Welcome to the forums unfortuantely this is not the first post about titles nor are you the first person to get hung up on this negligible aspect of employment.

There is your official title in the company organisation and there are the various descriptors used by your colleagues.

The immediate response to your post would be your are the "acting Head of H&S" although in reality it is your line manager and not this forum that decides.

That "truthful" title will diminish your aspirations, after all if you are only "temporarily" "acting" in post why should anyone in the organisation bother with what you say?

Focus on delivery and not how you are titled.

Even in the wider field of employment a title in one sector does not equate to what someone does in another sector, nor how they are remunerated.

I don't get how teams can feel they are being supported when someone who already has what is presumably a full time job is also landed with what may be another full time job - nor how a job title might affect that.

As Round says, the accurate term is 'acting head of...'

The other term that gets used is 'interim' but that usually applies to someone who is brought in from outside to cover the vacancy until it is filled, and is paid consultancy rates (higher than salaried rates).

The more important question is, if the post holder does not return, does the organisation plan to actually fill this position on a whole time basis or are they hoping to save costs by exploiting your willingness to take on additional responsibilities?

Edited by user 11 October 2025 18:11:40(UTC)  | Reason: correction to last para

That's an entirely different scenario from what first appeared.  So you are not doing your existing job plus the job of the person on leave; other people are doing these jobs and you have an entirely different and new job which is itself temporary in nature. As your new job is focused on bringing about a change in the business, the title of this job might well be something like Change Manager or Project Manager.(possibly suffixed to whatever your organisation names the intended change project as).

But what will happen after the leave situation is resolved one way or the other?  That's what I would be worried about.