Meet the Magnopians: Natalie White
Natalie is HR Director at Magnopus UK, overseeing people operations and workplace culture. Armed with a First in Law from Durham University – where she first discovered her passion for employment law – and a background volunteering with ChildLine in both Gibraltar and London, she spotted a critical need for internal HR when working as an EA. She completed her HR training while working full-time and hasn’t looked back, shaping the employee experience across the business for the past decade.
Tell us about your role at Magnopus!
As HR Director, I look after our most valuable assets: our people. I’m part strategic business partner, part workplace cheerleader, and part firefighter. My job is to make sure that you have everything you need to do your best work here, while ensuring the business stays safe, fair, and human-first.
What made you decide to pursue a career in this field?
I’m nerdy enough to have fallen in love with Employment Law during my degree, but I wasn’t planning to have a career in HR. Honestly, I saw a business I cared about needing proper people support, and I knew I had the legal background and empathy to do it justice. I love the balance of strategy and human connection… plus, no two days are ever even remotely the same!
What three skills are essential for anyone in your role?
Emotional intelligence, a rock-solid understanding of employment law, and an exceptionally good sense of humour. Trust me, you need the last one!
What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learnt in your career?
Credibility comes from fairness, consistency and competence – when you lead with those three things, everything else falls into place naturally.
How do you approach challenges and setbacks?
I treat problems like an escape room: stay calm under pressure, look past obvious assumptions for unconventional clues, and collaborate with the team to test different approaches until we unlock the right solution.
What’s your favorite thing to do when you’re not working?
I absolutely love to read – there’s nothing better than escaping into another world when life is getting stressful. I’m a member of a book club that meets once a month in a local pub, and that forces me to dip my toe into all sorts of genres. Right now, I’m reading Isola byAllegra Goodman, and next up I’m going to re-read the Fourth Wing series (my favourite!), in preparation for the next book’s release.
If you could wake up in the body of another person (just for one day), who would it be and why?
Max Verstappen on a Grand Prix Sunday. Another big passion of mine is Formula 1 (both of my children, and my pet tortoise, are named after F1 drivers). I’m a notoriously nervous driver myself, so experiencing the exhilaration of a race through the body of a 4-time world champion feels like a great loophole! I’d also treat it like an ultimate backstage pass - absorbing the paddock drama, eavesdropping on team strategy and seeing how it all works behind the scenes. Plus, how amazing would it be to experience doing something that you’re the best in the whole world at?! (And if you disagree that Max is the best – you’re wrong, but feel free to drop me a Slack to debate it!)
Ready for race day!
Natalie’s tortoise, George – not quite as fast as his namesake, F1 driver George Russell.
What are you listening to right now?
I’m currently obsessed with Noah Kahan’s The Great Divide. If you don’t feel something listening to that album, you might want to check your pulse! My current shower song is Olivia Rodrigo’s “the cure” – that’s a great ‘scream it out after a hard day’ vibe.
If you could have any other job in the world, what would it be?
Either a fiction editor, so I could justify spending my entire life surrounded by books, or an F1 journalist (for aforementioned paddock gossip purposes). Getting paid either to read or to ask invasive questions about team dynamics under the guise of journalism sounds like living the dream.
