Lead - HR Business Partner - Plant

Role Purpose

To serve as the strategic HR partner for Skyroot Aerospace’s plant operations, driving workforce planning, organizational effectiveness, employee relations, workforce productivity, talent development, and a high-performance culture.

The role requires a strong blend of strategic HR business partnering and hands-on plant HR management, including extensive experience managing blue-collar workforces, frontline supervisors, technicians, and manufacturing employees. The incumbent will partner closely with manufacturing leadership to build a scalable, disciplined, safe, and performance-driven workforce aligned with the company’s aerospace manufacturing and production goals.

Key Responsibilities

1\. Strategic HR Business Partnering

• Partner with manufacturing, production, quality, supply chain, and operations leaders to align people strategies with business objectives.
• Translate manufacturing plans, production schedules, and capacity requirements into workforce and people plans.
• Advise business leaders on organization structure, manpower deployment, spans of control, succession planning, and organizational effectiveness.
• Drive change management, workforce transformation, and HR initiatives to support business growth and operational excellence.
• Use people analytics and workforce metrics to identify risks, improve productivity, and support data-driven decision-making.

2\. Plant HR & Blue-Collar Workforce Management

• Own end-to-end HR management for plant operations, covering technicians, operators, contract workers, supervisors, and other frontline employees.
• Drive manpower planning, shift-wise deployment, attendance, overtime management, absenteeism control, and workforce utilization.
• Partner with production leaders to ensure adequate staffing against production targets, operational priorities, and changing capacity requirements.
• Establish effective shop-floor communication mechanisms, employee connect initiatives, grievance redressal systems, and workforce engagement practices.
• Build strong relationships with frontline employees and supervisors to foster discipline, accountability, collaboration, and operational continuity.

3\. Employee Relations & Industrial Relations

• Manage employee relations, disciplinary matters, grievance resolution, workplace conflicts, and investigations with fairness and consistency.
• Handle industrial relations, labour law compliance, statutory requirements, inspections, and liaison with relevant authorities, as applicable.
• Oversee contract labour management in partnership with Administration, Procurement, and relevant business teams.
• Ensure compliance with applicable employment legislation, wage and working-hour requirements, social security provisions, and workplace policies.
• Identify emerging employee relations risks and proactively implement measures to maintain a stable and productive workplace.

4\. Talent Acquisition & Workforce Planning

• Partner with Talent Acquisition to develop hiring plans for technicians, operators, supervisors, and manufacturing leadership roles.
• Forecast workforce demand based on production capacity, project milestones, shift requirements, and future expansion.
• Drive timely hiring, onboarding, deployment, and integration of manufacturing employees.
• Develop workforce sourcing strategies, including ITIs, diploma institutions, apprenticeships, and other relevant talent pipelines.
• Monitor hiring effectiveness, time-to-fill, workforce availability, attrition, and hiring costs.

5\. Performance Management & Productivity

• Drive performance management for manufacturing teams, ensuring clear goals, measurable KPIs, periodic reviews, and accountability.
• Partner with functional leaders to establish performance measures relating to productivity, quality, attendance, safety, and operational efficiency.
• Identify performance gaps and implement improvement plans in collaboration with managers and supervisors.
• Support incentive and recognition programs aligned with productivity, quality, safety, and business outcomes.
• Monitor overtime, absenteeism, attrition, and manpower cost trends and recommend corrective actions.

6\. Learning, Capability Development & Succession Planning

• Identify capability gaps across technicians, operators, supervisors, and manufacturing managers.
• Partner with technical and functional teams to develop training plans covering technical skills, quality standards, safety, process discipline, and leadership capabilities.
• Strengthen frontline leadership through supervisor development, people-management training, and coaching.
• Drive cross-skilling, multi-skilling, internal mobility, and career progression for shop-floor employees.
• Develop succession plans for critical plant positions and build a sustainable pipeline of skilled talent.

7\. Employee Engagement, Culture & Retention

• Drive employee engagement, workforce communication, recognition, and retention initiatives across manufacturing operations.
• Conduct employee connect sessions, pulse surveys, focus groups, and exit interviews to understand workforce concerns.
• Develop targeted retention strategies for critical skills and hard-to-replace manufacturing talent.
• Foster a culture of ownership, teamwork, continuous improvement, inclusion, and accountability.
• Partner with leaders to strengthen employee morale during periods of growth, change, and increased production demand.

8\. Compensation, Benefits & HR Operations

• Partner with Compensation & Benefits teams on salary structures, wage revisions, incentives, benefits, and internal pay equity.
• Ensure accurate and timely management of HR processes related to attendance, leave, payroll inputs, employee records, and workforce reporting.
• Support workforce budgeting, manpower cost forecasting, and periodic cost optimization initiatives.
• Ensure effective administration of employee lifecycle processes, including onboarding, transfers, promotions, disciplinary actions, and separations.
• Maintain accurate HR data, documentation, policies, and audit-ready records.

9\. Safety, Compliance & Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Partner with EHS, Quality, Security, Administration, and Operations teams to strengthen workplace safety, discipline, and compliance.
• Promote a safety-conscious culture and ensure HR processes support mandatory training, appropriate conduct, and adherence to site requirements.
• Support workforce readiness for audits, operational reviews, and applicable statutory inspections.
• Participate in cross-functional initiatives to improve shop-floor effectiveness, employee experience, and operational reliability.

Requirements

Qualifications & Experience

• Bachelor’s or master’s degree in human resources, Business Administration, Industrial Relations, or a related discipline.
• 8+ years of progressive HR experience, with substantial experience in a manufacturing or industrial environment.
• Mandatory hands-on experience managing plant HR and blue-collar workforces, including technicians, operators, contract workers, and frontline supervisors.
• Strong working knowledge of labour laws, industrial relations, statutory compliance, and contract labour management.
• Experience in workforce planning, performance management, employee engagement, talent acquisition, and HR operations.
• Demonstrated ability to partner with plant leadership and translate operational priorities into effective HR solutions.
• Experience in aerospace, automotive, precision engineering, electronics, heavy engineering, or other complex manufacturing environments will be an advantage.

Key Competencies

• Strong business acumen and strategic HR partnering.
• Hands-on plant HR and blue-collar workforce management.
• Employee relations, conflict resolution, and stakeholder management.
• Analytical thinking and data-driven decision-making.
• Workforce productivity and cost optimization.
• Change management and organizational effectiveness.
• Strong communication, influencing, and leadership skills.
• Ability to operate effectively in a fast-paced, high-growth manufacturing environment.