Senior Workday Specialist, Recruiting & Talent

About the role

World Resources Institute works to improve people's lives, protect and restore nature and stabilize the climate. As an independent research organization, we leverage our data, expertise and global reach to influence policy and catalyse change across systems like food, land and water; energy; and cities. Our 2,000+ staff work on the ground in more than a dozen focus countries and with partners in over 50 nations. We are seeking an experienced and people-focused Senior Workday Specialist, Recruiting & Talent to take functional ownership of our Workday Recruiting and Talent modules across our country offices in Africa, Brazil, China, Colombia, Europe, India, Indonesia, Mexico, US. Sitting inside the global HR team and reporting to the Global Director, Compensation, Benefits, and Analytics, you will be the single point of expertise for these modules. You will partnering with Talent Acquisition, Talent Management, and regional HRBPs to translate business needs into smart, scalable Workday solutions. Following our Workday journey to date, this role plays a critical enabling function, driving optimization, adoption, and continuous improvement of Recruiting and Talent processes across all country offices. You will work closely with the Workday Lead, Global IT, and HR teams across country offices to ensure the system is effectively supporting our people processes and hiring priorities. Job Highlight This is a hands-on functional ownership role. You will design, troubleshoot, and continuously improve, and you will be the go-to expert when a country office has a Workday related question on hiring or talent. This role supports users across multiple global time zones; therefore, a degree of flexibility in working hours is expected to ensure effective collaboration and timely support. The role will require significant overlap with European working hours to enable coordination with key stakeholders .

Responsibilities

• Workday Functional Owner, Recruiting & Talent (60%)
• Manage the Workday Recruiting module end-to-end, including job requisitions, evergreen requisitions, job postings, career sites, candidate, prospect and referral configurations, offer/employment agreements workflows, questionnaires, and interview workflows.
• Manage the Workday Talent Optimization module , including goals, performance management and reporting - expanding to succession planning and talent reviews over time as we implement our systems roadmap.
• Maintain business processes, condition rules, calculated fields and dashboards across both modules, in alignment with global standards and local requirements.
• Drive continuous improvement: identify opportunities for system optimization, automation, and process simplification, and leverage Workday's latest features to keep our recruiting and talent practices ahead.
• Lead the bi-annual Workday release cycle for your modules: assess new features, plan adoption, execute regression testing, and communicate changes to HR users.
• Maintain training documentation, business process workbooks, and the security model for your modules.
• Partnership & Process Design (25%)
• Partner with Talent Acquisition, Talent Management, and regional HRBPs to gather requirements, and configure solutions that work for local nuances without fragmenting the global model.
• Support integrations between Workday and the recruiting ecosystem: job boards, LinkedIn Recruiter, referral tools, background-check platforms, assessment tools owning the functional side and partnering with IT on the technical build.
• Translate business requirements into smart, scalable solutions and communicate clearly with internal partners at all levels.
• User Support & Capacity Building (15%)
• Provide expert support across global offices: troubleshoot and resolve complex configuration and functional issues in collaboration with Global IT, Workday support, and external vendors.
• Produce and maintain training materials, job aids, and runbooks to empower self-service for recruiters, hiring managers, and the wider HR team.
• Run sessions for country HR teams as new features or processes are rolled out.

Requirements

• Education
• Bachelor's degree in Human Resources, Information Systems, Business Administration, or a related field. Relevant work experience in lieu of degree is accepted.
• Workday Pro certification in Recruiting and/or Talent is preferred
• Minimum of 6 years of hands-on experience with Workday HCM configuration and business process framework, with at least 3 years where Recruiting and Talent were your primary modules.
• Subject-matter expertise in configuring job posting templates, career sites, job application busin

Additional Information

This is a hybrid position requiring a minimum of eight days per month in the office. During the probation period, you will be expected to work in the office at least four days per week. The role is based in our New Dehli office. Applicants must have existing work authorization in India at the time of application.

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