Joining us, you get to work for not just one high performing London Borough, but two.

Sutton and Kingston councils have a shared HR service serving both authorities. Some teams and some roles are more focussed on one Council than the other, but working in the shared service you get opportunities to learn from a wider pool of activities and two different political bodies.

There are some really exciting things happening in both Sutton and Kingston. We are developing the London Cancer Hub, a world leading cancer research and treatment hub that will bring together professionals from across different sectors to identify and test new treatments and therapies. We are undertaking the largest housing regeneration programme ever delivered in Kingston, building new energy efficient housing that will transform some of our oldest Council owned housing. Both boroughs have publicly committed to doing what they can to tackle the climate emergency and are investing in new technologies and societal change that will help bring carbon emissions down and improve our climate impact.

Sutton is a well connected attractive part of London that has a reputation for excellent schools, green and leafy open spaces, and a history that drives a thriving heritage and culture offer through our museums and libraries. The Council is controlled by a long established Liberal Democrat Administration and has high ambitions set out in its corporate plan “Ambitious for Sutton”, that will ensure Sutton remains a great place to live, work and raise a family. The Council plays a leading role in a number of local partnerships and places great emphasis on engaging effectively with its residents, listening to local voices and making their message heard across London Government.

Kingston is a beautiful Royal borough with a historic setting on the banks of the Thames with excellent schools and a bustling retail centre, all surrounded by open green spaces such as Richmond Park and Bushey Park, former recreation grounds for Tudor kings and queens. The Council is controlled by a Liberal Democrat Administration and has a corporate plan “Making Kingston Better Together” that sets out a vision to be a vibrant, diverse and inclusive borough where residents are active, empowered, engaged and able to remain independent and resilient. The Council engages with residents through a number of forums and events through the year, and like Sutton plays a leading role in developing the South West Region of London.

To assist the delivery of a professional Organisational and Workforce Development service through the provision of wide breadth of support, administration, and record keeping responsibilities that help contribute to an efficient, accurate and customer focussed service.

You will Act as the first point of contact for OWD related matters (managing allocated mailboxes) and take ownership of enquiries, liaising with customers and supplier as necessary, seeking responses from colleagues and others where required, to ensure any advice/response reflects customer policy and procedures, and legislative requirements and provides a prompt service that meets agreed service level agreements.

• Diary management; arranging meetings, workshops; training and minute taking.
• Prepare and publicise information on L&D sessions and OD Events.
• Co-ordinate and process requests for learning and development related activities - raising orders and ensure approvals/expenditure are monitored against budget.
• Prepare, collate and distribute training and event materials, to ensure delegates receive necessary information in a timely manner prior to events.
• Support at any learning and development and engagement sessions (e.g. induction) and monitoring attendance and collating feedback.
• Upkeep of web-pages; information, FAQs, guidance and toolkits as required.
• Support any Freedom of Information and Subject Access Requests.

The Royal Borough of Kingston and the London Borough of Sutton employ nearly 500 staff across its shared services in HR, Finance, Customer Service, Neighbourhoods, Environment and ICT. This is a highly rewarding way of working that will help you develop new skills as you manage relationships and provide a consistent service across multiple partners.

This is an exciting opportunity to join a progressive HR and Organisational Development (OD) Shared Service that focuses on our customers’ needs across Kingston Council, Sutton Council and our traded services. We are building a strategically focused OD service that is responsive to our internal customer needs and enables them to provide the services needed for the communities we work with. This is a great place to be a HR and OD Professional!

We are an award winning HR Shared Service, because people are at the heart of everything we do and our Service is very proud to have won the MJ Award for community diversity and inclusion, 2022.

• Experience of supporting HR/OD practitioners and services through administration and the provision of information to others.
• Experience of recording information and monitoring activities to report on the progress against performance indicators and identifying areas of concern.
• Evidence of continuous professional development and keeping up to date with employment law and good practice.
• Knowledge and use of a range of Learning and Development and Engagement systems, HR & Payroll ICT systems, portals and packages (advantageous - not essential).
• Ability to work accurately and to competing deadlines, managing various transactions across a range of activities. Able to schedule and prioritise own workload and allocate work and monitor the progress to meet SLA targets.
• Able to demonstrate a clear understanding of excellent customer relations and high level customer service skills to actively manage the expectations of managers.
• Able to work flexibly as part of a team and wider service and adapt to changing circumstances.

As an organisation that values and nurtures talent, we’re committed to helping you fulfil your potential and will offer you a supportive, friendly and collaborative environment to grow and develop your career and skills. We’re constantly striving to improve our ways of working so putting your ideas across however big or small; will be fully encouraged and supported by your colleagues and our dynamic and experienced management team.

In addition we offer a modern and flexible working environment for our staff supported by our IT infrastructure, Google Chromebooks and Google Apps, which have acted as a key enabler for collaborative and streamlined working. The COVID-19 pandemic has required us to be even more flexible in how we work and manage staff workloads, ensuring they have the correct equipment and resources to be able to maximise their talents and looking after their wellbeing.

Employees have access to a wide range of benefits, some of which include:

• Generous annual leave entitlement plus bank holidays (pro-rata if part-time working hours apply)
• Three volunteering days per year
• Flexible and agile working arrangements
• Comprehensive learning and development programme
• Discounts on a range of local shops, restaurants, gyms and leisure centres
• Interest free season ticket loans
• Local Government Pension Scheme
• Bicycle loan facilities and cycle to work scheme
• Zip car scheme
• Free eye tests and contribution towards glasses
• Confidential wellbeing and counselling support
• Subsidised gym membership

We pride ourselves on being a diverse, tolerant and welcoming Borough and we aim to create a workforce which reflects the community we serve. We are respectful of difference and realise the positive value of diversity in our workforce. We welcome and encourage job applications from people of all backgrounds and particularly welcome applications from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic candidates and disabled candidates as these groups are currently under-represented in our workforce.

We are proud to be recognised as a Disability Confident employer, and are committed to thinking differently about disability and taking action to improve how we recruit, retain and develop disabled people. We guarantee to interview all disabled applicants who meet the minimum/essential criteria for the role.

We offer a range of family friendly, inclusive employment policies, flexible working arrangements, staff engagement forums, and inclusive staff networks who help drive our diversity agenda.

We are an accredited London Living Wage Employer and this means that everyone working at the Royal Borough of Kingston, regardless of whether they are permanent employees or third-party contractors and suppliers receive the London Living Wage. The real Living Wage is higher than the government’s minimum, or National Living Wage, and is an independently calculated hourly rate of pay that is based on the actual cost of living.

The UK has introduced a new points-based immigration system affecting EU and Non-EU workers and sponsorship requirements. We advise checking the GOV.UK website for right to work guidance.