HR Advisor

About Bristol Waste Company:

What we do is important – we’re here to keep Bristol, and beyond, clean, and safe.

We do this for our city’s residents, workers, visitors, and businesses. Our work helps deliver Bristol’s sustainability targets in partnership with the council. 

Bristol Waste’s commercial operation, where we serve businesses and organisations across the region, is also growing.

Our ambition is to provide good quality, value for money services, and we continue to deliver a social value impact worth more than £30 million every year.

We want people who share our values and want to work with us to drive our business forward.

Purpose of the role:

We are looking for an experienced HR Advisor to join the Bristol Waste People Team. 

As a HR Advisor you will be working alongside the HR business partners (HRBP) and wider team to deliver the people strategy and embed a positive culture in line with our values.

A key focus of the role is to work alongside managers to navigate a broad range of employee relations issues and other HR matters, providing quality specialist HR advice and support.  

You will provide guidance to colleagues and managers based at several sites across the city, so flexibility to travel to various locations is required. 

Key Responsibilities

As the HR Advisor you will:

• Provide timely and accurate advice and support to managers and colleagues, in line with Company policy and in turn employment legislation. 
• Coach, support and develop managers through informal and formal employee relations cases including (but not limited to) sickness/ absence, investigations, disciplinaries, grievances, performance improvement and appeals. 
• Guide managers in dealing with colleague health and wellbeing matters in a sensitive manner, liaising with SHEQ (Safety, Health, Environment, Quality) Occupational Health and other wellbeing providers. 
• Ensure employee relations cases are logged, and relevant documents are recorded and filed appropriately. Providing managers with periodic management information, to assist them in monitoring the performance of their teams. 
• Proactively manage potential risks with the support of the HRBPs. 
• Work with the HRBPs to identify improvements to people policies, processes and systems.
• Work collaboratively with the HRBPs and wider people team to deliver the people team objectives, supporting organisational change projects and initiatives. 
• Coach, deliver briefings and facilitate training on HR policy and procedures.
• Support and develop the people service assistants (PSAs) to respond to contractual queries and low-level employee relations queries. 
• Liaise with a range of stakeholders at all levels, including Trade Union representatives.
• Ensure to maintain and encourage a safe working environment.

Essential Requirements for the Role:

• CIPD qualification level 5 and above or equivalent experience. 
• A good understanding of employment legislation and uses initiative to keep on top of legal updates.
• Significant experience of complex employee relations casework and dealing with a range of difficult issues.
• Comfortable facilitating and mediating difficult and sensitive conversations.
• Committed to doing the right thing and passionate about providing a great colleague experience. 
• Ability to proactively manage risks and follow escalation procedures. 
• Ability to collate, analyse and interpret data.
• Excellent diary management, working to deadlines even when under pressure having a range of priorities. Able to balance proactive tasks against reactive tasks.
• Ability to build strong working relationships with key stakeholders with a proven ability to influence. 
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills and able to confidently deliver training/briefing sessions.
• Demonstrates a professional, approachable and flexible attitude to work in a fast-paced and changing environment.
• Competent in using Microsoft applications and experience in using people management systems.

Desirable Requirements Qualifications, Skills and Abilities:

• Experience of working in the Waste or services industry.
• Experience in an operational environment where Health and Safety is crucial.
• Experience of working in a Unionised environment. 
• Experience of supporting organisational change projects, including TUPE and restructuring.

Our Benefits:

• Annual leave package of 25 days plus 8 bank holidays.
• Employer contribution of 5% into the company pension scheme.
• Support for Mental Health, including a BUPA Employee Assistance Programme that provides support covering Mental Health, Financial and Family related topics. We also have Mental Health First Aiders across the business.
• Support for your Physical Health with our BUPA Health Cash Plan (we cover the cost of coverage for you), Cycle to Work scheme and an onsite Physiotherapist. All are free for our colleagues.
• Because we value our colleagues, we want to recruit more employees just like them, which is why we have our employee referral scheme.
• Dedicated learning and development team. We take pride in developing our colleagues and some examples of this include our In-House Driver Development Programme and internal promotions. Many of our Senior Leadership Team have developed from Operational roles, such as one of our Contract Managers who started as a Street Cleanser.
• Employee recognition ‘Stand Out Award’ and long service awards. To celebrate our colleagues wherever they are on their journey with us, we recognise and celebrate talent.
• We recognise that everyone is different and strive to create an environment that supports all colleagues through flexible working. We have introduced a hybrid working model where possible and actively encourage part-time working, job sharing and flexibility on hours. If this interests, you please do get in touch, and we can start a conversation.