Role Overview:

We are looking for a Senior Manager Talent Acquisition to lead and drive the Talent Acquisition function across multi-location, retail and operational environments.

The role will be responsible for developing and executing scalable recruitment strategies across frontline, middle management, senior management, corporate and specialist roles. The position will own the end-to-end recruitment lifecycle, build talent pipelines for critical positions, partner closely with business leaders, strengthen recruitment efficiency and ensure a strong candidate experience.

The ideal candidate should have strong exposure to high-volume frontline recruitment as well as corporate and management hiring, preferably from retail, hospitality, F&B, entertainment or consumer-facing industries.

Key Responsibilities:

1. Talent Acquisition Strategy & Workforce Planning:

- Develop and execute the annual Talent Acquisition strategy aligned with business growth and workforce requirements.

- Partner with HRBPs and business leaders to understand current and future hiring needs and translate them into actionable hiring plans.

- Drive manpower planning and recruitment prioritisation based on business criticality, budgets, attrition trends and projected requirements.

- Develop differentiated recruitment strategies across frontline, middle management, senior management, corporate and specialist roles.

- Identify opportunities to improve the scalability, productivity and cost-effectiveness of the recruitment function.

2. End-to-End Recruitment Leadership:

- Lead the complete recruitment lifecycle from manpower requisition and JD finalisation through sourcing, assessment, selection, offer management and onboarding.

- Ensure recruitment delivery within agreed timelines:

1. Junior-level positions: 30 days

2. Middle-management positions: 60 days

3. Senior-management positions: 90 days

- Personally drive critical, senior and business-sensitive mandates.

- Ensure robust recruitment governance, documentation and adherence to approved hiring processes.

- Build a strong and consistent candidate experience across the recruitment journey.

3. New Location & High-Volume Recruitment:

- Drive recruitment strategy for new locations and pre-opening requirements, ensuring manpower readiness within agreed timelines.

- Develop location-specific hiring strategies for challenging markets and high-volume frontline requirements.

- Build recruitment models that enable rapid mobilisation without compromising on quality.

- Partner with Operations and Project teams to align hiring milestones with business timelines.

4. Talent Pipeline & Critical Hiring:

- Build and maintain ready talent pools for critical, recurring and hard-to-fill positions.

- Develop external talent pipelines for key roles in partnership with HRBPs and business leaders.

- Conduct talent mapping and market intelligence for critical functions and leadership positions.

- Proactively engage with high-potential candidates before positions become vacant.

- Strengthen sourcing through referrals, internal job postings, professional networks, databases, job portals, social recruitment and targeted searches.

5. Internal Mobility & Talent Marketplace:

- Drive internal hiring and mobility through effective utilisation of internal job postings and employee referrals.

- Maintain an appropriate balance between internal and external hiring based on business and talent requirements.

- Partner with HRBPs to identify internal talent for open positions and support career mobility across locations and functions.

- Improve internal talent visibility and conversion into critical roles.

6. Sourcing & Employer Branding:

- Develop a multi-channel sourcing strategy covering:

1. Employee referrals

2. Job portals

3. LinkedIn

4. Professional networks

5. Campuses

6. Recruitment partners

7. Targeted talent searches

- Strengthen the employer brand and talent proposition across relevant talent pools.

- Identify innovative sourcing channels and digital recruitment solutions to improve reach and quality.

- Build relationships with campuses, industry networks and external talent communities.

7. Stakeholder & Business Partnering:

- Act as a strategic Talent Acquisition partner to business leaders, HRBPs and functional heads.

- Consult hiring managers on role definition, candidate profiles, sourcing strategy, assessment methodology and market availability.

- Bring external market insights to hiring decisions and challenge requirements where appropriate.

- Partner with stakeholders to improve recruitment effectiveness and selection quality.

8. Assessment & Selection:

- Strengthen structured selection and competency-based interviewing practices.

- Conduct initial assessments/interviews for critical positions and corporate roles as required.

- Ensure consistency and quality in candidate assessment across locations and functions.

- Support the deployment of assessment tools, psychometric assessments and technology-enabled selection methods where relevant.

9. Recruitment Analytics & Governance:

- Track and analyse key Talent Acquisition metrics including:

1. Time to Hire / Time to Fill

2. Offer-to-Joining Ratio

3. Source Effectiveness

4. Cost per Hire

5. Quality of Hire

6. Internal vs. External Hiring Ratio

7. Recruitment Funnel Conversion

8. Candidate Experience

9. Vacancy Ageing

10. Recruitment Productivity

- Prepare periodic recruitment dashboards and insights for HR and business leadership and use data to identify bottlenecks and drive continuous improvement.

10. Recruitment Vendor Management:

- Manage recruitment agencies, search partners, job portals and other external TA partners.

- Establish clear SLAs and performance expectations with recruitment partners.

- Review vendor performance based on quality, TAT, conversion and cost metrics.

- Optimise the recruitment partner ecosystem based on business requirements.

- Ensure adherence to approved vendor and commercial processes.

11. Campus & Early Career Talent:

- Develop and execute campus recruitment strategies for management trainees, interns and early-career talent.

- Lead campus engagement and selection processes.

- Build relationships with key educational institutions.

- Strengthen internship and management trainee pipelines as long-term talent sources.

12. Offer Management & Onboarding:

- Ensure competitive and timely offer management within approved budgets and Compensation & Benefits guidelines.

- Partner with C&B and HRBPs on critical offers, exceptions and market benchmarking.

- Track offer acceptance, joining ratios and early-stage dropouts.

- Analyse joining drop-offs and implement corrective actions.

- Partner with HR Operations and business teams to ensure a seamless pre-boarding and onboarding experience.

13. Team Leadership:

- Lead, coach and develop the Talent Acquisition team.

- Define individual and team KPIs and establish a performance-driven recruitment culture.

- Build recruiter capabilities across sourcing, stakeholder management, interviewing, market mapping and analytics.

- Review team productivity and optimise allocation of recruitment mandates.

- Build a high-performing and agile TA team capable of supporting business growth.

Ideal Candidate Profile:

- 815 years of overall Talent Acquisition experience, with around 12 years preferred.

- MBA / Postgraduate qualification in HR.

- Strong experience in high-volume frontline recruitment and corporate/management hiring.

- Experience in multi-location environments.

- Preferred industry exposure:

1. Retail

2. Hospitality

3. F&B

4. Entertainment

5. Consumer-facing organisations

- Strong stakeholder management and influencing skills.

- Excellent communication skills in English and Hindi.

- Strong understanding of recruitment metrics, sourcing channels and talent market intelligence.

- Proven experience managing and developing a TA team.