Head of People Partnering, Trainline
More information about location
2+ days a week in office
Europe's leading rail ticketing platform
Be an early applicant
Europe's leading rail ticketing platform
1001+ employees
Be an early applicant
More information about location
2+ days a week in office
1001+ employees
Company mission
Trainline is proud to be Europe's leading rail and coach platform - a tech company with a mission to make train travel as smooth as possible to allow travellers to make greener travel choices.
Role
Who you are
- Proven experience in a senior HR business partnering role within a scaling tech organisation, ideally at Head of level supporting teams of 500+ headcount
- Strong generalist background, with end-to-end experience across the employee lifecycle — from hiring and onboarding to performance, progression, and exits
- Experience partnering with Tech, Product or Engineering organisations, ideally in organisations with a strong understanding of their rhythms and challenges
- Comfortable working across UK and EU jurisdictions, with an understanding of local employment frameworks and cultural nuances
- A strategic thinker with hands-on execution ability — comfortable operating at pace and navigating ambiguity
- A natural relationship builder and coach — confident influencing senior stakeholders, managing complexity, and role modelling inclusive leadership
- Data-savvy, commercially minded, and outcome-oriented with demonstrated examples on your CV and in interviews
- Someone who embraces our hybrid working approach and role models this
- Some PLC experience is a bonus
What the job involves
- At Trainline, our People Partnering function is at the heart of how we support, grow and enable our teams to thrive
- We’re a progressive, high-impact team that works closely with senior leaders to shape culture, drive performance, and embed people strategy across every stage of the employee experience
- As part of a purpose-driven, tech-led business with bold growth ambitions, you’ll partner with brilliant teams across the UK and Europe — all within a high-trust, hybrid-first environment that values inclusion, challenge and continuous learning
- This is a unique opportunity to help scale a forward-thinking People Partnering model in a business that’s moving fast and thinking big
- We’re looking for a Head of People Partnering to lead our business partnering function and drive impact across our Tech and Product teams
- This is a critical leadership role within our People team - shaping how we support, grow, and enable our teams to thrive as we continue to scale and evolve Trainline
- You’ll be responsible for building strong relationships with senior leaders, embedding our people strategy, and ensuring we deliver a high-performing, inclusive, and engaged culture
- Lead and develop a high-performing team of People Partners to support Tech and Product teams across the UK and EU
- Act as a strategic advisor and partner to senior leaders across our Extended Leadership Team (ELT) - shaping org design, workforce planning, talent development, and leadership effectiveness
- Drive delivery of key people programs (e.g. performance, engagement, pay & career progression, talent reviews) in a way that’s simple, scalable and embedded in the business
- Drive capability and succession planning with leaders, ensuring we’re building future-fit teams aligned with business strategy
- Partner closely with the People Operations, Talent, and L&D teams to ensure a cohesive and consistent experience across the employee lifecycle, driving value for our team and the wider business
- Provide coaching and challenge to leaders to raise the bar on performance, management capability and decision-making
- Use data and insight to influence business decisions and improve people and team outcomes
- Bring external insights and market trends into the business to inform our people strategy and stay competitive in attracting and retaining top talent
- Support change and transformation activity — from reorgs to scaling teams and evolving our hybrid working model
- Oversee complex employee relations matters and act as a point of escalation for sensitive or high-risk issues, ensuring fairness, consistency and legal compliance
Application process
- Call with someone from the Talent team covering experience and motivations (45 mins)
- Leadership & experience focused interview with People Director (45 mins)
- Peer interview with Head of People Partnering (45 mins)
- Panel interview (60 mins)
Salary benchmarks
Our take
Trainline make it super easy to book transport tickets. Its app is intuitive and well designed and its even pioneering paperless travel, allowing users to store their tickets in the app.
It's hyper-focused on customer experience and has a product culture of fast iteration to deliver great outcomes for customers. Its customers make 170,000 journeys a day and it sells 200 tickets a minute.
Its continuing to innovate to stay ahead, using machine learning to predict price movements and integrating with Siri and Google Assistant so people can buy tickets simply by speaking to their phone.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
Company
Employee endorsements
Challenging work
"The complex nature of the market as we work with different suppliers is an amazing opportunity to create fluid solutions. A very well segmented..."
Company benefits
- Flexible working (40% min office attendance)
- Cycle to work scheme
- Discounted gym memberships through Wellhub
- Private Health and Dental Insurance
- Enhanced Pension (matched contributions)
- Income Protection
- Share Incentive Plan (buy one get one free)
- Learning budget
- Primary & Secondary Caregiver Leave
- Shared Parental Leave
- Enhanced sick pay
- Free Perkbox subscription
- Electric Vehicle Salary Sacrifice Scheme
- YellowNest - Subsidised Childcare Fees
- Work from Abroad
Company values
- Own It - We care about every customer, partner and journey
- Do Good - We make a positive impact
- Travel Together - We're one team
- Think Big - We are building the future of rail
Company HQ
Farringdon, London, UK
Articles
Leadership
Jody Ford
(CEO)Joined Trainline in 2020 as COO before becoming the CEO in 2021. Previously the Group CEO at Moonpig and Photobox and also spent over 10 years at eBay in various VP roles.
Lisa Hillier
(Chief People Officer)Previously the CPO at Gousto, The Restaurant Group, and Just Eat. They also spent over 6 years at Betfair as the Head of HR and Chief Human Resource Officer.
Mike Hyde
(Chief Technology Officer)Previously a Director of Data Science at Facebook and as a Director of Business Insights at Skype and Microsoft.
Sakshi Anand
(Chief Growth Officer)Joined Trainline in 2023 as the VP of Growth and President of UK before becoming the CGO in 2025. They are also the Founder of NeuStar Consulting.
People progressing
Gary joined in 2022 from Comparethemarket as Director of Engineering and was recently promoted to VP Engineering, reporting directly to CTO.
Joe joined in 2022 from Meta as Director of Data Science and was recently promoted to VP Data, reporting directly to CTO.
Ali joined in 2023 from Meta and was recently promoted to VP Product, reporting directly to CPO.
Diversity, Equity & Inclusion at Trainline
- 💚 Diversity drives us forward We know that having a diverse team is crucial to Trainline’s ongoing success. A team that is diverse in all forms – gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability, nationality and diversity of thought are key to Trainline being an inclusive environment where every Trainliner can be their true self. We're committed to creating workplaces where everyone belongs, is celebrated and their differences are valued, creating an awesome employee and customer experience. 💚 Meet our Networks Our diversity networks are inclusive communities developed and led by Trainliners, with sponsorship and support from senior leaders. They're all about empowering and supporting underrepresented groups, by providing a safe space to talk, a place to come up with new ideas and a channel for voices to be heard. 🚀 Women in Leadership 💜 Gender Equality Network 🏳️🌈 Rainbow Train (LGBTQIA+) 🌻 Sunflower (accessibility) 🌍 Ethnic Diversity Network 🐣 Parent & Carers
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