Chanel People Experience Partner

About Chanel

Chanel is one of the world’s most revered luxury houses, founded by Gabrielle Chanel and distinguished by an enduring vision of elegance, freedom, and modernity. As an employer, the House brings together métiers ranging from haute couture, fashion and leather goods to fragrance, beauty, watches, and fine jewelry, offering employees the opportunity to contribute to a legacy defined by exceptional craftsmanship and creative audacity. Chanel values excellence, discretion, collaboration, and long-term development, fostering an environment where talent is nurtured and heritage is continually reinterpreted for contemporary clients. Its teams are united by a commitment to quality, innovation, and the timeless spirit of the brand.

Role & Responsibilities

• Deliver seamless, branded, human-centred experiences across the employee lifecycle, including onboarding, mobility, reboarding, exits and transitions.
• Shape lifecycle strategies by anticipating workforce needs, emerging expectations and market dynamics.
• Identify employee experience friction points through data, sentiment and case trends, and propose structural improvements.
• Maintain accurate employee records and documentation, update Workday, and ensure compliance requirements are met across Hong Kong and Macau.
• Safeguard consistent, compliant HR operations, documentation standards and governance frameworks across markets.
• Simplify workflows, improve employee touchpoints and strengthen governance discipline to drive operational excellence.
• Monitor data integrity, reporting accuracy, audit readiness and readiness for policy updates.
• Act as the primary employee relations advisor for assigned portfolios, handling employee concerns fairly and confidentially in alignment with Chanel values.
• Manage employee relations cases end to end, from intake to closure, ensuring staff cases and responsibilities are governed according to requirements.
• Provide judgement-based recommendations in partnership with HR business partners and Legal as needed.
• Identify root causes of employee relations trends and enable preventative action through policy updates, manager capability building or process enhancements.
• Translate People Experience strategic priorities, including culture, engagement, flexibility, wellbeing and communication clarity, into actionable plans and experiences.
• Influence leaders to adopt people-centric practices and embed the human touch.
• Strengthen culture through events, recognition, leadership connectivity and community-building initiatives.
• Provide insights into employee sentiment through touchpoints, cases and engagement feedback.
• Adapt People Experience initiatives, including engagement, recognition, events and campaigns, to division-specific needs.
• Advise business leaders on people matters, offering clarity, sound judgement and practical solutions.
• Surface people insights, employee sentiment and risk patterns proactively to influence business decisions.
• Partner closely with HR business partners and Centres of Expertise to provide integrated people support aligned with organisational and business objectives.
• Build organisational empathy and champion employee voice in keeping with Chanel’s culture and commitment to humanity.
• Use people data, workforce trends and lifecycle metrics to inform strategy, anticipate needs and provide actionable recommendations.
• Anticipate people needs from trends, such as seasonal retail workload, reboarding needs and cultural fatigue.
• Connect data to employee experience, culture and governance outcomes.
• Lead or support market-wide and cross-functional projects, including culture transformation, process redesign and wellbeing initiatives.
• Ensure operational readiness for new workforce policies, tools and systems.
• Advocate for simplification, employee-centricity and innovation in experience processes.
• Contribute to a cohesive, agile People Experience team with shared accountability across portfolios.
• Build future capabilities within the People Experience team by modelling sound judgement, experience-led thinking, digital fluency and continuous improvement.
• Partner effectively with HKMO, Regional HR and cross-functional teams.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Human Resources, Psychology or a related field.
• Proficiency in English and Traditional Chinese, written and verbal.
• Solid understanding of local employment regulations, policies and governance requirements.
• At least 8–10 years of HR, People Experience or People Operations experience, with proven responsibility for lifecycle management and stakeholder advisory.
• Experience in luxury retail, multi-stakeholder environments or fast-paced business settings is highly valued.
• Demonstrated ability to lead employee relations investigations, risk assessments and case handling at a senior advisory level.
• Advanced familiarity with Workday and strong HR systems literacy.
• Strong analytical capability, including the ability to interpret data and generate insights.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills for developing communications, guides and manager advisories.
• Ability to design end-to-end employee journeys and lead transformation.
• Ability to re-engineer processes and elevate governance maturity.
• Ability to act as an influential strategic business partner.
• Sound judgement and employee relations leadership, including leading investigations, making fair decisions and mitigating risks.
• Digital fluency, including creating dashboards, improving systems and driving data-led thinking.
• Ability to establish service standards and coach others.
• Ability to lead transformation and foster agility across the team.

Skills

Experience

At least 8–10 years of HR, People Experience or People Operations experience, with proven responsibility for lifecycle management and stakeholder advisory; experience in luxury retail, multi-stakeholder environments or fast-paced business settings is highly valued.

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Human Resources, Psychology or a related field.

Culture

Chanel fosters a culture of timeless creativity, exacting craftsmanship, and quiet excellence, where employees are encouraged to uphold the house’s heritage while contributing to its continued innovation. The workplace environment is refined, collaborative, and deeply committed to quality, offering professionals the opportunity to grow within a globally respected maison that values discretion, artistry, and long-term vision.

About Cerulean

Cerulean is the definitive career portal for the global luxury industry. We match exceptional professionals with exclusive opportunities at the world's most prestigious brands. From haute couture and fine watchmaking to prestige beauty, hospitality, and boutique retail, Cerulean centralises luxury employment to help you find the career for which you were destined.