People Manager (part-time)

Job title: People Manager 

Line manager (responsible to): Chief of Staff 

Hours: Part-time; 3 days per week 

Way of working:  We work on a hybrid model. This means the team comes together in the London office every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. With the option of working remotely on Wednesdays and Fridays.  

Overview of the role 

The Drum is a global, creative, and fast-moving company, and we know that our success is driven by the talent and passion of our team. That’s where you come in.  

We’re on the look-out for an organised People Manager to keep our HR operations running smoothly. Based in London, you’ll oversee and contribute to the HR day-to-day operations across our key locations in London, Glasgow, and the U.S., providing expert guidance and support on local employment laws, policies and compliance while supporting a thriving, global workforce. 

You’ll lead on end-to-end HR support, working closely with managers to provide advice, drive development opportunities, and foster a culture where people feel valued, engaged, and empowered to do their best work. 

If you're passionate about people, culture, and making a real difference in a growing company, we’d love to hear from you. 


Key responsibilities 

• Act as a key point of contact for HR queries, ensuring a smooth and compliant employee lifecycle from pre-onboarding to exit 

• Draft contracts, contract amendments and all other necessary administration needed for any type of employment change. Ensuring accurate record keeping and timely updates to employment files. 

• Maintain all processes in place and regularly assess ways of working for increased engagement and contribute to a high performing culture. 

• Maintain and update the HRIS (HiBob), ensuring accurate data management and producing HR reports to support business decisions (retention, absence management, time off utilisation, etc) 

• Guide and advise managers on Employee Relations (ER) cases, ensuring compliance and consistency across such areas as conduct, performance, probation, flexible working, grievances, and family leave. 

• Ensure accurate and timely payroll and benefits administration with the finance team and coordinating with external providers where necessary (Employer of Records and US payroll). Identifying opportunities for process improvements where necessary. 

• Support managers in the administration of performance review processes, ensuring documentation is up to date and aligned with company policies 

• Draft and update policy and procedure documents proactively and in line with local country legislative changes. 

• Manage the process and administration of onboarding and offboarding processes, including pre-employment checks, system setup, exit interviews, and ensuring all documentation is completed accurately and implemented into the HRIS (Hibob). 

• Coordinate recruitment, including posting job adverts, scheduling interviews, and liaising with hiring managers to support an efficient recruitment process. 

• Drive engagement and inclusivity via the Culture Club and the D&I group. 

• Manage the annual employee survey, collating and organising results to support leadership in identifying key themes and actions. 

• Own ad-hoc projects, from conception to embedding such as the launch of new HR legislation or actions from reports and surveys. 

Who we are 

The Drum is a leading independent media business with the mission of helping marketing professionals around the world to learn, make better decisions, make better marketing and be more successful.  
 

Our vision is to create the leading destination for marketing insights in the world with a particular focus on brand decision-makers. We think of our audience first, use data intelligently, build on our innovative product range and love using the foundation of our industry – creativity. 
 

With bases in London, Glasgow, and Miami, we inform and inspire readers with content on marketing, creativity, agencies, media, technology and sustainability. 

 
We curate valuable insights: 

• Via our team of journalists 

• From the best-in-class work identified through our award shows 

• From user-generated content  

• Via content co-created with our clients  

• Through the ratings we gather from marketing services buyers on The Drum Recommends. 

Our excellent team delivers all this to our audience through multiple channels: articles and reports; TV; audio; live in person in Europe and America, at The Drum Labs; at industry events.  

If you’d like to read more about The Drum’s culture, values, and commitment to diversity and inclusion then please click here to be redirected to our career’s page. 

The Drum’s hiring process 

The deadline for applications will be 27 February 2025. However, we may remove the advert earlier if there has been a huge amount of interest.  

If you feel that you may not meet all of the requirements, we’d still like to hear from you -- never shy away from applying. We endeavor to reply to all candidates.  

For this role, there will be two interview stages. The first stage will be via video call and will look at your experience, skills and suitability for the role and what’s required. You can ask us questions and find out more about The Drum.  

The second stage will involve a competency-based task that we will ensure you have plenty of time to prepare. There may be a third stage to meet with more of the senior team. 

Requirements

Who you are 

• Already at the level of a People Advisor or HR Business Partner and looking for an opportunity to step up in a part-time role 

• Experience balancing value-adding projects with business-as-usual HR operations 

• Experience in elements of the employee-life cycle; attraction and recruitment, development, wellbeing, performance, engagement, recognition and reward, transitioning and exiting 

• Skilled with HR Information Systems such as Hibob and other software such as Applicant Tracking System, Workable (Employer of Records is desirable) 

• Prior experience with fast-paced organisations as a certain level of adaptability will be required 

• Experience with extracting and presenting HR data in a digestible format and presenting to internal stakeholders at all levels  

• Strong communication skills as you will be in a unique position of working closely with different audience types - the wider team, people managers and senior leadership 

• Good working knowledge of employment legislation and process in the UK (USA is desirable) 

• Efficient with a level of autonomy and time management 

• Able to balance a commercial, people and compliance lens in their work 

• Proactive mindset with seeing certain challenges and offering solutions  

• Ideally CIPD level 5 qualified 

Benefits

• Hybrid way of working – 3 days a week in our Shoreditch or Glasgow office, and then 2 optional from home or the office 

• 28 days annual leave plus public holidays 

• Early finish every Friday! 

• When we achieve our financial goals, we share the profits with the whole team. 

• A mentoring Scheme to support your development 

• Giving back to the community is essential so we offer 2x paid charity volunteering days each year 

• Employee Assistance Programme (EAP)  

• Free Eyecare Vouchers  

• Enhanced Sick Pay 

• Enhanced Family Leave for those starting or adding to their families 

• Employee Referral Bonuses 

• Cycle to work scheme