Job Description

Head of People & Capability

London | Hybrid

Build the people function behind one of the UK's most ambitious recruitment businesses.

Joss Search is entering the most exciting chapter in its history. We're growing across the UK and US, launching new products and services, and transforming how the whole business works. Now we need a Head of People & Capability to lead our people agenda into its next phase.

This needs to be an experienced People leader who loves strategy and execution. Someone who can coach managers, shape culture, handle the trickiest of ER matters, and build people processes that scale, all in service of helping great people thrive.

The role

You'll own the full people function across Joss.

You'll bring employee relations and employment law expertise in-house — becoming the trusted advisor for our most complex people decisions and reducing our reliance on external counsel. You'll own the employee lifecycle end to end: benefits, engagement, culture, development, retention. Every people experience at Joss should feel thoughtful, consistent and commercially smart — and that's yours to design.

You'll also lead and develop our Senior People & Capability Lead, giving them the structure, clarity and support to deliver exceptional recruitment, onboarding and development experiences across the business.

What you'll actually be doing

• Owning the full employee lifecycle, from first hello to fond farewell
• Managing ER matters and providing expert employment law guidance
• Building engagement, wellbeing and benefits strategies people genuinely feel
• Embedding our values and strengthening an award-winning culture — we're a "we before me" business, and we work hard to keep it that way
• Driving retention: understanding what makes people stay, succeed and do the best work of their careers
• Building transparent career pathways and development frameworks that mean something
• Coaching managers and raising leadership capability across the business
• Bringing structure, consistency and automation to people operations
• Leading culture initiatives, events and employee experience programmes
• Supporting our continued growth across the UK and US

Why this isn't your average Head of People role

This is a unique opportunity to build our first people function. People responsibilities at Joss have historically sat across several pairs of hands. You'll pull them together into a best-in-class function built to support the next decade of growth. From culture and engagement to ER, development and operational excellence, you'll have genuine influence over how this business scales.

And you'll be joining a leadership team that truly believes great businesses are built by great people and that culture should be deliberately designed, measured and continually improved. Not left to chance!

You'll probably have

• Significant experience in a senior HR Generalist, People Partner or Head of People role
• Deep ER experience and real confidence with complex cases
• Strong UK employment law knowledge
• Experience of working in a global business and working with US employment law
• Experience advising senior stakeholders and coaching managers
• A genuine passion for culture, development and employee experience
• The ability to think strategically and roll your sleeves up — often in the same hour
• CIPD qualification or the equivalent experience to match

International employment arrangements, US exposure or visa and sponsorship know-how are extremely beneficial.

Most importantly: you'll be someone who wants to build, improve and cheerfully challenge the status quo.

Why Joss?

• We're the leading recruiter of exceptional people into Private Equity and Alternative Investment firms
• We're an Employee Ownership Trust — when Joss wins, everyone wins, with an annual EOT bonus to prove it
• Hybrid working
• Back-to-back Sunday Times Best Places to Work winner (we're rather proud of that)
• A genuine chance to shape the future of a growing international business
• Real career progression
• A culture built on ownership, development and collaboration

Interested?

If you're a People leader who wants to influence strategy, shape culture and build something that lasts — we'd love to hear from you.