Benefits & HR Systems Integration

• Ensure the evaluation and benchmarking of target compensation and benefit structures across 22 countries; support the Reward team to design and execute benefits harmonization plans to align with the RWS global pay philosophy.
• Lead the transition and data migration of Acolad employee records into RWS’s core HRIS platforms, ensuring strict GDPR compliance and master data integrity.

Employee Relations, TUPE & Employment Compliance

• Lead and execute legal employee transfer processes (including TUPE consultations in the UK and equivalent transfers of undertakings in Ireland, Portugal, and other regions).
• Serve as the main HR interface, together with the Acolad IR representative with Works Councils, trade unions, and local employee representative bodies across the target footprint, maintaining constructive and collaborative industrial relations.
• Partner with Legal advisers to draft and issue local-compliant transfer letters, new employment contracts, and settlement documentation.
• Ensure all integration actions comply with local statutory requirements, national collective bargaining agreements, and fair labor standards.

Culture, Onboarding & Change Management

• Design and execute comprehensive executive onboarding pathways and integration sessions to welcome, align, and retain senior leadership.
• Align the newly acquired organization with RWS's global performance management structures, culture initiatives, and Global Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (GDEIB) strategy.
• Partner with Corporate Communications to deliver clear, empathetic, and multi-channel employee messaging that supports change management objectives and keeps employee sentiment high.
• Support leadership alignment activities, including facilitating offsites, strategic reviews, and retrospective integration assessments.

Continuous Improvement & Governance

• Manage and control the HR integration budget, tracking advisory fees, separation packages, and retention payments against the business case.
• Create the RWS HR M&A Playbook to act as a standard blueprint for managing the people aspects of M&A transactions to ensure compliance, mitigate key-talent flight risks and align organisational cultures whilst achieving deal synergies.
• Capture HR-specific lessons learned to continuously refine and mature the RWS HR M&A Playbook for future transactions.
• Champion the Shared Service Centre (SSC) model, identifying and planning the transition of transactional HR tasks into RWS global service centers.

Skills & Experience

• Extensive operational HR or M&A integration experience, with a good proportion in a senior HR leadership role.
• Proven track record of leading cross-border HR integrations, carve-outs, or organizational restructurings in a complex, multi-country environment.
• Strong expertise in international employment law, specifically TUPE compliance, European collective consultation processes (with French labor/Works Council regulation know-how is a preference).
• Demonstrated experience partnering with Finance on synergy tracking, financial headcount modeling, and restructuring cost management.
• Professional HR Certification (CIPD or equivalent) is highly desirable.
• Bachelor’s degree in Human Resources, Business Administration, Psychology, or a related field.
• Strong English language skills; plus French language skills are highly beneficial.
• Practical experience working with enterprise HRIS platforms and navigating complex employee data migrations.
• Exceptional stakeholder management skills, with the capability to influence senior executives, build trust with employee representatives, and lead cross-functional integration project teams.
• Comfortable operating in a fast-moving, ambiguous environment with shifting transaction timelines and multiple concurrent project workstreams.

Life at RWS

Life at RWS - If you like the idea of working with smart people who are passionate about growing the value of ideas, data and content by making sure organizations are understood, then you’ll love life at RWS.

Our purpose is to unlock global understanding. This means our work fundamentally recognizes the value of every language and culture. So, we celebrate difference, we are inclusive and believe that diversity makes us strong. We want every employee to grow as an individual and excel in their career.

In return, we expect all our people to live by the values that unite us: to partner, putting clients fist and winning together, to pioneer, innovating fearlessly and leading with vision and courage, to progress, aiming high and growing through actions and to deliver, owning the outcome and building trust with our colleagues and clients.

RWS embraces DEI and promotes equal opportunity, we are an Equal Opportunity Employer and prohibit discrimination and harassment of any kind. RWS is committed to the principle of equal employment opportunity for all employees and to providing employees with a work environment free of discrimination and harassment. All employment decisions at RWS are based on business needs, job requirements and individual qualifications, without regard to race, religion, nationality, ethnicity, sex, age, disability, or sexual orientation. RWS will not tolerate discrimination based on any of these characteristics.

RWS Values

Get the 3Ps right – Partner, Pioneer, Progress – and we´ll Deliver together as RWS.

Recruitment Agencies

RWS Holdings PLC does not accept agency resumes. Please do not forward any unsolicited resumes to any RWS employees. Any unsolicited resume received will be treated as the property of RWS and Terms & Conditions associated with the use of such resume will be considered null and void.