Director of People

Director of People

Your new company

The Great Schools Trust (GST) is a values-based mission driven multi academy trust which has doubled in size from three academies (1200 students) in 2015 to five academies (2500 students) in 2021. The trust's first school, opened in 2012 as a 11-18 free school with a distinct 'leadership' specialism and with the vision of driving system change and enhancing the social and geographical mobility of its community. By 2019 the academy became the highest performing non-selective state school in Cheshire and ranked in the top 5 of the highest performing free schools nationally. Over 95% of its students have progressed onto their first-choice university in the last 3 years (compared to 8% HEI progression pre-2012 in the locality). In February 2021, two Wave 14 free school applications were approved by the DfE.

At full capacity GST's seven academies will grow the trust's student cohort to over 5000 students and 600 staff. GST's ambition is to double again in size by 2030, operating 14 academies in 6 hubs across three NW regions. GST understand that a happy and healthy workforce has the greatest impact above all else on the quality of children and young people's learning and progress. Furthermore, we must ensure both wave 14 academies open successfully whilst also support internal growth of our existing academies and further expansion. The attraction, development and retention of talented mission driven employees will support GST's second strategic anchor and their top area of investment over the next three years - our 'People'.

Your new role

The trust now seeks to appoint a Director of People to make this goal a reality. The candidate would become the talent architect for the trust and lead the optimisation systems and processes that drive the performance of our people. The strategic plans of GST are delivered through a culture of intent and values-based leadership. The strategic objectives and granular detail for the trust's People Strategy will be up to the successful candidate to proffer. The successful applicant will Research, Design, Implement & Lead the GST People Strategy, and focus on the following key areas.

• Attraction
• Recruitment/Selection/Talent
• Growth/Commercial business growth
• Development
• Performance/Development of performance
• Lead
• Engagement
• Reward
• Compliance

What you'll need to succeed

The candidate must be able to research, design, implement and lead the trust's 'People Strategy' to achieve the strategic ambition of becoming 'Employer of Choice' by 2026.
CIPD level 5 (minimum or equivalent)
Experience in development of a people/HR service
Strong OD and change HR project exposure


What you need to do now
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