People Partner

River Island

People Partner supporting stakeholders and leaders in driving employee performance and development. Focused on talent management and coaching high-performing teams in a global retail context.

Posted 6/5/2026full-timeLondon • 🇬🇧 United KingdomMid-LevelSeniorWebsite

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Build trusted relationships with stakeholders and provide commercially focused people partnering support aligned to business priorities.
Support leaders to drive performance, engagement, capability, and team effectiveness.
Coach and support leaders to build high-performing and inclusive teams.
Support a consistent and performance-led leadership culture across business areas.
Support talent identification, succession planning, and development activity across allocated business areas.
Contribute to building sustainable leadership and talent pipelines.
Support delivery of organisational change initiatives and people priorities within business areas.
Ensure change activity is delivered consistently and with appropriate employee support and engagement.
Use people data and insights to identify risks, trends, and opportunities.
Support evidence-based people interventions and decision making.
Work collaboratively with Employee Relations and Centres of Expertise to deliver joined-up people solutions.
Contribute to People Team initiatives while promoting inclusion, wellbeing, and positive employee experience.

Requirements

What you’ll need

Strong commercial acumen and focus on business performance.
Excellent stakeholder management and relationship-building capability
Strong coaching and influencing skills.
Strong communication and interpersonal skills.
Good diagnostic and problem-solving capability.
Ability to balance operational delivery with strategic thinking.
Strong organisational and prioritisation skills
Comfortable working in ambiguity and fast-paced environments.
Strong analytical capability with attention to detail.
Collaborative and solutions-focused approach.
Resilient and calm under pressure.
Passion for employee experience, inclusion, and leadership development.
Strong integrity and sound judgement.
Experience supporting employee relations, organisational change, performance management, talent, and engagement activity.
Experience coaching and influencing leaders.
Ability to analyse people data and translate insights into practical actions.
Strong commercial awareness and understanding of operational business environments.
Previous experience within a People Partner, HR Advisor, HR Business Partner, or equivalent people-focused role.
CIPD Level 5 qualified or equivalent experience

Benefits

Comp & perks

Generous 50% staff discount so you can treat yourself to the latest products, and a bargain staff shop on site!
Reducing Islanders everyday expenses through discounts, benefits, financial advice, wellbeing solutions and more through the Retail Trust.
A free onsite gym, subsidised restaurant & café to fill your needs. Various social events to socialise throughout the year.
Every family is unique, we support Islanders with all different family setups enhanced maternity, paternity, adoption & fertility treatment. We also work closely with the Retail Trust to create dedicated support for all our Islanders!
Flexible working, on top of payday and summer early finish Fridays.
Give as you earn scheme, a ‘Giver Island’ day each year and receive matched funding.
Support with upskilling through on the job training and qualifications. A succession plan if you want to progress.
A generous bonus scheme & private pension plan.
The choice to opt in for healthcare through our provider AXA.
25 days paid holiday, exclusive of Bank Holidays. With the added option to purchase additional holiday twice a year for whatever the need!

ATS Keywords

✓ Tailor your resume

Applicant Tracking System Keywords

Tip: use these terms in your resume and cover letter to boost ATS matches.

Hard Skills & Tools

people data analysisperformance managementtalent identificationsuccession planningcoachingemployee relationsorganisational changediagnostic capabilityproblem-solvingstrategic thinking

Soft Skills

commercial acumenstakeholder managementrelationship buildingcommunicationinterpersonal skillsorganisational skillsprioritisationcollaborationresilienceintegrity

Certifications

CIPD Level 5