Senior HR Manager

• Business Support
• Human Resources
• Auckland
• Permanent Full-time

5 November 2026

• Work for one of New Zealand's leading law firms
• Join a high-performing, supportive and inclusive team
• Help shape HR operations delivery at Bell Gully

About Bell Gully

Bell Gully is a leading New Zealand law firm. We work together to achieve exceptional outcomes for, and long-term relationships with, our clients, people and communities. We are committed to excellence and developing our people to achieve their best and are looking for individuals who are like-minded aspirational people.

About the role:

Ready to lead the HR operations at one of New Zealand's leading law firms? Join our Auckland team at Commercial Bay as Senior HR Manager, reporting to the HR Director. You will have the opportunity to shape and enhance how HR operations are delivered across the firm.

You will lead our HR Advisory and Early Careers team, provide trusted guidance across employee relations and recruitment, and drive our next chapter of HR modernisation, from smarter workflows to AI.

This will include:

• Leading, developing and coaching our HR Advisory, Early Careers and Administrator team.
• Working with the HR Advisory team on employee relations, providing pragmatic advice with sound judgement and confidence.
• Working with the team to enhance and deliver our recruitment approach, including our graduate and summer intern programmes.
• Overseeing remuneration, benefits and people cycles.
• Ensuring HR policies, compliance and risk practices remain current and fit for purpose.
• Turning data into meaningful insights through workforce dashboards and reporting.
• Modernising HR workflows and making effective and responsible use of technology and AI-enabled tools.

To be successful in this role you must have:

• Experience as a senior HR Business Partner, HR Manager or HR Operations Lead in a complex environment.
• Five or more years' experience leading HR teams, with a track record of coaching and driving high performance.
• Deep experience in HR operations, policy, compliance and reporting.
• The credibility to influence partners and senior leaders.
• A passion for process improvement, including technology and AI-enabled tools.
• Strong judgement, a commercial lens and risk awareness.
• Highly organised, with the ability to triage competing demands.

It is desirable if you have:

• Experience implementing HR technology or AI-enabled improvements.
• Law firm experience.
• Change management experience.

Culture and benefits:

In addition to a strong team culture, we offer a range of benefits and initiatives to help our people maintain a healthy and enjoyable lifestyle. These include:

• professional development opportunities; including through a personalised leadership programme;
• a comprehensive health and wellbeing programme;
• an annual subsidy for personal health insurance and wellbeing activities;
• community support programmes;
• sports teams, an annual ball, and regular firm events.

If you are interested, please apply with a cover letter and CV. For more information or a confidential conversation, please contact Grant McKendry at [email protected].

We continuously work hard to ensure our workplace is inclusive, and trust that different experiences, perspectives, and values work together to achieve a better outcome. As such, this position is open to anyone with the qualifying skill set.

Agency referrals will not be considered at this stage.