Senior Learning and Development Manager

As we continue our mission to make people happy through chocolate, we have an exciting new opportunity available for a Senior Learning and Development Manager to join our HR team on a permanent basis.

As Hotel Chocolat looks to the future, this new role for Senior Learning and Development Manager will be responsible for designing the strategy that drives a high-performance, meritocratic culture along with meaningful careers for our teams across the business. The role will lead on the end-to-end talent journey including early careers and community engagement, talent attraction and development as well as business skills and competency. With ownership of an expert team spanning recruitment and learning and development, this role is central to our HR strategy that drives successful business outcomes.

Salary paying £55,000 - £65,000 per annum, dependant on experience.

As well as a competitive salary and a range of company benefits, you’ll receive 50% discount on all products, and a 70% discount for you and your guests when you stay at our Rabot Estate hideaway on the paradise island of Saint Lucia.

Here at Hotel Chocolat, we've adopted hybrid working. This means you’ll join us on site for three days a week, and for the other two days – you can work from wherever you like! The on-site locations for this role are:

• Support Office in Royston
• Factory in Huntingdon
• Distribution Centre in St Neots

What you’ll be doing….

• Create and embed a forward-thinking performance and development strategy that aligns with the business and HR plan to define a short, medium and long-term Talent strategy.
• Leading the team with long, medium and short-term objectives which support the vision of the organisation and aid the flexibility and readiness of the business.
• Recruiting and inducting a high performing team of Recruitment and L&D specialists to ensure effective partnering with their respective business areas.
• Understanding and implementing an introduction to management programme in line with the company’s leadership expectations.
• Work closely with the senior leadership team to ensure the plan covers recruitment, induction, ongoing training and development across the entire business and meets with business needs.
• Develop and curate programmatic development interventions that address early careers as well as leadership development priorities.
• Building a comprehensive end to end approach to Leadership development that inducts and empowers our leaders of the future through a structured framework of behavioural and technical expertise.
• Through empowering the team, will continually seek to improve our learning journey, making and implementing recommendations for ongoing improvements to enhance quality outcomes whilst working with our leadership team to develop their teams to a world class standard.
• Review existing training materials, create, develop, and implement a training plan which sits alongside, supports and complements company strategy.
• You will oversee and manage our partnerships with our LMS and Recruitment systems.
• Through understanding our future business plans, you’ll create a resourcing, development and succession plan that will set Hotel Chocolat up for success for the future.
• Through using your understanding of workforce planning, empower a comprehensive resourcing plan and having a keen eye on future skills needs, developing early careers talent programmes including apprenticeships, education partnerships and our communities.

Who you are…

Essential

• An experienced Senior Learning & Development Manager who can deliver results and change in a fast-paced environment and get things done in a way that inspires others.
• Proven as an inspirational collaborator who knows how to build true partnerships with multiple stakeholders and work closely with the wider HR Team.
• Ability to devise and execute L&D strategies and programmes, including knowledge of apprenticeship schemes.
• Commercial acumen and business awareness – able to make the link between talent strategy and business strategy.
• Strategic and creative thinking and the ability to produce innovative solutions in line with the business strategy.
• Experienced at monitoring impact and evaluation success, setting and hitting ambitious targets.
• Data Analysis and a track record of achievement of KPIs and targets to demonstrate the impact on commercial outcomes.
• Experienced communicator with proven ability to influence and challenge key stakeholders when required.

Desirable

• Experience within a retail, manufacturing or ecommerce business would be ideal
• Relevant qualifications in L&D, Occupational Psychology, or leadership

Who are we?

We’re one of the UK’s favourite premium chocolate brands, with a range of products spanning luxury gifts, alcohol and our pioneering drinking chocolate system, the Velvetiser™.

A cacao pod takes years to grow – it can’t be rushed if it’s going to be just right for our products. The same can be said for Hotel Chocolat, which originally started as a mint production company before we realised it was luxury chocolate that we were really passionate about.

Now, we’re market leaders in the industry. What began as an online-only business grew to over 100 stores across the UK, and we’re still growing… Today, we’re multi-category, multi-channel, and multi-territory, and our customers, colleagues, cacao farmers and suppliers all benefit from the success we make together.

To learn more about us and read about our People Pledge – our commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion – click here: hotelchocolat.com/uk/engaged-ethics/our-people.html