People & Engagement Associate

Join us at EIT:

At the Ellison Institute of Technology (EIT), we’re on a mission to translate scientific discovery into real world impact. We bring together visionary scientists, technologists, engineers, researchers, educators and innovators to tackle humanity’s greatest challenges in four transformative areas:

• Health, Medical Science & Generative Biology
• Food Security & Sustainable Agriculture
• Climate Change & Managing CO₂
• Artificial Intelligence & Robotics

This is ambitious work - work that demands curiosity, courage, and a relentless drive to make a difference. At EIT, you’ll join a community built on excellence, innovation, tenacity, trust, and collaboration, where bold ideas become real-world breakthroughs. Together, we push boundaries, embrace complexity, and create solutions to scale ideas from lab to society. Explore more at www.eit.org.

Your Role:

At EIT we are seeking a collaborative and delivery focused Associate to join our People and Engagement team. The People & Engagement Associate will provide project, portfolio, reporting and analytical capability across the People & Engagement function. The Analyst role acts as a capacity multiplier through helping ensure priorities are well planned, actively managed and informed by high-quality data and insight. 

This is a hands-on role for someone who enjoys working across multiple activities ranging from developing a project plan, exploring an opportunity in detail to getting directly involved in Delivery. It will suit someone who enjoys both thinking through a challenge and collaborating across teams to make things happen.  

Your Responsibilities:

Project Delivery & Change  

• Help shape People & Engagement projects and initiatives, working with colleagues to define the challenge, intended outcomes and practical steps need to deliver. 

• Turn ideas, research and recommendations into clear project plans, coordinating activities and keeping work moving. 

• Get directly involved in priority projects and workstreams, providing practical delivery support where it will make the greatest difference. 

Planning & Connecting Priorities 

• Maintain the People & Engagement roadmap connecting priorities, milestones, dependencies, risks and decisions. 

• Coordinate regular project reviews helping the team understand and celebrate success, resolve issues, agree next steps and follow through on actions. 

• Make progress visible through clear, useful updates, highlighting where plans need attention or additional support. 

• Support annual and ongoing People planning, including tracking resources, budgets and priorities. 

Insight & Better Ways of Working 

• Use workforce data, research and colleague feedback to understand challenges, identify opportunities and recommend practical action. 

• Partner with the Senior Director and wider team to develop useful dashboards and reporting that support decisions and track progress. 

• Explore and apply AI, automation and digital tools to improve analysis, simplify reporting and make workflows more effective. 

Organisational Effectiveness & Team 

• Act as a multiplier through collaborating and adding capacity where needed in the team. 
• Connect information across the team so that relevant dependencies, themes and implications are understood. 
• Apply structured problem-solving and thinking to questions around People, Process & Technology.  
• Support the HRBPs on organisational diagnostics, organisation design, change and employee experience activity.  
• Prepare concise briefing materials, recommendations and presentations for leadership discussions and decision-making. 

Requirements

You may currently work in project delivery, business improvement, organisational development, consulting or similar roles. You will have gained strong project and problem-solving foundations and are looking for an opportunity to apply them more broadly working with the people who turn recommendations into actions. You will enjoy variety, be comfortable moving between detailed work and the bigger picture and enjoy working through opportunities across People, Process & Technology. You will take satisfaction in helping a team deliver to shared goals.  

Essential Knowledge, Skills & Experience

• Experience in project delivery, analysis, business process, strategic planning, analytics or similar background. 
• Strong problem-solving skills and an evidence-based approach. Having the ability to turn complex information into clear conclusions and actions. 
• Strong Excel skills and confidence working with quantitative and qualitative data, with excellent presentation creation capability. 
• Experience contributing to projects involving multiple stakeholders, coordinating activities and handling sensitive and confidential information with discretion.   
• Excellent written communication and presentation skills, with strong attention to detail. 
• Working in an environment that has an evidence-based approach to solving problems across People, Process & Technology. 
• Proven experience using AI and digital productivity tools to improve analysis, communication and workflow. 

Desirable Knowledge, Skills & Experience

• Experience in a people & change, organisational development or consulting environment, or in a fast-paced, R&D or innovation led context.  
• A degree or postgraduate qualification in Occupational Psychology, Psychology, Organisational Behaviour.  
• Experience with Power BI or another data visualisation / business intelligence tool. 
• Exposure to People data, HR analytics or workforce planning. 

Benefits

We offer the following benefits:

• Competitive salary + travel allowance + bonus
• Enhanced holiday. Our annual leave allowance is 25 days plus 8 bank holidays and an additional 3 days between Christmas and New Year. You will also have the opportunity to purchase an additional 5 days annual leave in January and July.
• Pension - Employer contribution 7.5%, minimum employee contribution 5%
• Life Assurance.
• Income Protection
• Private Medical Insurance as standard for you, your partner and any dependents. Including hospital Cash Plan
• Employee discounts
• Electric car scheme
• Nursery Salary Sacrifice scheme
• Cycle to Work Scheme
• Family Planning
• Neurodiversity support including advise and assessments
• Coaching & Therapy services

Working Together – What It Involves:

• You must have the right to work permanently in the UK with a willingness to travel as necessary.
• You will live in, or within easy commuting distance of, Oxford (or be willing to relocate).
• Due to the nature of the function and the business, this is an office-based role.