North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust
Workforce Officer
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Workforce Officer
Employee Relations Officer (First-Line Support)
About the Role
This critical role provides first-line employee relations (ER) support, offering consistent, policy-aligned advice on Agenda for Change (AFC) terms and conditions, disciplinary matters, grievances, dignity and respect issues, capability, sickness absence, and probation frameworks.
The post-holder manages a personal caseload of routine ER matters, ensuring robust case documentation and performance monitoring while contributing to continuous service improvement. This includes reviewing workflows, analysing ER/sickness absence data, and updating People Directorate resources.
As a professional representative of the directorate, the role also involves:
- Providing coaching and mentoring to junior colleagues
- Ensuring strict adherence to confidentiality, safeguarding, equality, health and safety, and infection prevention protocols
- Acting as the key contact for the Workforce Department, offering operational ER and AFC advice
The position demands clear communication, teamwork, and flexibility to travel across NHS foundation trust sites. High-quality, timely support must be delivered across University Hospitals Tees Group (South Tees and North Tees) to sustain excellent HR service delivery.
Key Responsibilities
Core ER and Case Management
- Provide first-line ER advice aligned with Trust policies, procedures, and Agenda for Change (AFC) terms and conditions
- Manage and escalate a caseload of routine ER cases, including:
- Disciplinary procedures
- Grievance handling
- Dignity and respect incidents
- Capability assessments
- Sickness absence management
- Probation reviews
- Ensure accurate record-keeping, data analysis (ER/sickness metrics) and Ad-hoc reporting
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Workforce Support and Efficiency
- Serve as the primary operational ER contact for staff, managers, and service leads
- Assist Clinical Service Units and Corporate Teams in responding to incidents (routine and complex/sensitive cases)
- Apply varied communication methods (e.g., written reports, verbal briefings) tailored to audience needs
- Collaborate with senior leadership to uphold workforce strategy goals, KPIs, and reporting deadlines
Process Improvement & Compliance
- Recommend service enhancements based on data trends and staff feedback
- Regularly review and update HR processes, templates, and communication tools
- Actively support compliance with: confidentiality, dignity at work, equality & diversity, safeguarding, health and safety (including infection prevention)
Cross-Site Operational Role
- Travel across multiple NHS sites (including South Tees Hospitals NHS FT and North Tees & Hartlepool NHS FT) as part of daily duties
Requirements
Essential
- Degree-level qualification (HR, business, law, social sciences) or equivalent professional experience in Employee Relations, HR Advice Centres, or Casework
- Proven experience in handling disciplinary, grievance, sickness absence, and workplace conflict cases
- Understand of Agenda for Change (AFC) pay structures and diagonal pay filtering
- Strong analytical skills to interpret workforce/sickness data and suggest actionable insights (e.g., Leave Management Reports, ER trend identification)
- Ability to work collaboratively in a team environment, alongside multiple departments
- Proficiency with HRIS (e.g., Sierra IMPACT, Latica HR solutions) and MS Office packages
- Empathy and undefined emotional intelligence to support sensitive employee queries
- Commitment to NHS values (Eight Values Framework) including dignity, honesty, trust, compassion
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Desirable
- Experience in NHS employment relations or health sector HR
- Knowledge of safeguarding, equalityact legislation and modern slavery guidance
- Familiarity with Change Management processes (referencing merger of two Trusts)
- Accessible for out-of-hours rota-in work where required
Benefits and Work Environment
North Tees & Hartlepool NHS FT aims to be "the best place to work"—informing this role with perks including:
- Inclusive and supportive workplace, offering sexual harassment training and helplines
- Well-being initiatives across physical and mental health including:
- Employee Assistance Programme
- Gym memberships, weight management programmes
- Joining others programmes and green spaces
- Drive to Excellence (DTE) Awards vapour highlighting top-performing individuals across work themes
- Professional development opportunities in HR advancement (e.g., CIPD professionelling)
- Support for *ethical leadership through "Making Every Contact Count" (behaviour change initiatives)
- Career progression within an organisation prioritising high-quality patient care and leadership development
Enterprise interests: Mediation courses, eradiation training workshops
Further Information
- Informal inquiries can be directed to:
- Durrab Ahmed – Head of HR (Large Learnt Partnership Programme)
- Email: durrab.ahmed@nhs.net
- Telephone: 07880 7811125
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