Local Organiser

The Foodbank Local Organiser is responsible for developing the foodbank’s capacity to organise and campaign for change.

You will do this by building the skills and confidence of foodbank clients,volunteers and staff to campaign locally. Local Organisers build relationships in foodbanks to identify some of the issues driving poverty in the community and to bring people together to take action on those issues

Working with both Trafford North and South Foodbanks, you will develop and lead a volunteer campaign team to create a campaign strategy and lead on the delivery of the strategy to win change, while developing leaders within the foodbanks.

This role is funded for 2 years by Trussell as part of their Organising Programme, and you will be part of a network of Local Organisers around the UK doing this work

You will be the link between your food bank(s) and the Organising and Local Mobilisation team at Trussell, as we build a movement to end the need for food banks.

Responsibilities of Local Organiser:

• To build trusted relationships with foodbank clients, holding 1 to 1 conversations andgroup activities to identify potential campaign issues and build their skills and capacity to campaign alongside you

• To develop and manage a team of volunteers, building and distributing leadership across the team, within the foodbanks to work on local influencing and campaigning to reduce poverty and the need for foodbanks.

• To explore and understand the experiences that are bringing people to need the foodbank’s support, working with foodbank staff and volunteers, through listening activities and/or research. 

• To map out and build relationships with the foodbank’s partners, referral agencies and local anti-poverty organisations, and to engage with them in identifying the local drivers of poverty.

• To identify a local issue driving poverty, build a campaign team and develop a strategy to build power and win change, working with foodbank staff and volunteers. 

• To deliver the local campaigning strategy working with foodbank staff, volunteers and clients.

• To work with the Organising and Local Mobilisation team in Trussell and engage with the training and support on offer, including work with other Local Organisers in the Trussell network.

• To engage in Trussell’s central priority campaign activities, working with the food bank and local community to get involved in taking action on national campaigns 

Person Specification

Desirable technical skills and knowledge:

• Experience of campaigning or organising to achieve a change.

• Experience working alongside people with lived experience of poverty

• Experience facilitating groups and organising engaging group activities

• Experience managing and working with volunteers.

• Experience of community outreach in the local area.

• Good project management skills, able to balance a range of priorities.

• Behaviours and competencies:

• Excellent interpersonal skills and ability to build relationships and gain trust of people with lived experience of poverty and using food banks

• Confident in communicating and able to seek and balance a range of views 

• Influencing stakeholders where required.

• Demonstrate a commitment to the values of Trussell /local foodbank.

Key Stakeholders

• Your local foodbanks, including the project manager, volunteer, and people they  support.

• Local elected representatives

• Local organisations working to support people in poverty

• The Trussell Area Team, who support your foodbanks in their day-to-day work.

• The Trussell Organising and Local Mobilisation Manager, who will be your key point of contact in the OLM department and support you throughout.

• The wider Trussell Organising and Local Mobilisation (OLM) Team who will deliver training and relational support.

Trussell’s Policy, Research and Impact department

Our Values

Trussell is a charity that works to end the need for food banks. It is founded on and shaped by Christian principles

Our values of dignity, justice, compassion and community, are central to all that we do and therefore supports our aim to be an organisation where the diversity of all employees is valued. We welcome people of all faiths and no faith and those that are committed to these values.

We recognise that we have under-represented groups within our workforce.

As part of our commitment to diversity and equality of opportunity we are actively encouraging applications from under-represented groups such as returning parents or carers who are re-entering work after a career break, people who are LGBT+, from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds, those with a disability, impairment, learning difference or long-term condition, with caring responsibilities, from different nations and regions and those with a lived experience of poverty as well as any other under-represented group in our workforce.

We are committed to ensuring the safety and protection of our employees from all forms of harm