HR Manager – Early Years / Nursery Group

Location: South London

Salary: £45,000 - £60,000

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We are partnering with a growing early years nursery group in South London to appoint an experienced HR Manager to take ownership of the people function across the organisation.

The business currently operates seven nursery settings with approximately 300 employees and has an ambitious growth strategy, with further expansion planned over the coming years.

This is an excellent opportunity for an HR professional who enjoys being close to the operation and wants to play a key role in shaping the people strategy of a growing organisation.

You will work closely with the founder, senior leadership, nursery managers, and wider operational teams, providing a combination of strategic HR leadership and hands-on operational support across the full employee lifecycle.

The Role

As HR Manager, you will take responsibility for the day-to-day HR function across the group, ensuring the business has the people, processes, culture, and capability required to support both its current operation and future growth.

Key Responsibilities:

• Acting as the primary HR point of contact for senior leaders, nursery managers, and employees across the group
• Providing trusted HR advice and guidance across all aspects of the employee lifecycle
• Supporting and coaching nursery managers on people management, employee relations, and best practice
• Managing complex and sensitive employee relations cases, including disciplinary, grievance, capability, absence, and performance management
• Advising managers on sickness absence, long-term absence, return-to-work processes, and reasonable adjustments
• Supporting investigations and ensuring HR processes are handled fairly, consistently, and in line with employment legislation
• Managing the end-to-end recruitment process, working with managers to identify workforce requirements and attract high-quality nursery professionals
• Developing effective recruitment and retention strategies in what can be a challenging early years labour market
• Supporting onboarding, induction, and probation processes
• Developing and maintaining effective employee retention and engagement initiatives
• Identifying trends in turnover, absence, recruitment, and employee relations and using data to recommend improvements
• Supporting the development of training, learning, and development programmes
• Working with managers to identify skills gaps and development requirements
• Supporting performance management and appraisal processes
• Developing career pathways, succession planning, and internal progression opportunities
• Helping to build a strong pipeline of future Nursery Managers and senior leaders
• Ensuring HR policies, procedures, and employee documentation are accurate, current, and consistently applied
• Keeping the organisation up to date with changes to UK employment legislation and HR best practice
• Ensuring appropriate HR processes are in place around safeguarding, safer recruitment, and DBS requirements
• Working closely with operational leadership to ensure people practices support Ofsted requirements and the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS)
• Supporting managers with employee-related issues arising from Ofsted inspections and regulatory requirements
• Maintaining accurate and confidential employee records
• Overseeing HR systems and ensuring employee data is accurate and up to date
• Producing regular HR reports and people analytics for the senior leadership team
• Monitoring key people metrics including headcount, turnover, retention, absence, vacancies, and employee relations
• Supporting workforce planning as the organisation expands
• Reviewing organisational structures and staffing requirements across existing and new settings
• Supporting the HR requirements associated with new nursery openings, acquisitions, and organisational change
• Developing consistent HR practices across all settings while recognising the individual needs of each nursery
• Supporting managers through restructures, changes in responsibilities, and other organisational change
• Working with payroll and finance to ensure accurate employee information and effective payroll processes
• Supporting benefits, salary reviews, and other employee reward processes
• Managing HR-related suppliers and external advisers where required
• Ensuring compliance with GDPR and the confidential handling of employee information
• Promoting a positive, inclusive, and high-performance culture across the organisation