. It plays a critical role in leading and embedding the new Arbex culture and ways of working, industrial relations, managing risk, and ensuring full compliance with employment legislation, while balancing commercial outcomes with reputational and legal considerations.
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The HR Director leads and delivers large-scale transformation and change programmes, shaping organisational structures, driving continuous improvement, and ensuring the organisation can adapt effectively to evolving business needs. This includes supporting the shift to a more regionalised operating model, enabling manufacturing and functional teams to operate closer to the business, and helping leaders move with pace, accountability, and clarity through change. In parallel, the role drives culture, engagement, and inclusion, embedding a compelling employee experience and strengthening organisational identity and purpose.
Responsibilities
Strategic People Leadership
- Define and lead the UK&I people agenda aligned to business strategy
- Define and lead the Global Functions people agenda aligned to business strategy
- Drive long-term workforce planning and organisational effectiveness
- Shape culture, engagement, and performance outcomes at scale
- Act as a trusted advisor and coach to senior leadership teams
Leadership Team Partnership
- Active member of UK Leadership Team
- Influence business strategy through a people lens
- Provide executive-level coaching and challenge to senior leaders
- Build high-performing leadership teams and succession pipelines
End-to-End HR Delivery
- Accountable for all elements of the HR lifecycle:
- Talent management and succession planning
- Employee relations and complex case management
- Reward, benefits, and pension governance
- Learning, development, and leadership capability
Industrial Relations & Manufacturing HR
- Lead union relationships and collective bargaining negotiations
- Oversee consultation processes, restructuring, and site changes
- Ensure compliance with employment legislation (including TUPE)
- Manage large-scale organisational change programmes
Organisational Change & Transformation
- Lead major transformation initiatives across the UK&I and Global Functions
- Design and implement organisational structures
- Drive continuous improvement and efficiency
- Manage risk during complex business change
Culture, Inclusion & Engagement
- Embed new Arbex culture and ways of working and behaviours – Empowered, Agile, Bold, Nurturing, Consumer-centric, and Future-minded
- Lead employee engagement and culture initiatives
- Drive inclusion, wellness, and belonging strategies
- Strengthen organisational purpose and employee narrative
- Improve leadership effectiveness and people manager capability
Governance, Risk & Compliance
- Ensure full compliance with UK & Ireland employment law
- Lead audit, risk management, and regulatory adherence
- Chair or oversee pension schemes and governance bodies
- Manage employment tribunal risk and external relations
- Foster a culture of accountability, collaboration, and continuous improvement
Person Specification
To succeed in this role, you will need the following qualifications:
Required Qualifications
- Proven experience operating at HR Director / senior leadership level within a complex, multi-site organisation
- Demonstrated success partnering with senior leadership teams and boards, providing strategic challenge and coaching
- Extensive experience across the full HR lifecycle (talent, ER, reward, L&D, organisational design)
- Strong background in industrial relations, including union engagement and collective consultation processes
- Track record of leading large-scale transformation, restructuring, and change programmes
- Experience operating across commercial and/or manufacturing environments
- Strong knowledge of UK & Ireland employment law, including consultation and TUPE
- Deep understanding of employee relations and risk management, including tribunal exposure
- Expertise in organisational design, workforce planning, and performance management
- Ability to translate business strategy into a clear, actionable people agenda
- Strong commercial acumen and ability to link people outcomes to business performance
- Strong grounding in reward, pensions, and benefits governance
- Skilled in managing high-risk, complex ER issues with sound judgement
- Ability to balance commercial outcomes with legal and reputational risk
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Preferred Qualifications
- Experience across UK & Ireland and/or wider EMEA markets
- Exposure to multi-national or FMCG organisations
- Experience leading HR through M&A, JV, or complex restructuring environments
- Fellow or Member of the CIPD
- Masters HRM
Total Benefits
We believe that our employees are our greatest asset, and we're committed to providing them with the resources they need to be successful. If you're looking for a rewarding career with a company that cares about its employees, then ARBEX is the place for you.
Flex That Works at ARBEX
We believe great work happens when people come together with purpose. That’s why we offer a flexible work model that blends remote work with intentional in-person collaboration — helping you connect, grow, and innovate while maintaining the balance you value.
And finally, the fine print….
For ARBEX to grow and prosper, we must be an inclusive organization that applies the diverse experiences and passions of its team members to brands that shape the future of tissue and hygiene, which is why we seek to build a workforce that encompasses the experiences of our consumers. When you bring your original thinking to ARBEX, you fuel the continued success of our enterprise. We are a committed equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, pregnancy, genetic information, citizenship status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
The statements above are intended to describe the general nature and level of work performed by employees assigned to this classification. Statements are not intended to be construed as an exhaustive list of all duties, responsibilities, and skills required for this position.
Employment is subject to verification of local policies.
Primary Location
United Kingdom - Flexible Location - South East England
Additional Locations
Worker Type
Employee
Worker Sub-Type
Regular
Time Type
Full time
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