Lead Specialist, Program Manager

About Pearson

Pearson is the worlds lifelong learning company. Our purpose is to help people realize the life they imagine through learning. We create meaningful and impactful learning experiences that support individuals at every stage of their personal and professional journey from school and higher education to workforce skills and lifelong learning.

With trusted educational content assessments and digital learning solutions Pearson helps learners educators and organizations build and verify the skills needed to succeed in a rapidly changing world. Serving millions of learners globally we combine deep expertise in learning science with innovative technology to deliver flexible inclusive and futureready learning at scale.

At Pearson learning isnt just what we doits who we are. We are committed to creating a culture of belonging innovation and continuous growth where our people are empowered to make a real difference through the power of learning

About the job

Leads critical workforce programs driving strategy capability and engagement for a department of 160 permanent employees and over 250 contingent workers located in the UK and India. Uses deep expertise to deliver high-impact initiatives resolve challenges and influence senior leaders. Mentor peers and set standards for excellence in workforce processes and engagement.

This is a Leadership Team position reporting to the Executive Partner for Pearson Qualifications Technology with dotted lines to UK and India HR Business Partners. Key stakeholders include Talent Managers Finance Business Partner Leadership and Management team members and India Hub Leads.

The role is a blend of hands-on analysis & delivery process administration and strategic leadership and has no direct line reports.

Key Responsibilities Skills & Experience

Relating to permanent employees

• Workforce Compensation Planning & Forecasting
• Performance Management & Recognition
• Workforce Engagement & Recognition
• Workforce Communications including monthly All Hands team meeting updates on People News
• Training & Upskilling
• HR Process navigation & administration including recruitment
• Oversight of HR processes via co-ordination with line managers

Relating to both permanent & contingent workforce:

• Workforce Planning & Strategy including vacancy management ensuring we have the Right People in the Right Place at the Right Time and Skills & Capability Assessment
• Workforce Planning & Strategy alignment with OCTO (Pearsons Global Technology function)
• Ad hoc workforce project delivery
• Analysis of workforce data

Additional Skills & Experience

• Analytical Thinking
• Data manipulation & analysis especially using spreadsheets eg vlookups
• Management & analysis of PII / Confidential data
• BI & Data presentation quality & accuracy analysis & visualisation
• Planning & Project Management
• Stakeholder management; presentation at Leadership forums & influencing senior stakeholders
• Organisational Design & Capability Development
• Recruitment Processes (UK and India)
• Training provision including managing 3^rd party delivery partners
• Proactive autonomous approach
• Pragmatic approach focussed on balancing achievement of outcomes with adherence to process
• Mentoring & guidance for colleagues
• Problem solving
• Governance
• Interpersonal Skills
• Business Acumen
• Change Leadership

Desirable Skills Qualifications & Experience

• Project Management accreditation
• UK and India HR policies & employment laws
• Accounting principles & concepts