Senior Performance and L&D Curriculum Specialist - Maternity leave

Fresh Food, Happy Dogs.

We believe dogs deserve the healthiest, most natural and tastiest meals - with none of the nasties. That’s why we make FRESHly prepared food, cooked just like you would at home and delivered direct to our customers in perfect portions. As a B-Corp certified company, you’re joining a sustainable business that genuinely cares about our people, our products and our impact on the planet. Our goal is simple: to help dogs live healthier, happier, and longer lives, while leaving humans smiling after every interaction.

We’ve come a long way since our co-founders (Kev & Dave), hand delivered the very first Butternut Box. Today, we feed hundreds of thousands of hungry dogs across the UK and Europe - but we won’t stop until we’re feeding dogs everywhere. To get there, we need a team of brilliant people who share that ambition to come and work for us. 

🐾 The job: 

Please note that this role will close on: 12th of August.

We’re looking for someone to help shape how we grow and support our people – from how we learn, to how we create high performing teams through our performance and talent cycle. This role will sit within our Develop Centre of Excellence, focusing on two key areas:

1. Delivering and continuously improving our performance and feedback cycles.
2. Building and coordinating learning programmes across Butternut Box including early careers and owning our core curriculum.
3. Evolving and scaling our Manager and Leadership development.

You’ll be a hands-on partner who can turn frameworks into smooth-running processes, connect with stakeholders to identify and solve core skills gaps and help build a development experience that’s meaningful and scalable across multiple markets.

You’ll be part of the Develop Centre of Excellence team, reporting to the CPO.

🌱 The key responsibilities include but are not limited to:

Performance & Feedback

• Coordinate and manage the end-to-end performance and feedback cycle (including reviews, calibration support, data accuracy, and manager enablement).
• Maintain and improve our systems and tools (HiBob) to ensure performance processes run smoothly and inclusively.
• Support Managers and Team Leads through the cycle, providing training resources and clear communications.
• Help translate feedback and calibration insights into practical development actions.

Track participation, timelines, and key metrics to help us understand progress and impact.

Learning & Development Partnering

• Create clear manager and leadership development pathways and content taking the best from our existing learning offering
• Act as an L&D Business Partner for key functions, helping to identify capability needs and co-design solutions that support the People Plans.
• Help standardise and improve the core learning offering, building a light but impactful curriculum for key roles and groups (e.g. People Managers, Team Leads).
• Work with external providers and internal experts to ensure learning content is relevant, measurable, and embedded into daily work.

Monitor engagement and feedback to continuously improve learning programmes.

Early Careers & Talent Pathways

• Explore how we elevate our apprenticeship, placement, and graduate options to broaden our early talent pools.
• Coordinate early career pathways (e.g. internships, apprenticeships, graduate rotations) and ensure alignment with local legislation and workforce planning goals.

Track progress, funding eligibility, and success measures across regions.

Social Value & Community Partnerships

• Work alongside the People teams to shape opportunities for Squad members to give back – partnering with schools and charities where we can share time and skills.
• Support the thinking and coordination of this initiative in line with Butternut’s wider charity and social impact strategy.

Collaboration

• Work closely with the Develop C of E, wider People team and managers to ensure seamless process delivery.

Collaborate cross-functionally with Talent Acquisition and People Managers to align talent, performance, and growth initiatives.

What success looks like after 6–12 months

• The performance and feedback cycle runs on time, with clear communications, confident manager participation and every squad member having a meaningful review with their manager.
• A simple, relevant learning curriculum exists and also shows the squad a roadmap of how they develop their career at Butternut with foundational skill development.
• You’ve built trusted relationships with key stakeholders in the UK and Europe.
• Data and feedback from both performance and learning programmes are being used to drive better decisions about growth and development.

What you’ll bring

• Experience in HR, L&D, or talent development — ideally in a fast-paced or multi-country environment.
• A solid understanding of performance management cycles, calibration, and feedback systems.
• Confidence managing multiple stakeholders and external providers.
• Strong organisational skills with attention to process, detail, and follow-up.
• Curiosity for learning design and talent development, with a mindset of continuous improvement.
• Comfort with systems (ideally Culture Amp or similar) and basic data reporting.

A collaborative, down-to-earth style — you’re approachable, practical, and motivated by making things work better for people.

⏳ The interview process:

1. Initial call with your dedicated Talent Acquisition Partner, carried out remotely. 
2. Skills interview for 45 minutes with our CPO, remotely.
3. Behaviours interview for 45 minutes with our People Director, remotely. 
4. Leadership interview consisting of two 45 minute interviews, in person at our office in White City with our CPO and Co-Founder.

We usually expect our interview process to take 3-5 weeks, end to end. 

🙌 Our benefits:

• 25 days holiday (plus 8 bank holidays) and an additional day for every year of service up to 5 years
• 5 additional, paid 'paws' days off per year dedicated to your learning, development or personal wellbeing. Hit pause when you need it most
• £500 personal learning & development budget to sharpen your skills
• A significant discount on our Fresh food, to keep your own dogs as healthy as our customers
• Enhanced parental leave
• Flexible core working hours
• Cycle to work scheme
• Pension with NEST
• Private Medical Insurance with Vitality
• Private Dental Insurance with Bupa
• Paid time off for fertility treatments and pregnancy loss
• Paid sabbaticals for squad members with 5 or more years service at Butternut
• Discounted gym access through MyGymDiscounts
• Lots of office dogs (Ajax, Peggy, Chief, Louis, Hansen, Winnie and many more….)

💡 Important things to note:

• We recommend getting your application in as soon as possible. We reserve the right to close the role early. 

• Our team thrives on collaboration. We spend 3 days a week in our West London office (Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday) and 2 days working from wherever you’re most productive. Because being together is a big part of our culture, we’re looking for someone within a comfortable commutable distance to London.

• We’re a small (but mighty!) recruitment team. We aim to respond to everyone personally, but if we’re flooded with brilliant applications, we may need to close the role early. We appreciate your patience while we review applications. 

• For this specific role, we’re unable to offer visa sponsorship, so you’ll need the right to work in the UK.

❗️We believe in a seat at the table for everyone. 

Butternut Box is an equal opportunity employer. We believe that to make the best food for all dogs, we need a team that represents all humans. We celebrate different nationalities, backgrounds, experiences and perspectives. We are specifically committed to increasing representation from underrepresented groups. We want a strong, diverse team built from different identities and lived experiences. We’re not perfect, but we are dedicated to the ongoing work of building an inclusive, supportive place where you can do the best work of your career.