Director of People (12m FTC Mat Cover)

We exist to make migration easy.

A systemic problem of this magnitude requires a team of curious thinkers who relentlessly pursue solutions. Those who constantly challenge the why, dismantle assumptions, and always take action to build a better way.

A Marshmallow career is built on a cycle of continuous growth, with learning at its core. You will be challenged to raise the bar on your capabilities and supported with the right tools and guidance to do so. This ensures you can deliver impactful work and drive change.

If life at Marshmallow sounds like it could be for you, explore our Culture Handbook to find out more.

Move our mission, and your career, forward.

Our People team is responsible for creating the environment where everyone at Marshmallow can do their best work and grow. We bring together Talent Acquisition, People Partnering, People Operations, Learning & Development, Internal Communications and Facilities to support our teams across London and Budapest.

We partner closely with the Exec and senior leadership to align our people strategy with our business goals, build a high‑performance and inclusive culture, and ensure a smooth, engaging experience across the entire employee lifecycle. From hiring and onboarding, to development, wellbeing, and workplace experience, the People team is at the heart of how Marshmallow operates and evolves.

We’re looking for someone who can confidently lead this function through a 12‑month period, guiding specialist leads across each discipline, and ensuring our people, processes and culture continue to thrive as we grow.

• Lead the end-to-end People function (Talent Acquisition, People Partnering, People Operations, L&D, Internal Communications and Facilities) across our London and Budapest locations.

• Own and deliver the People strategy for the duration of the cover period, aligning it with business goals and supporting high performance and engagement.

• Partner closely with the CEO, Exec and senior leadership to drive organisational effectiveness, using people data and insights to inform strategic decisions.

• Oversee inclusive, effective hiring and proactive people support, ensuring managers are equipped to lead, develop and engage their teams.

• Ensure robust, compliant People operations, including accurate people data, governance and continuously improving systems, policies and employee lifecycle processes.

• Champion an inclusive, learning-focused culture by supporting impactful L&D, transparent internal communications and a safe, welcoming workplace environment.

• A thoughtful people leader who balances strategic thinking with a pragmatic, hands-on approach when needed

• Confident influencing at exec level, with strong communication skills and the ability to build trusted relationships across the business

• Motivated by creating inclusive, engaging, high-performance cultures where people can do their best work

• Resilient and calm under pressure, comfortable leading through ambiguity and change while keeping teams aligned and supported

• An experienced senior People / HR leader with background in fast-paced, scaling environments and exec-level reporting

• Experienced across the full People lifecycle—Talent Acquisition, People Partnering, People Operations, L&D, Internal Communications, and Facilities

• Capable of owning and delivering a People strategy that supports business goals and high-performance culture across multi-location teams

• Data-driven in your decision-making, using People data, reporting and insights to influence senior stakeholders

• Exceptional at communication and stakeholder management, with a pragmatic, hands-on approach to solving complex people challenges

• Flexible working - Spend 3 days per week with your team in our new collaborative London office, and own your own working hours. The rest is up to you 🏠

• Competitive bonus scheme - designed to reward and recognise high performance 🌟

• Flexible benefits budget - £50 per month to spend on a Ben Mastercard meaning you get your own benefits budget to spend on things you want. Whether that’s subscriptions, night classes (puppy yoga, anyone?), the big shop or a forest of houseplants. Pretty much anything goes 💰

• Mental wellbeing support – Access therapy and mental health sessions through Oliva 💚

• Learning and development – Personal budgets for books and training courses to help you grow in your role. Plus 2 days a year - on us! - to further your skillset 🤓

• Private health care - Enjoy all the benefits Vitality has to offer, including reduced gym memberships and discounts on smartwatches 🏥

• Medical cash plan - To help you with the costs of dental, optical and physio (plus more!)

• Tech scheme - Get the latest tech for less 🖥

Plus all the rest; 33 days holiday (including bank holidays), pension, cycle to work scheme, monthly team socials and company-wide socials every month!

We break it up into 4 stages:

• Initial interview with a member of the Talent team (45 mins)

• A skill-based past experience interview focused on your People leadership experience and approach with a Senior People Partner (1 hour)

• A technical task style interview, where you will likely complete a presentation on a topic related to this role

• A culture and values interview with senior leadership to explore your leadership style, collaboration, and alignment with our mission (1 hour) and an informal conversation with senior leaders to answer any remaining questions and ensure mutual fit (45 mins)

We’ll let you know if you’re invited to an interview or not. But, as a small team with a lot of applications to consider, we can’t give individual feedback on each application.

Background checks
As part of our commitment to maintaining a safe and trustworthy environment, we’ll carry out standard background checks, including a DBS and a Cifas check. These help ensure there are no ongoing criminal proceedings and support the prevention of fraud and other forms of serious misconduct. If anything of concern is identified, it may affect your eligibility for certain roles or services. Feel free to ask our Talent Acquisition team if you have any questions about this!

At Marshmallow, we want to hire people from all walks of life with the passion and skills needed to help us achieve our company mission. To do that, we're committed to hiring without judgement, prejudice or bias.

We encourage everyone to apply for our open roles. Gender identity, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age or background does not affect how we process job applications.

We're working hard to build an inclusive culture that empowers our people to do their best work, have fun and feel that they belong.

We take privacy seriously here at Marshmallow. Our Recruitment privacy notice explains how we process and handle your personal data. To find out more please view it here.