Talent Acquisition Business Partner - South & Midlands

If you enjoy delivering high-volume recruitment in fast-paced operational environments and partnering with leaders to solve real hiring challenges, this is a role with genuine impact.

We’re looking for a Talent Acquisition Business Partner to take ownership of hiring across our Arriva Bus Midlands & South division - playing a key role in keeping our services running while building capability for the future.

Joining at a time of continued focus on performance and workforce stability, you’ll play a key role in shaping how we attract, hire and retain talent at scale across your region.

The role is hybrid, with an expectation of 3 days per week spent either in the Thurmaston office or travelling to operational sites. Time spent on site visits contributes towards this requirement.

About The Role

This is a hands-on, strategic TA role with real regional ownership. You’ll lead the full recruitment lifecycle across operational and engineering functions, with a strong focus on driver hiring, acting as a trusted advisor to hiring managers and HR Business Partners.

You’ll combine strong delivery with market insight to shape attraction strategies, influence decisions and drive hiring outcomes in a high-volume, fast-paced environment. Candidate experience is central - ensuring clear communication, pace and consistency from first contact through to onboarding.

Alongside delivery, you’ll also have line management responsibility, playing a key role in driving performance, consistency and capability across the Talent Acquisition team in your region.

What You’ll Be Responsible For

Leading end-to-end recruitment across high-volume operational roles, ensuring an efficient, consistent and well-managed process across multiple sites, with a particular focus on driver recruitment.

Building and maintaining strong talent pipelines to support both immediate hiring demand and longer-term workforce needs.

Using market insight and local knowledge to provide visibility on talent availability, competitor activity and hiring trends, enabling better decision-making and workforce planning.

Partnering closely with HRBPs, Operations, L&D and Training Schools to ensure candidates move efficiently through assessment and onboarding, maintaining pace, quality and compliance.

Coordinating activity across the wider TA team, ensuring delivery is aligned, consistent and focused on achieving strong hiring outcomes across your region.

Developing external partnerships to strengthen local attraction, representing Arriva within the market and supporting community and recruitment activity where needed.

Using data to track performance, monitor key metrics such as pipeline health and conversion, and identify opportunities to improve efficiency and outcomes.

Acting as an ambassador for Arriva’s employer brand, ensuring a consistent and engaging candidate experience at every touchpoint.

What We’re Looking For

• •Proven experience delivering recruitment in high-volume, operational environments
• •Strong direct sourcing capability and experience engaging passive talent
• •Experience leading or supporting volume hiring campaigns and pipeline delivery
• •Confidence partnering with senior stakeholders and influencing hiring decisions
• •Experience building talent pipelines and supporting internal mobility
• •Experience managing or developing others within Talent Acquisition
• •Strong understanding of local labour markets and attraction strategies
• •Comfortable working in a fast-paced, matrixed environment
• •Experience using ATS platforms (e.g. Workday) and recruitment data

We’re also looking for someone who aligns with Arriva’s values and is passionate about developing people, supporting growth and building future capability across the organisation.

The closing date for applications is Wednesday 2 September 2026 . Arriva Group reserves the right to close this vacancy early.