Location: Hybrid – most of your time will be spent in our offices on Bristol Harbourside, though there will be lots of opportunities to work from home or elsewhere if you’d like.
We’re happy to support flexible working – both through hybrid working and your working pattern. You need to be able to attend key meetings and inductions, have some cross-over with the rest of the People team and deliver the responsibilities of the role.
Department: People Team
Report to: People Manager
Responsible for: N/A
Salary: £25,397 per annum (full-time salary)
Contract: 12-month new parent leave cover contract.
Working hours: Part time, 22.5 - 30 hours a week, ideally over 3 or 4 days (0.6 to 0.8 FTE), it’s up to you.
About We The Curious
We The Curious is an educational charity and South West England's leading science centre.
We produce experiences that bring people together to play, get creative with science and explore different ideas.
We work with partners, locally and nationally, supporting people to be inquisitive, develop new skills and improve their wellbeing.
We are progressive, inquisitive, collaborative, playful and creative.
Our mission
Our aim is to connect and empower people through sharing creative experiences which celebrate unknowns in science.
Our work as a charity is driven by five key pledges:
_Cultivate Curiosity
_Include Everyone
_Open Up Science
_Sustainable Futures
_Build Resilience
You can find out more about these in our Manifesto.
About the role
Support our People team with people related queries and help coordinate our people journey. You'll be involved in everything from recruitment to retirement and everything in-between.
Our team is small but ambitious. We're knee deep in delivering our 5-year People Plan which we are really proud of and in this role, you’ll support our new initiatives, policies and practice. When we’re talking about our “People” in this document we mean staff, volunteers and trustees, that’s because we’re a charity.
In the team we currently have a People Director, a People Belonging Manager, a People Coordinator, a People Manager and a Volunteer Programme Manager. We spin a lot of plates, collaborate with people from all across the organisation as well as external partners, and are proud of the work we do. Our People Coordinator is going off in New Parent Leave, so you'll be covering the work she does!
What will you do in this role?
If you haven’t completed your CIPD level 3 HR qualification, we are happy to discuss supporting you to complete this!
Role specific responsibilities
_Monitoring our People inboxes, making sure you get back to queries nice and quickly, or passing on emails for to the rest of the team to deal with.
_Recruitment administration and coordination, including organising interviews, advertising jobs and working with managers to coordinate our recruitment processes.
_Processing all paperwork and correspondence for new starters like references and welcome emails, as well as issuing offer letters and contracts.
_Coordinating new starter onboarding, such as organising inductions and training activities, as well as being there for them with any queries during their first few weeks. Once you are comfortable to, we’d love you to run induction sessions.
_Keeping all our spreadsheets and trackers up to date so we have the information we need on employees.
_ Supporting the People Manager with payroll administration.
_ Assisting with arranging training courses and development activities
_ Project admin support to include the research, development and launching of new people initiatives
_ Creating reports on people data, such as holiday and absence reports.
_ Working with our volunteers, work experience students and placement students.
_ Supporting with admin on employee relation issues and taking notes in meetings.
_Keeping our people management databases updated with any changes to people details. We use PeopleHR, Rotacloud and Better Impact.
What will you do in this role?
General responsibilities
_Responsible for following safeguarding policies and procedures and raising any concerns to your manager/Designated Safeguarding Officer.
_Promoting charity messaging across your area of work wherever possible, with support from the Development and Marketing teams.’
_General responsibility for departmental compliance with GDPR.
_Support the rest of the People team with projects when required.
What we're looking for from you
_You'll have great attention to detail and a knack for noticing the little things, you tend to catch the details others might not spot
_ You’ll love being organised and be happy to prioritise your own workload.
_You’ll have previous admin experience, this might be in HR or a similar type of fast paced admin role.
_ You’ll have good experience of using systems like Microsoft Office, including Teams and Outlook
_ You’re comfortable using or willing to learn HR Management Systems (we use PeopleHR but you don’t need to know this exact one)
_ You will be a team player, working collaboratively is at the heart of what we do, you’ll have experience of working in a team and desire to work cross departmentally.
_ Interest in working in a role with lots variety , such as administration, working with volunteering and advocating for a better and inclusive workplace.
_ You value inclusion, equity and diversity and put this at the heart of your work. A lot of the changes we want to make are linked to making the world of work a better place, and sometimes this means asking uncomfortable questions or challenging the norm.
Application process
Deadline for applications: Sunday 24th November at midnight
Interview date(s) and location: Monday 9th and Tuesday 10th November 2024
Interview questions will be sent out prior to the interview to help you prepare.
Start date: Early January 2025
If you would like to apply, please complete the application form. It contains three questions designed to assess your experience and suitability for the role.
Please do not send in CVs or covering letters as we don’t review them.
We appreciate interviews can be stressful, so we try to make them more of a conversation and a chance for you to tell us about how your skills and experience make you the right person for the role.
If you are invited for interview, we’ll send you the questions that you’ll be asked beforehand so that you have time to prepare.
If you have any particular needs or requirements, please do let us know so we are able to make the required adjustments.
If you would like to talk about the role or the application process, please email people@wethecurious.org
Including everyone
We value the positive impact greater representation will have on our organisation, programmes and culture. It’s our goal to become an inclusive place to work and for our teams to better reflect our city and the people who visit us.
We welcome applications from people of all lived experiences and particularly those that are not well represented* in the science centre sector.
We want to work with you to ensure the recruitment process is accessible for you, please contact us if you have questions about We The Curious, our accessibility or recruitment process at people@wethecurious.org
*By not well represented we mean people with lived experience including but not limited to:
_African and African-Caribbean heritage
_South Asian and East Asian heritage
_Other global majority ethnic groups
_Disabled
_Neurodivergent
_Visually Impaired
_Deaf community
_LGBTQIA+ and/or non-binary
_Working class background
_Didn’t go to university or first in your immediate family to attend University
Support during the process
We The Curious is a Disability Confident Employer and we welcome applications from candidates who self-assess themselves as having a disability. We will guarantee an interview to applicants who advise that they have a disability and who meet the minimum criteria for a job vacancy. To help you, under the Equality Act 2010 a person is defined as having a disability if a) they have a physical or mental impairment, and b) the impairment has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on their ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities.
We want to work with you to ensure the recruitment process is accessible for you.
If you are disabled, neurodivergent, or if you have a long-term health condition, we’ll be happy to make reasonable adjustments to our processes for you.
You’ll have the opportunity to let us know about any adjustments you may need throughout the application and selection process. We’ll continue this conversation if you join us as a staff member, and we’ll work with you to make sure you have the adjustments you need to succeed in your role.
Examples of adjustments could include:
_providing alternative formats at every stage
_options to apply
_extra time for tasks
_providing some extra information about what to expect
_office orientation before an in-person interview.
Working with us
We value the people that work with us. Our staff have access to the following:
Wellbeing & support
_Flexible working
_Hybrid working
_Cycle to work scheme
_Free yearly flu jabs and eye tests
_Paid sick leave for physical and mental health
_Mental Health First Aiders
_Confidential advice & counselling through the Employee Support Programme
Leave
_25 days per year in addition to bank holidays (all pro-rata).
_A day of extra holiday for every 5 years' service
_An amount of paid leave for emergency dependent care, domestic emergency leave and compassionate leave
New Parent Policy
We are proud to be a family friendly organisation, which is why we work to develop our people practices in line with that value. We have recently introduced a none gendered approach to Maternity and Paternity, re-branded as our “New Parent Policy”. There are eligibility criteria and terms and conditions, but the key take away is that anyone who is due to become a new parent, regardless of their gender, can take 1 year off work, and we’ll pay your full salary for the first five months.
Facilities & discounts
_Free entry to the venue at any time with up to four guests, plus 12 additional entry tickets per calendar year to give away.
_15% off in the We The Curious café
_20% off in our shop
_Range of discounts with local businesses and free entry to other local attractions.
_Social events
_Free parking
_Secure cycle storage
Pension
_We offer a pension scheme with 5% company contributions.
_Death in service benefit
_Four times your annual salary.
