Development Partner - Digital & Technology

Are you passionate about unlocking potential and driving performance through talent and learning? Do you thrive in fast-paced, digitally focused environments? This is your opportunity to play a pivotal role in shaping the future of M&S’s Digital & Technology Business Unit.

As a Development Partner, you’ll be at the heart of connecting business strategy with people development, ensuring our teams are equipped to deliver innovation, agility, and excellence. You’ll work closely with senior stakeholders, combining commercial acumen with deep expertise in talent consultancy to identify and prioritise the capabilities needed to succeed.

This role offers the chance to influence the M&S Talent Plan, contribute to ExCo-level decisions, and embed a culture of continuous learning and growth. You’ll be a key player in a newly formed Community of Practice, helping to design and deliver impactful solutions across leadership, core, and technical competencies.

If you’re ready to make a strategic impact, build trusted relationships, and champion learning as a driver of transformation, this is the role for you.

To stay close to customers, our support teams are in the office three days a week as we believe that skills are developed through collaboration, and that spending time together makes us more creative and connected.

Due to high interest, this role may close earlier than advertised. We recommend applying as soon as possible.

What you’ll do

Your key accountabilities will include:

• Strategic Talent Alignment -Act as a trusted advisor, aligning talent and learning strategies with business goals, and leveraging Talent CoE tools to identify, develop, and mobilise talent across the business.
• Insight & Influence - Provide insight to support ExCo-level talent decisions and influence the M&S Talent Plan, ensuring solutions meet leadership, core, and technical competency priorities.
• Learning Facilitation & Quality Assurance - Facilitate and quality-assure learning interventions, maintaining high standards across M&S and supporting leadership teams with impactful development experiences.
• Engagement & Advocacy - Champion the M&S Learning strategy within your business unit, driving awareness, uptake, and engagement, while fostering a culture of learning as a strategic lever for growth.
• Data-Driven Impact Leverage data and insights to measure learning outcomes, continuously improve the experience, and provide valuable feedback to shape future solutions.

Who you are

Your skills and experience will include:

• Deep understanding of the Digital & Technology landscape.
• Strong commercial mindset and consultancy skills in Talent & Learning.
• Proven ability to build credible relationships across senior stakeholders.
• Experience in facilitation, coaching, and embedding learning strategies.
• Passion for using data and feedback to drive performance and innovation.

What’s in it for you?

Working at M&S means being part of something bigger - helping to deliver quality, value and service to millions of customers every day. We’re inclusive, fast-moving and always evolving, with a strong sense of purpose and a focus on doing the right thing.

Here are just a few of the benefits that make working here even more rewarding:

• 20% colleague discount on all M&S products and many third-party brands for you and someone in your household, available once you’ve completed your probation
• Competitive holiday allowance with the option to buy more
• Discretionary bonus schemes linked to your performance and ours
• Strong pension and life assurance to help plan for the future
• Tailored induction and training to support your development from day one
• Exclusive perks and savings through our M&S Choices portal
• Market-leading family policies, including parental, adoption and neonatal leave
• 24/7 wellbeing support, including virtual GP access and mental health services
• One paid volunteer day a year to support a cause that matters to you

Everyone’s welcome

We are ambitious about the future of retail. We’re disrupting, innovating and leading the industry into a more conscientious, inspiring digital era. We’re transforming how we work together and offering our most exciting opportunities yet. Marks & Spencer strives to be an inclusive organisation, trusted and admired by our colleagues, customers and suppliers. Join us and make change happen.

We are committed to building diverse and representative teams, where everyone can bring their whole selves to work and be at their best. We support each other and work together to win together.

If you feel you'd benefit from any support or reasonable adjustments during any stage of the recruitment process, please don’t hesitate to let us know when completing your application. This information will be picked up by our team, so we can try and put steps in place to help you be at your best through this process.

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