Descrial
Human Resources Generalist
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ABOUT DESCRIAL
Descrial is an AI work-execution platform purpose-built for alternative investment firms and their portfolio companies and securely orchestrates proprietary data, external sources, and workflows. Descrial is an important pillar of Enterprise Intelligence Orchestration (EIO) and enables it by structuring and standardizing data while embedding domain expertise, thereby enabling faster and contextual analysis, broader coverage, and more intelligent decision-making. It is backed by TresVista’s 1,800+ employees and deep domain expertise across investment diligence, research, valuation, fund administration, accounting, and data analytics. The team is small, senior, high-ownership, and in-office, with direct access to the Executive Committee.
OVERVIEW
As Descrial builds out its UK team, we are looking for an HR Manager to be the people function in London. You will be Descrial’s only HR professional in the UK, for a team growing from a handful of people to around thirty, and our reference point on UK employment law. You will own the employee lifecycle end to end for a fast-growing technology business: from offer and onboarding, through day-to-day employee relations and queries, to exit. You will make sure everything we do is compliant with UK employment law, and you will be a trusted point of contact for employees, hiring managers and the leadership team. This is a hands-on role in a tech start-up environment: you will build the foundations (policies, processes, templates) as well as run them.
You will have access to AI tools and will use them to research UK employment law and reach well-founded answers yourself, with external employment counsel as a backstop where it is needed.
This is a generalist HR role, not a recruitment role. You will work alongside our Talent Acquisition team, who source and screen candidates, and you will own everything from the point of offer.
ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
Employee lifecycle management
- Own the UK employee lifecycle: offer, pre-boarding, onboarding, probation, confirmation, role changes, and exit
- Prepare and issue offer letters, employment contracts, and written statements of employment particulars compliant with the Employment Rights Act 1996, and manage variations to terms, including written notice of changes to existing employees
- Run the HR side of onboarding (contracts, right-to-work checks, induction, payroll and pension set-up, and early check-ins), working with our office and IT teams on equipment and systems access
- Manage probation reviews, contract changes, internal moves, and leavers (including notice, final pay, and exit interviews), with a fair, documented process at every stage
- Maintain accurate employee records and HR data in our HRIS, in line with UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018
Offers and negotiations
- Support hiring managers and Talent Acquisition on compensation, offer structure, and negotiations with candidates, within approved bands and with fair, consistent practice across the team
- Manage offer approvals, and ensure offers are accurate, timely, and clearly communicated
- Ensure pay decisions are consistent and defensible under the Equality Act 2010, including equal pay principles
Right to work, immigration and pre-employment checks
- Own right-to-work checks in line with Home Office guidance before anyone starts, for employees and for workers and contractors where the rules apply, with compliant records and follow-up checks on any time-limited permission
- Carry out other pre-employment checks (references, qualifications, and any role-relevant checks) lawfully and proportionately
- Manage Descrial’s Home Office sponsor licence: use the Sponsor Management System, sponsor roles where the business decides to, report changes within the required timescales, and keep the records the sponsor guidance requires
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UK employment law and regulatory compliance
- Act as Descrial’s reference point on UK employment law, including the Employment Rights Act 1996 and 2025, Equality Act 2010, Working Time Regulations 1998, National Minimum Wage / National Living Wage rules, and statutory leave and pay (sickness, maternity, paternity, adoption, shared parental, parental bereavement, neonatal care, and carer’s leave)
- Use AI tools as your first line of research and drafting on UK employment law, check the answers against primary sources (legislation, GOV.UK, Acas and Home Office guidance), and seek validation from external employment counsel only where it is required
- Lead the roll-out of the Employment Rights Act 2025 as its measures come into force, including the duty to take all reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment and the changes to unfair dismissal, and brief leadership on what is changing and what needs to happen
- Own the UK employee handbook, contract templates, and HR policies, and keep them current as UK law changes, with an annual review
- Maintain HR compliance records and evidence for audits, including client due diligence and security reviews (e.g. SOC 2 and ISO 27001)
- Work with our Compliance team on employee data protection, including privacy notices, subject access requests, and record retention
Payroll, pay and benefits
- Own the monthly UK payroll inputs (starters, leavers, changes, absence, and statutory payments) and work with our Corporate Finance team in India, who run payroll, to check the outputs before each pay run
- Ensure compliance with National Minimum Wage, holiday pay and holiday records, statutory sick pay and family-related pay, and auto-enrolment pensions, including assessing and enrolling new joiners
- Coordinate with benefits providers, the pension provider, and insurers (e.g. private medical and life cover) on starters, changes, and leavers, including how benefits are taxed through payroll
Employee relations and wellbeing
- Be the first point of contact for employees and managers on policy, benefits, leave, pay, and employment queries
- Run employee relations cases end to end, including absence, capability, conduct, grievances, flexible-working requests, and dismissals, with investigations and hearings that follow the Acas Code of Practice and a fair process
- Manage sickness absence, including fit notes, return-to-work meetings, occupational health referrals, and reasonable adjustments
- Put in place harassment prevention measures (risk assessment, training, and clear reporting routes) and wellbeing support, and promote an inclusive workplace
Policies, processes and people operations
- Build and maintain UK HR policies, templates, and processes that work for a small, growing technology company
- Run performance cycles, compensation reviews, and learning and development for the UK team in partnership with TresVista’s HR team, making sure group processes work under UK law before they reach UK employees
- Report on key people metrics (headcount, attrition, absence, onboarding) to leadership
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WHO YOU ARE
Prerequisites
- 5+ years in UK HR roles, including at least 2 years as the sole or most senior HR professional for a UK employer
- Strong, current knowledge of UK employment law, including the Employment Rights Act 2025, with examples of policies or processes you have updated as the law changed
- A track record of running employee relations cases end to end, including investigations, hearings, and dismissals, without a specialist employee relations team behind you
- Hands-on experience across the full UK employee lifecycle: contracts, right-to-work checks, onboarding, probation, variations, and exits, with HR records kept in line with UK GDPR
- Working knowledge of UK payroll and statutory payments, enough to prepare payroll inputs and check another team’s payroll run
- Experience building or rewriting an employee handbook and HR policies
- Working knowledge of UK immigration compliance, including right-to-work checks and sponsor licence duties
- Proficient with AI tools for legal and policy research, with the judgement to check answers against primary sources and to know when external counsel is needed
- Experience preparing offers and handling candidate negotiations, with sound judgement on compensation and fair pay
- Comfortable setting up processes and templates from scratch in a small team; self-starter who works well independently
- Strong written and verbal communication, and sound handling of confidential information
- Right to work in the UK
Good to have
- A recognised UK HR qualification, such as CIPD Level 5 (Associate) or above, or working towards it
- Hands-on experience as a user of the Home Office Sponsor Management System
- Experience in a technology start-up or scale-up, or in financial services, professional services, or SaaS
- Experience working with an offshore payroll or shared-services team
- Experience putting harassment prevention measures in place, such as risk assessments and training
- Recruitment or talent acquisition experience
- Experience with HRIS and applicant tracking systems
- Exposure to client due diligence, audit, and information security frameworks (SOC 2, ISO 27001)
EDUCATION
Degree-level education or equivalent practical experience. A CIPD qualification is desirable but not required.
WHAT WE OFFER
- You will be working closely with the Executive Committee who have over 20 years of experience in leading a company with 400+ leading clients in the alternative investment space
- Competitive compensation
- The opportunity to build the UK people function from the ground up
- AI tools to support your work, and access to external employment counsel where it is needed
- Innovative, supportive, and collaborative work environment
- Office in central London (King’s Cross)
Right to work: we cannot sponsor visas for this role.
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