‘Community Grocer’ FoodAssistant (Driver Essential)

Job Description and Person Specification

Job Title: ‘Community Grocer’ Project Assistant

Salary: FTE £20,000 per annum with actual salary for 3-days being £12,000 per annum.

Location: The role will involve working across Manchester from various locations. Applicant must be able to travel to M32 8JA.

Position type: Initially 12-month fixed contract with extension subject to funding.

Working hours:Core hours are Tuesday and Thursday with flexibility for the additional hours between Monday-Friday. Working-hours require starting Tuesday and Thursday at 8am.

Other details:

  • 5% employer pension.
  • 25 days holiday plus 8 statutory bank holidays (pro-rata for 0.6 FTE) rising 1 day per year to a maximum of 30 days.
  • Plus 1 leave dayfor employee birthday and 1 wellbeing day accompanied by £100 wellbeing budget.
  • Statutory sick-pay.

Equal Opportunities:

HMHC strives to be an equal opportunities employer and celebrates diversity. We welcome applications from people living in Manchester looking to return to work and may not have continuous employment history.

Application and recruitment details:

  • A word-document detailing your education, work and volunteering history with a statement about how you meet the essential and desirable criteria as outlined in the ‘Job Description and Person Specification’ available from This document should not exceed 3-pages, A4, 12-font.
  • Submit an ‘Applicant Form’ and‘Equal Opportunities Monitoring Form’ available from
  • Submit application to by Friday 14th July 2017, 2pm.
  • Shortlisting will take place by Friday 21st July. Please note that feedback will only be providedfor applicants attending interview.
  • Interviews for this post will be held on Monday 31st July 2017.
  • Appointment subject to the receipt of satisfactory references.

For further information, in the first instance, contact with your query and a telephone number.

Background:

The ‘Community Grocer’ food project is a new and growing project across Manchester with aims to strengthen local communities’ ability to reduce food poverty and improve health and life outcomes. At the heart of the project are ‘community food hubs’ redistributing surplus food and household items that would otherwise go to waste. Our vision is that the ‘Community Grocer’ will become neighbourhood-hubsoffering cooking workshops, training, volunteer opportunities and access to partner services.Each hub is locally managed and controlled by volunteers, meeting local need and a place where people want to go. They are a starting point for addressing poverty, enabling people to organise activities, undertake social action and for transforming lives.

The ‘Community Grocer’ is a partnership with One Manchester (registered social landlord) and neighbourhood organisations, and works collaboratively with a range of partners. Currently there are hubs located in Rusholme and Ardwick, with 4 new projects opening 2017/18 with identified locations being Clayton, Abbey-Hey, Fallowfield and Moss-Side.

Role Description:

TheProject Assistantwill be responsible for growing and diversifying supplies of donated surplus stock, and supporting the day to day running of thehubs. This role will include collecting and delivering stock to the hubs, securing new sources of donated stock, managing driver volunteers and working closely with hub volunteers.

The key-tasks include:

  1. Collecting and distributing stock from suppliers to the community food hubs using a ‘Transit’ size van.
  2. Identify and secure new supplies of donated food and goods from retailers and manufacturers.
  3. Work with community food hubvolunteers supporting the day-to-day running of the community food hubs.
  4. Manage volunteer drivers including schedules, expenses and supervision.
  5. Support training taking place in the community food hubs.
  6. To deliver, where appropriate, training sessions for volunteers.
  7. Undertake additional project administration and coordination as required.

For this post, successful candidates will need to demonstrate their skills and experience of the following:

Essential Criteria:

  1. Full driving licence with no more than 6-points, full driving licence for a minimum of 1-year and confidence to drive a ‘transit’ size van.
  2. Aged 21-years and over.
  3. Good communication skills including ability to liaise with food retailers and manufacturers.
  4. Ability to support resident volunteers and knowledge of how to make effective use of volunteers.
  5. Good organising and project planning skills.
  6. Experience of working on own initiative with minimum supervision.
  7. Energy, enthusiasm, creativity and tenacity.
  8. Professional attitude and conduct.
  9. Passion for supporting people facing social exclusion and inequalities.
  10. Good IT skills.
  11. Entitlement to work in the UK.
  12. Ability to start work promptly following the recruitment process.

Desirable Criteria:

  1. Good track record of securing donations and / or fundraising for community projects.
  2. Experience of managing volunteers.

All Healthy Me Healthy Communities post-holders must be able to demonstrate their commitment to:

  1. Health & Safety
  2. Reducing disadvantage
  3. Equal opportunities