Employee Relations Team Leader

About this role

Location: 726 Exchange Street, Buffalo New York

The Employee Relations Team Leader (ERTL) is a management position reporting to the Senior Employee Relations Manager. Approximately equally divided between team leadership and case management responsibilities.  The role leads assigned Senior Lead ER Consultants (SLERC) while also individually managing complex Employee Relations matters often requiring more specialized ER leader involvement due to risk, sensitivity, stakeholder complexity, enterprise impact, capacity constraints, or escalation.

The ERTL serves as a primary point of escalation, case calibration, and quality oversight for assigned SLERCs, supporting consistent investigation practices, documentation quality, risk assessment, recommendation standards, workload prioritization, and execution of complex ER processes across all lines of business and levels of the organization. Unlike frontline ER consultation roles, this position is focused on investigation execution and oversight, defensible documentation, risk escalation, SLERC development, and consistent application of ER standards. The ERTL exercises independent judgment to determine matter prioritization, assignment, escalation needs, investigation approach, and appropriate stakeholder involvement.

Essential Functions • People Leadership & Team Effectiveness: Leads assigned SLERCs, including coaching, feedback, development support, performance input, and accountability for team effectiveness. Partners with the Senior Employee Relations Manager on formal performance management, capacity planning, development planning, and team priorities. • Workload, Assignment & Capacity Management: Balances SLERC workload and assignment decisions based on case complexity, risk, capacity, geography where relevant, enterprise priorities, and development needs; determines whether matters should be assigned to SLERCs, retained for direct handling by the ERTL, or escalated to senior ER leadership. • Direct Case Ownership, Investigation Oversight & Quality Assurance: Personally manages assigned complex or escalated ER matters when direct ER leader involvement is warranted due to heightened risk, sensitivity, stakeholder complexity, enterprise impact, capacity needs, or escalation requirements, while also providing support for SLERC-handled investigations. Maintains high-quality investigation and documentation practices that align with ER standards and applicable legal, regulatory, and audit expectations; reviews SLERC investigation documentation for quality, consistency, timeliness, and completeness; provides feedback and coaching to elevate investigation quality and documentation standards in accordance with internal risk and controls.

• SLERC Escalation, Case Calibration & Recommendation Standards: Serves as a primary escalation point for assigned SLERCs, providing guidance on investigation strategy, stakeholder alignment, documentation approach, risk assessment, recommendation quality, and appropriate next steps. Helps drive consistency in how investigations are conducted, documented, assessed, escalated, and resolved across assigned SLERC work. • Risk Management & Escalation: Identifies, assesses, and escalates critical issues, patterns, and trends; provides recommendations to mitigate risk, support compliant decision-making, and strengthen manager effectiveness while aligning with business objectives. • Policy Interpretation & Consultation: Interprets and applies Key’s policies, HR practices, and applicable employment laws and regulations to provide sound guidance and recommendations to internal clients and partners. • Stakeholder Partnership: Builds and maintains effective working relationships with HR Business Partners, Key Legal, Internal Fraud Investigations, Clinical Consultant, Corporate Information Security, Physical Security, Background Investigations Unit, ER Solutions Team, and other subject matter experts to support timely and appropriate case resolution. • Intake, Assignment & Case Management: Coordinates the assignment of complex, sensitive, escalated, or high-risk ER matters, including Ethics Helpline complaints, partnership requests from internal partners, Open Door Disputes, and other assigned ER cases; determines appropriate routing based on risk, complexity, workload, capacity, development needs, enterprise priorities, and required investigation expertise .

• Reporting, Governance, External Agency & Compliance Support: Utilizes ER case management data, reporting tools, and process insights to monitor workload, identify trends, support risk-informed decision-making, and manage operational responsibilities related to Ethics cases, Sales Practice escalations, GRC testing, internal audits, governmental compliance reviews, and external agency matters. Supports Legal and senior ER leadership with information gathering, documentation review, or case analysis related to external agency matters, internal audits, and compliance reviews, as assigned.

• Business Alignment & Trend Discussions: Maintains awareness of current projects, business priorities, and HR functional issues by participating in staff meetings, conference calls, ER trending discussions, and quarterly business reviews; communicates relevant trends and escalated issues to HR leadership, when applicable. • Team Communication, Onboarding & Training: Provides timely and effective communication to team members; coordinates activities related to interviewing, hiring, onboarding, and training new team members; conducts or facilitates presentations and training, as needed. • Continuous Improvement & Digital Enablement: Contributes ideas and supports implementation of process enhancements that improve investigation quality, documentation standards, reporting, knowledge management, responsible use of digital tools, service delivery, risk mitigation, consistency, client satisfaction, and operational effectiveness.

Required Qualifications / Skills • Bachelor’s degree in Busi

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