Head Of Policy And Communications Jobs in London, Greater London

Sydenham Garden is seeking a Community Activities & Volunteering Lead on a fixed term 3 year contract to join our team of 15 staff and approximately 60 volunteers in delivering adult mental health and dementia services in our beautiful garden setting in south-east London. 

Why we need you

Sydenham Garden, based in Lewisham in South-East London, is a unique wellbeing centre utilising its gardens, nature reserve and activity rooms to help people living with and recovering from mental and physical ill-health. We provide nature and arts based creative, social and therapeutic activities for co-workers (the name we give to our primary beneficiaries). With 3-year funding from The National Lottery Community Fund to help us ‘grow our community’ and increase the sustainability of our impact we’re seeking a Community Activities & Volunteering Lead to drive continuous improvement and development of volunteer-led community activities for the benefit of co-workers as well as managing the day to day running of our volunteer programme.

Why you should join us 

We’re a friendly team who are passionate about creating a supportive and inclusive community for people living with mental and physical ill-health. You’ll be part of a supportive team of staff and volunteers, and benefit from spending time in our beautiful gardens and nature reserve.

What we’re looking for

You’ll have experience of delivering group activities and working with people with mental/physical-ill health and/or Dementia. You’ll have experience of recruiting, working with, and managing volunteers and be confident building positive relationships with a wide range of people. You’ll be able to innovate and develop new initiatives as well as balance competing priorities while being willing to play a team role and get stuck into different activities.

Equity, Diversity and Inclusion

Sydenham Garden is committed to Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI). We want to build a diverse and inclusive staff, volunteer and trustee team where everyone feels that they belong and that reflects the profile of the communities we serve. Therefore, we will welcome and consider applications from candidates of all backgrounds and protected characteristics, and we particularly encourage applications from people of African or Caribbean heritage to ensure our staff team represents the communities we serve.

PLEASE SEE BELOW TO DOWNLOAD THE JOB DESCRIPTION & PERSON SPECIFICATION AND FOR FULL DETAILS OF HOW TO APPLY INCLUDING OUR EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES MONITORING FORM.

The Churches Conservation Trust (CCT) has an international award-winning reputation in heritage conservation and regeneration for its own estate. For this reason CCT has been contracted to deliver a programme of work for Historic Chapels Trust (HCT). HCT owns and cares for 20 of the most significant Nonconformist and Catholic chapels no longer in regular use by their congregations, all listed at Grade I and Grade II*.  Key to the project is management of the assets, funded by the National Heritage Memorial Fund (NHMF) through their Cultural Assets Fund (CAF).

As a member of CCT’s national Conservation team you will be the main point of contact for all chapel maintenance related issues, liaising closely with contractors, local groups and volunteers. Alongside the Conservation Projects Manager for Chapels you will deliver the maintenance programme, including regulatory and legal compliance, as well as deal with utilities and insurance of chapels. 10 of the chapels are in our North region, 6 in our West region and 4 are in our South East region.

You will have previous experience in the field of historic buildings maintenance, repair or property management. You will be an effective communicator, be able to plan and deliver your own workload and also work as part of a team. As you’ll be working at chapels throughout England it is essential you have a full driving licence.

If you would like to apply for this role, please visit our recruitment portal to begin your application. You will be asked to submit a CV and a short supporting statement (max 2 sides A4) outlining why you’d like to apply and how you fulfil the person specification for this post, so you’ll need to refer to the job description.

The closing date for receipt of applications is 8am on 4th November 2024

The interviews will take place in London on 15th November 2024. Please note that the interview date and location have been specifically chosen according to the availability of the panel.

We are a Disability Confident Committed Employer. Candidates who declare that they have a disability and who meet the essential criteria for the job will be offered an interview.

If you have any queries about this role, or if you have a disability and wish to request a reasonable adjustment at any stage of the recruitment process, please contact us.

We are an inclusive employer and offer equal opportunities to all regardless of an individual’s age, disability, gender identity, marriage or civil partnership status, pregnancy or maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation.

We are not a licensed sponsor at this time. Any offer of employment will be made subject to valid right to work in the UK being provided.

Local Finance Consultant – Citizens Advice

MLC are proud to be partnered with Citizens Advice to recruit their new Finance Consultant, who will provide support and guidance across the local Citizens Advice offices across the country. You will be responsible for a portfolio of offices, building strong working relationships with both finance and non-finance staff in those offices. You’ll bring your financial expertise and knowledge to a team of people working hard to give advice to millions across the country.

This year Citizens Advice are celebrating their 85th anniversary and during that time they have been helping to shape a society that’s fairer for everyone – working on issues that affect the whole of society. Last year they directly helped over 2.66 million people find a way forward with one-to-one advice, in addition to over 60 million views of their online self-help advice. As part of their commitment to supporting society, they are one of a small number of statutory consumer watchdogs with the ability to submit super-complaints to government. Their value to society has been estimated at £4.7 billion.

This is a fantastic opportunity to join an organisation which places high value on staff engagement and growth, with a proven track record of supporting career development with internal promotions and training. The role joins at the end of a period of change for the charity and is a great chance for you to make your mark and develop the role further.

Key Responsibilities include:

• Provide support to local offices with their financial management, reporting and processes.
• Monitor and ensure improving financial standards and compliance with the Charity Commission and other statutory reports.
• Help develop the financial health reporting strategy for the organisation, working with key stakeholders to support the development.
• Upskill local offices with their financial acumen and ability for self-service.

The successful candidate will:

• Be either fully qualified, or part-qualified and studying towards a recognised accounting qualification.
• Experienced in charity accounting, whether that is directly working in a charity or through auditing charities.
• Enjoy working in an evolving environment where there is a focus on modernisation within the finance team.

For an informal discussion on the role or your job search in general, please contact Jamie Elliott at MLC Partners.

SOS Children’s Villages UK is part of a global federation, founded in 1949. SOS Children’s Villages exists to ensure that each child and young person grows up with the healthy relationships they need to become their strongest selves. Working in over 130 countries, we are the world’s largest non-governmental organisation focused on supporting children and young people who don’t have, or who are at risk of losing, parental care.

The Senior Programme Manager is an exciting new role that will oversee the vital processes we use to maintain oversight of programmes funded by SOS Children’s Villages UK.

You will:

• spearhead a new, transformative programme aimed at delivering real, positive change for children and families, requiring an ambitious leader committed to making a lasting difference.
• work collaboratively, with two direct reports, to capture and communicate the powerful impact of our work to stakeholders both within and beyond SOS Children’s Villages.

We are looking for an organised, experienced individual with strong project management skills and a background in international development or a related field. 

As part of the largest global organisation focused on supporting and protecting children who have lost or are at risk of losing, parental care, SOS Children's Villages UK is uniquely positioned. We have access to a vast wealth of data, insights and experience from around the world, while also benefiting from the agility of a small, dynamic team.

Our goal is to leverage these strengths to engage with the well-developed UK international development and child protection sectors, linking these with our wider global work.

If you have a natural talent for entrepreneurship and relationship building and are ready to take on this rewarding challenge, we want to hear from you! 

To Apply

Please read the full job description within the Candidate Pack, and submit a copy of your CV and a covering letter.

The deadline for applications is Sunday 17th November at 17.00 UK time. We reserve the right to close the application process early if a successful candidate is found.

Please note: The post-holder must be UK-based. We are unable to provide employment sponsorship if required and unfortunately cannot progress applications without the required right to live and work in the UK on a permanent contract.

We are looking for a talented operations manager who will enable us to keep running operations for AIM itself. This could include human resource management, finance, team productivity improvements and managing the community office workspace, as well as providing support to our incubated high-impact charities, both with their initial set-up and on an ongoing ad hoc basis.

IMPORTANT: This is a summarised version of the job advert for CharityJob's purposes. Clicking 'Apply' will take you to the complete and detailed version on our website, where you'll also be able to apply.

ABOUT THE ROLE

People who work in operations have a multiplier effect, increasing the efficiency of their colleagues within the organisation by constructing processes that ensure the organisation operates smoothly and at top capacity. An excellent and more succinct description of operations management as a field comes from Gabrielle Zevin’s Tomorrow, Tomorrow and Tomorrow:

Though it took Sadie years to admit this to Sam, Marx did prove incredibly useful that summer. No, Marx wasn’t a game designer. He wasn’t an ace programmer, like Sadie, and he couldn’t draw, like Sam. But he did almost everything else for them, and his contributions ranged from the pedestrian, but necessary, to the creatively essential. Marx organised workflow, so Sadie and Sam were more aware of what the other was doing and what they needed to be doing. He made long lists of supplies they would need. He was more than liberal with his credit card—they always needed more memory and storage, and they were regularly burning out graphics cards—and he must have made fifty trips to the large computer store in Central Square that summer. He opened a bank account, and an LLC, Go, Ichigo, Go. He arranged for them to pay taxes (which saved them money in the short term by making their business purchases tax-free), and if, at some point, they needed to hire people, which he knew they would, he set them up for that, too. He made sure everyone ate, hydrated, and slept (at least a little), and he kept their workspaces clean and free of chaos.

The Operations team provides operational support to AIM (e.g., human resource management, finance, productivity). The team also supports our incubated charities, assisting with their initial set-up after the program so they can hit the ground running, as well as ongoing ad-hoc requests and advice as needed. Added to this, Operations supports other participants in programs run by AIM(e.g., people completing fellowships with our research team). While this is less than for the Charity Entrepreneurship Incubation Program, it increases as these programs mature. 

Our Operations team currently consists of ~2.8 FTE – our Chief Operating Officer (previous Managing Director and CTO of Founders Pledge), our Director of Operations (with a mixed background in legal services, management consulting, and scale-up operations), and a Senior Operations Manager (with a background in risk and security management in low- and middle-income countries). The team also relies on external contractors for some of its functions (e.g., bookkeeping, legal advice).

SPECIFIC RESPONSIBILITIES

The exact % split might vary throughout 2025 depending on AIM’s program strategy and number of programs after our yearly evaluation

Employee experience 

• Supporting the development and implementation of HR initiatives and systems

• Providing advice on policies and procedures

• Assisting in performance management processes

• Supporting the management of disciplinary and grievance issues

• Maintaining employee records according to policy and legal requirements

• Reviewing employment and working conditions to ensure legal compliance

Grants and compliance management support

• Support with processing almost £2M in grants per year for seed grants and other funding circles etc.

• Maintain grant tracking systems and ensure accurate reporting

• Ensure legal and regulatory compliance, particularly in the UK

• Support risk management initiatives, including cybersecurity

• Improve grants-related processes and procedures for efficiency

Event logistics

• Organising internal and external events like our Christmas party, retreats, and community co-working days; contingency planning, determining objectives and conducting post-mortems

• Assisting the Recruitment team with logistics needs (e.g., booking travel and accommodation, getting materials to venues)

Automating workflows and building internal tools

• Identifying opportunities to systematise or automate processes with a view to increasing efficiency

• Responding to internal calls for greater systematisation (e.g. “we need a CRM”), mapping out costs and benefits

• Leveraging spreadsheets, no-code and low-code tools to build internal systems

• Maintaining internal systems and refining based on quick feedback loops and user feedback.

Overseeing our facilities management

• For our London office and residential accommodation, we are managing an external service provider tasked with the regular upkeep and operation of these facilities. There is some chance that the functions performed by this external service provider are brought in-house, but at the moment we expect this function to remain outsourced and for the Operations Manager to play an overseeing role. 

Ad hoc tasks

• We believe that the above describes the key buckets, but in essence, the Operations team tends to step in and be needed wherever their help is cost-effective to solve or prevent problems

FUTURE GROWTH TRAJECTORIES

Future growth trajectories for excelling hires could look like:

• As an entry-level role, you’d have the opportunity to advance to Senior Operations Manager and eventually Director of Operations (although the latter would depend on a vacancy being available) 

• There would be room for specialising in a specific area of Operations, such as HR or finance

• As part of your professional development, we could explore more technical routes such as investing in coding or no-code training

EXAMPLE OF THE WORK YOU'LL BE DOING

• After an initial brief, independently organise the entire lifecycle of an event at our office expecting between ~15-50 people to attend. You would know the goal of the event, some parameters like the budget, and would have some light assistance from other staff or external partners with whom we’re co-hosting the event.

• Effectively acting as an office manager/all-rounder for AIM’s London office. This means overseeing day-to-day operations to ensure smooth functioning, including managing office supplies, coordinating with service providers and contractors, and promptly triaging and resolving issues as they arise. Additionally, it means implementing and improving office policies, such as policies around hotdesking, inviting and vetting guests, meeting room usage, etc. 

• After supporting another department with their work, you realise that a series of manual steps they take could be made much more efficient by creating an automated workflow using Airtable and Zapier. You follow a user-centred design process to collect information about requirements, must-haves and nice-to-haves and then build a prototype to later test and refine. 

• Entirely oversee our managed accommodation for staff and program participants, responding to booking requests and changes, ensuring seamless check-in and check-out procedures, and promptly responding to requests or issues. 

• Knowing AIM’s internal policies and ensuring they’re being followed. For example, reviewing expenditure at the end of the month and checking adherence to our Financial Controls Policy, touching base with staff to check whether they have a professional development plan in place.

ABOUT YOU

This role will likely suit an early to mid-level operations generalist, but we’re also very interested in hearing from more senior operations specialists as there is room for future growth in responsibilities within the organisation depending on competency and expertise. We would also be keen for talented recent graduates applying for this position as many areas of responsibility can be learned by a quick learner fairly fast.

We expect excellent candidates will meet many (but not all) of the criteria below. We encourage you to apply even if you do not meet all of the listed characteristics. In the past, we've offered positions to applicants who demonstrated strong overall potential, providing training to address skill gaps. We prioritise high general ability, a strong work ethic, and alignment with our values, methods, and approach to maximising global impact over specific prior work experience or backgrounds. We sketch a picture of potential ideal candidates to give a more concrete sense of what particularly strong candidates might look like, not to discourage interested readers from applying.

THE IDEAL CANDIDATE

• Has a bias to action, meaning they prioritise taking initiative when they see a problem and make decisions quickly to drive progress and maintain momentum

• They are excited to play a supporting role and to step up and take pride in doing whatever needs to be done

• They use techniques that allow them always to be moving forward (e.g. prioritisation, time-boxing), and find it easy to pivot in the face of new information (i.e. don’t succumb to the sunk cost fallacy)

• Learns new skills or becomes familiar with new processes quickly, particularly by diving in head first and learning by doing. 

• Is a highly organised, conscientious person and often relied upon to organise something (e.g., a holiday)

• Leans towards frugal solutions (e.g., the second cheapest product), using 80/20 principles, and cheap tests / MVP testing over perfection where possible

• Has had positive past experiences testing aspects of this role before (e.g., maybe they have organised an event from scratch before and both enjoyed it and had positive results)

• Is thinking of their career trajectory as in operations management or closely related fields rather than as a stepping stone to a different career

• Is generally tech-savvy and, for example, defaults to a spreadsheet or finds appropriate tools when trying to solve a problem

• Is a tactful person who can adeptly communicate about delicate issues

Desirable specific skills and areas of experience include: 

• Previous experience using Google Workspace suite of apps (i.e. Gmail, Docs, Sheets, Slides)

• Previous experience or willingness to learn how to use Slack, Asana, Airtable and Zapier

• Comfort working in a start-up environment. This means:

  • Wearing multiple hats: Ability to take on diverse tasks beyond a single job description.

  • Adaptability to change: Thrives in a fast-paced setting where priorities can shift rapidly, and new challenges arise unexpectedly.

  • Proactive problem-solving: Takes initiative to identify and address issues independently, often with limited resources.

  • Comfort with ambiguity: Operates effectively without always having clear guidelines or established processes, using creativity and resourcefulness.

  • Team collaboration: Works closely with a small team, where collaboration and communication are key to success.

  • Ownership of projects: Takes full responsibility for projects from conception to completion, often with minimal oversight.

WHAT WE OFFER

• A job with a large, tangible impact on the world - your work will attract and select the founders of new field-leading charities and for-profit companies, as well as high-impact researchers and AIM staff

• High levels of intellectual challenge, autonomy, variety, and learning on the job

• An informal, fun, warm, and supportive work environment with high talent density. Our office in East London houses about 50% of our staff, dozens of charity founders and staff, and hosts a range of co-working opportunities and social events for the wider impactful entrepreneurship London community

• Become a part of our international network of ambitious, driven entrepreneurs and highly talented philanthropic professionals

• A true start-up culture, including low bureaucracy, a quick and collaborative work spirit, and high levels of talent density

• Significant opportunities to attend events and conferences to represent AIM, including international travel

BENEFITS

• A flexible working schedule, 30 paid days off per year, and unlimited sick leave

• UK visa sponsorship, if needed, as well as support with moving costs if relocating to London

• An annual costs-covered retreat to bring our whole team together to celebrate our achievements

• A workspace in our vibrant central London office, which is a hub for our program alumni and high-impact organisations/professionals 

• Parental, dependents, and compassionate leave schemes

• A range of other benefits, including a payroll giving scheme, staff tenure donation scheme, contributions towards professional development and IT costs, and a workplace pension

• We are open to discussing specific personalised perks or benefits that may enhance your work experience

APPLICATION PROCESS

Our application processes aim to be highly predictive, time-effective, and informative for you. Our process consists only of stages that our best evidence suggests are predictive of success on the job (such as test tasks) rather than more common but less predictive stages (such as cover letters). We only invite candidates to the next stage if we think they have a good chance of passing it, and take care to choose tasks and interview questions that will also give you a good sense of the role and our culture.

Applicants will be asked to complete the following stages:

1. Submitting our general application form (30 minutes to 1 hour),

2. A general test task (2-3 hours) with the top 10 to 30 candidates,

3. An initial interview (15 minutes) with the top 10-20 candidates,

4. A test task simulating the work you would do in your role (2-3 hours) with the top 5-15 candidates,

5. A final, more in-depth interview (~60 minutes) with the final 2-5 candidates.

We will also conduct a reference check before making an offer. Each stage typically takes 1-2 weeks from the end of the application deadline, and we hope to make an offer within ~8 weeks of the application deadline. Ideally, the candidate will begin onboarding as soon as possible after an offer is made. We strongly prefer candidates to join the team by January 2025, but we would consider a different date for an ideal candidate.