Talent Acquisition Manager - 12 months FTC

UKAEA is at the forefront of the UK’s fusion energy programme, delivering world‑leading science and engineering to bring fusion energy closer to reality. As our organisation continues to grow and evolve, we are seeking an experienced Talent Acquisition Manager for a period of 12 months to lead our technical recruitment function and ensure we attract high‑calibre talent across highly specialised engineering, scientific and niche disciplines.

The Role

As Talent Acquisition Manager, you will provide strategic and operational leadership for UKAEA’s recruitment function, ensuring the organisation’s resourcing needs are fully delivered in a complex and specialist environment. Managing a team of technical recruiters, you will have proven people management experience as well as previous 360 recruitment experience gained within an engineering, scientific or technical setting.

Reporting into senior leadership, you will own the end‑to‑end talent acquisition agenda for technical and scientific hiring, balancing immediate recruitment demands with long‑term workforce planning. You’ll shape how UKAEA attracts scarce skills, strengthens its employer brand, and delivers a candidate experience that reflects the calibre of our science and engineering mission.

Key Accountabilities

• Lead and grow a high‑performing Talent Acquisition team, providing direct line management to Talent Acquisition Leads and setting a delivery‑focused culture across a technically complex environment.
• Design and deliver a forward‑thinking Talent Acquisition strategy that supports leveraging direct sourcing, employer branding, and targeted recruitment campaigns.
• Partner with technical and scientific leaders to understand complex technical requirements, anticipate future skills gaps, and build proactive talent pipelines for scarce and specialist roles.
• Provide oversight and guidance on international recruitment involving visa sponsorship to assess eligibility, manage risk and ensure compliance with immigration regulations
• Own and continuously improve the end‑to‑end recruitment lifecycle, from job creation and attraction through to assessment, selection and complex offer negotiation.
• Drive innovation in recruitment tools, systems and processes, including the enhancement and optimisation of our applicant tracking system (SmartRecruiters) to enhance efficiency and candidate experience.
• Review, develop and enhance recruitment policies and processes, including those relating to diversity and inclusion, interview techniques and assessment methods.

As an employee of UKAEA you will benefit from:

• A salary of £51,317
• Corporate bonus scheme up to 7% and a Relocation allowance (if eligible).
• Generous annual leave allowance of 30.5 days (includes 25 days annual leave, 3 days Christmas closure and 2.5 privilege days) in addition to UK bank holidays
• Flexible working options including family friendly policies and the right to request flexible working from the start of your employment. 
• Employee Assistance Programme and trained Mental Health First Aiders, 
• Wide range of career development opportunities
• Outstanding defined benefit pension scheme
• A vibrant culture committed to equality and being fully inclusive

What to expect in our recruitment process:
For a step-by-step overview of how we hire from application to offer please see our Recruitment Process page: careers.ukaea.uk/join-us/recruitment-process

Onsite working at our Culham site in Oxfordshire is expected for 3 days each week, however, we actively support requests for flexible working. 

This role requires employees to complete an online Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) including The Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) checks for criminal convictions and possibly a search of open source data. 

Essential Requirements:

• Proven experience leading recruitment teams within an engineering, scientific or technical environment
• Previous in-house experience
• A strong track record of recruiting into specialist or highly technical roles using multiple attraction and resourcing tools
• Excellent stakeholder management skills, with confidence working with senior leaders and technically focused managers
• A practical, data‑driven approach to improving recruitment processes, systems and candidate experience
• A commitment to fairness, inclusion and best‑practice recruitment standards

A full list of our benefits can be found here https://careers.ukaea.uk/life-at-ukaea/employee-benefits/

UKAEA’s mission is clean energy for all, and we welcome talented people from all backgrounds to help us achieve this goal. We are committed to equality, diversity, and inclusion and strive to ensure fair representation across our workforce. We particularly encourage applications from groups currently underrepresented in STEM, including women and individuals from diverse ethnic backgrounds, while ensuring all appointments are made on merit.

UK Atomic Energy Authority is committed to being accessible. Please email [email protected] if you have any questions or require help or adjustments to compete on a fair basis, for example, changes to the way we interview or share information.  

Please note that vacancies are generally advertised for 4 weeks but may close earlier if we receive a large number of applications.