Macmillan Davies
Lead HR Business Partner
How your CV stacks up
Upload your CV to see how well it fits this job role
?%
Macmillan Davies is looking for an experienced Lead HR Business Partner to join our legal client's collaborative and ambitious HR team in Bristol or Exeter.
This is an exciting opportunity for a commercially minded HR professional who thrives in a strategic, partnership-led environment and enjoys influencing senior leaders to deliver exceptional people outcomes.
Working closely with senior stakeholders, you'll play a key role in shaping leadership capability, organisational culture and business performance. This is a highly visible position where you'll provide expert advice, challenge constructively and lead on complex people matters across the employee lifecycle.
THE OPPORTUNITY
As Lead HR Business Partner, you'll be a trusted adviser to senior leaders, providing pragmatic, commercially focused HR guidance that supports business objectives while maintaining fairness, consistency and legal compliance.
You'll also lead and develop a team of HR Business Partners, ensuring high-quality service delivery and acting as the escalation point for complex employee relations matters.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
- Build trusted relationships with senior leaders, providing expert advice across the full employee lifecycle.
- Partner with leadership teams to drive performance, talent development, succession planning and organisational effectiveness.
- Provide commercially focused guidance on complex employee relations issues, balancing business needs with legal and organisational risk.
- Lead and support organisational change initiatives, including restructures, consultations and TUPE where required.
- Coach, mentor and develop the HR Business Partner team, promoting consistency, capability and best practice.
- Use people data and insights to influence decision-making and demonstrate the impact of HR initiatives.
- Champion a positive, inclusive culture that supports engagement, development and high performance.
Reasons to use Rodeo
Start with a chat, not a search bar
Grad scheme, placement, apprenticeship? Not sure what you want yet — that's fine. Your agent talks it through with you and turns "I have no idea" into a shortlist.
It searches the market for you
Every day your agent scans the market matching roles against what actually matters to you, not just keywords on a CV.
Only hits
No noise. No "maybe this fits." Just roles with a clear explanation of why they're right — and where to focus when applying.
ABOUT YOU
We're looking for an experienced HR professional who can confidently operate at senior leadership level and influence decision-making across a complex organisation.
You'll have:
- Significant experience as an HR Business Partner, working closely with senior leaders.
- Previous experience within a professional services or partnership environment is highly desirable.
- Demonstrable experience leading, coaching or mentoring HR professionals.
- Strong knowledge of UK employment law, employee relations and organisational change.
- Experience managing complex employee relations cases and organisational change programmes.
- Excellent communication and influencing skills, with the confidence to challenge constructively.
- Strong commercial awareness and the ability to balance people priorities with business objectives.
- Experience using HR data and insights to support strategic decision-making.
- A resilient, pragmatic and collaborative approach, with excellent judgement and credibility.
Get help with your application
Your very own career expert that helps elevate your application to the next level.
WHY JOIN?
This is an opportunity to make a genuine impact within a people-focused organisation that values collaboration, innovation and continuous improvement.
You'll join a supportive HR team where your expertise will shape leadership capability, employee experience and organisational success, while enjoying a flexible and collaborative working environment that encourages professional growth and career development.
LOCATION
This role can be based from either Bristol or Exeter, with occasional travel to other offices as required. You will be required in the office 3-4 days.
“It took my CV and asked me questions relevant to understanding what kind of jobs to suggest for me. Suggestions were almost perfect. Jobs were exactly what I’ve been looking for.”
Jessica, London
Skills
Location