HR Business Partner

From seabed to surface, Acteon develops solutions to the energy industry's most complex problems. We harness data, engineering knowledge, and operational expertise to efficiently design, install, maintain, extend the life of, and decommission offshore energy assets to ensure they deliver maximum economic value.

Acteon is a complex global business operating in a private equity-backed environment, with entities and locations around the world. The HR Business Partner, APAC plays a key role in enabling business strategy through people, delivering a high-quality, commercially focused HR service across the Asia Pacific region, and supporting leaders and employees through all aspects of the employee lifecycle.

Reporting to the Regional HR Lead for APAC, the role acts as a trusted adviser and constructive challenger to regional leaders, covering a population of approximately 200 employees, providing expert guidance on employee relations matters, organisational change, performance, workforce planning, compliance, and talent development. The role also manages regional payroll delivery and manages a team of two HR Administrators responsible for day-to-day HR administration and transactional activities.

The successful candidate will combine strong operational HR expertise with good commercial judgement, the confidence to manage casework independently, and the ability to coach leaders through people matters. They will be comfortable operating in a fast-paced, evolving environment and lead HR automation and AI adoption to simplify processes and workflows.

Duties & Main Responsibilities

Regional Advisory and Manager Coaching

• Build trusted and credible working relationships with regional General Management, acting as a trusted adviser and constructive challenger on people matters.
• Provide pragmatic and commercially focused advice on people management practices including employee engagement and workforce risks.
• Coach and enable managers to take accountability for the effective leadership and management of their teams.
• Promote fair, consistent, and proactive people management practices across the region, in line with local employment legislation.

Leadership of the HR Administration Team

• Manage and prioritise the development of the regional HR team responsible for day-to-day employee lifecycle administration.
• Set clear responsibilities, service standards, and quality expectations, ensuring consistent and timely delivery across the region.
• Provide coaching, technical guidance and development opportunities to build capability and knowledge within the team.
• Ensure the team delivers accurate onboarding, contractual documentation, employee changes, benefits administration, HRIS record management and offboarding efficiently.
• Oversee regional payroll inputs are complete, accurate and submitted within agreed deadlines.
• Ensure employee data and records within HR systems are accurate, produce regular HR reporting, metrics, and workforce insights.
• Identify opportunities to simplify processes, drive HR automation, and AI adoption where appropriate to enhance the employee and manager experience.
• Ensure accurate employee data and records within HR systems, producing regular HR reports and converting workforce data into clear business insight to support decision-making.

Talent, Resourcing and Workforce Planning

• Partner with General Management Team and Recruitment to support workforce planning and ensure recruitment needs are met across the region.
• Provide guidance to hiring managers and ensure job descriptions and organisational structures remain current and fit for purpose.
• Support succession planning, retention initiatives, and employee development activity.
• Ensure Managers are competent and can use the talent platforms such as Act on Performance Framework
• Use workforce data and business insight to inform resourcing and organisational decisions.

Employee Lifecycle, Compliance and Regional Practice

• Oversee the effective management of the employee lifecycle from hire to exit, ensuring appropriate governance and documentation.
• Maintain current knowledge of relevant employment legislation and HR practice across the principal APAC jurisdictions supported by the role and ensure the HR team are adequately trained.
• Ensure regional HR policies, procedures and practices comply with local requirements and align with Group standards.
• Handle sensitive personal and employee information with appropriate confidentiality and care.

Employee Relations and Case Management

• Act as the regional subject matter expert for employee relations matters across APAC.
• Lead disciplinary, grievance, misconduct, capability, performance, probation, absence management, and workplace investigation cases from initiation through to conclusion.
• Provide practical, risk-based advice that reflects local employment legislation, company policy and Company values are adhered to at all times.
• Monitor case and workforce trends, identify emerging risks, and recommend preventative actions, manager guidance, or process improvements.

General

• Support the delivery of annual HR processes, including performance reviews, salary and bonus cycles, talent reviews, workforce planning, and engagement initiatives.
• Partner with the HR Centers of Excellence to implement reward, talent, learning, and engagement programmes effectively across APAC.
• Contribute to regional and global HR projects, business integrations, and change initiatives.
• Use technology, workforce data, and feedback to generate business insight and improve HR processes, service quality, and employee experience.

Required

Essential

• 5+ years generalist HR experience gained in an HR Business Partner, Senior HR Advisor, or comparable role within a fast-paced, multi business line environment.
• Proven experience of managing complex employee relations cases independently and end to end.
• Hands-on experience managing payroll processes, ideally across more than one APAC jurisdiction.
• Strong working knowledge of employment legislation and HR practice in Malaysia, with the ability to interpret requirements across other APAC locations.
• Experience advising and influencing senior leaders in a complex or matrix organisation.
• Experience leading, supervising, or developing HR administrative support.
• Strong coaching, stakeholder management, communication, and decision-making skills.
• High attention to detail, discretion and confidence handling sensitive employee information.
• Proficiency in HR systems, workforce data analysis, reporting and Microsoft Office applications, with the ability to convert data into practical business insight.
• Ability and willingness to work from the Kuala Lumpur office and travel regularly within APAC, including Singapore approximately every two months.

Preferred

• Degree in Human Resources, Business Administration or a related discipline, or equivalent professional experience.
• CIPD qualification or recognised local HR professional accreditation.
• Experience within the engineering, energy, offshore or industrial sectors.
• Experience supporting organisational change, restructures, acquisitions, or business integrations.
• Knowledge of regional immigration and mobility processes.
• Experience using HR analytics to identify workforce risks and support workforce planning and business decisions.
• Experience of workflow and job design