Senior Evaluation Officer Research Jobs

We are looking for a team player with excellent administrative skills, lots of enthusiasm and someone who will have a flexible and adaptable approach. They will be able to multi-task and work well under pressure using their initiative, ensuring the smooth operation company marketing.

Marketing Assistant is a new post at Open Clasp which will work closely with our producing team to deliver marketing campaign plans for our productions, community events & training programmes. They will schedule social media content, support in the creation of written, film & audio content for our audiences and monitor our website and social media analytics.

At Open Clasp our aim is to Change the World, One Play at a Time by placing theatre at the heart of transforming the lives of disadvantaged women and girls. We make truthful, risk taking, and award-winning theatre informed by the lived experiences of all women and girls. We are feminist. We fight for the rights of women and girls. We challenge injustice where we find it and stand as an ally with marginalised communities experiencing discrimination.

Founded in 1998, Open Clasp is part of the National Portfolio of Organisations funded by Arts Council England.  We take a special interest in women and girls from the North, shining a light on their experiences through our work. We make space for debate, encouraging our audiences to walk in the shoes of women excluded from society and the arts to address gender injustice.

Our transmedia approach shapes the work of researchers and leading policy experts. We contribute to regional and national discourse, performing Key Change at the Houses of Parliament in 2016 contributing to the Prison Safety and Reform White Paper, Lasagna was used in evidence as part of the Ministry of Justice Family Law Inquiry 2020 which recommended a root and branch overhaul and Rupture is the result of the Parental Rights in Prison partnership with NEPACS and Durham University. In 2021 during the pandemic, our play ‘Sugar’ was commissioned for BBC iPlayer and was programmed on Way Out TV directly into 54k prison cells.

Our Values:

• To collaborate with some of the country’s most marginalised women and young women, placing their lived experience at the centre of our creative processes
• Ensure the voices of those women are heard by audiences including policy makers
• Make space for discussion, debate and critical conversations
• Promote respect, equality and inclusion

Open Clasp is accredited as a living wage employer, Better Health at Work scheme and Investors in the Environment award for our environmental commitment.

About you

You will be passionate about campaigning for gender justice and building the power of women and girls for social & cultural change. You will have experience of marketing and PR, and an interest in working within the charity sector. We are a fast-paced company so you will need to have strong listening skills, an eagerness to learn and an open mind to develop and share ideas as part of a collaborative team. You will have a passion for the arts and its ability to bring about positive changes in people’s lives.

Our work involves creating spaces for women, inclusive of trans women, to be creative, to talk and discuss. To apply for this role you must be a woman. Open Clasp is exempt under the Equality Act 2010 Schedule 9, Part 1 due to the importance of this role working closely with members and participants, who are predominantly vulnerable women, and building relationships with these groups.

About Reprieve

Reprieve works with the most disenfranchised people in society. Our aim is simple: to consign the death penalty and abuses carried out in the name of “counter-terrorism” or “national security” to history, drawing public and political attention to past harms with a view to preventing them from occurring again.

In our view, you can best judge a society by how it treats prisoners, criminal defendants, and the far-flung targets of an ever-changing counter-terror policy. To us, the rule of law means little if we selectively apply it to people we agree with. It is for all of us. Liberty is always eroded at the margins.

Reprieve’s staff is made up of courageous and committed human rights defenders. Founded in 1999, we provide free legal and investigative support to people facing the death penalty and those victimised by states’ abusive counter-terror policies – rendition, torture, arbitrary detention and extrajudicial killing.

We fight our clients’ cases in courts around the world; investigate their mistreatment; and advocate on their behalf, encouraging public and political debate of human rights issues.

About this role

We are pleased to advertise for a Head of Death Penalty Projects- US to oversee our work against the death penalty in the United States of America. 

Reprieve has worked against the death penalty since our founding. In recent years we have built a particular specialism in issues relating to lethal injection, the most popular execution method in the US. Lethal injection has been touted as more humane than other methods – a modern, clean, clinical way to execute. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Lethal injection executions go wrong more often than any other execution method, often resulting in prolonged and torturous executions, commonly known as “botched” executions. Through our work we aim to dispel the myth of the humane execution, working with allies across medicine, business and other sectors to end the misuse of medicines and medical technology in executions.

The existing portfolio of work includes litigation, investigation and analysis, corporate engagement, a wide range of public and private advocacy, and developing and maintaining world-leading expertise on execution methods, particularly the jurisprudence and science relevant to lethal injection.

Contract, location and salary

The role is a full-time, permanent position with a salary of £59,226 per annum less any required deductions for tax and national insurance.Reprieve operates a hybrid working model and we require staff to work a minimum of 40% from the London office and the rest of the week from home. There is the opportunity for international travel in the role.

 Reprieve is proud to have an open and transparent pay structure, governed by a 2:1 pay ratio between the highest-paid member of staff and the lowest-paid member of staff. We are a flexible employer and offer a range of non-financial benefits to employees. We welcome applications from a range of backgrounds. You can learn more about Reprieve’s salary structure and ethos on our website. 

Full details and how to apply

Please see the job description for full details including a person description. Applicants should complete and submit an application form, and the deadline for applications is 17 November 2024. Applicants must have the right to work in the UK currently and for the duration of the 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.