Job Profile: Projects Manager

March 2017

Job Profile: Projects Manager

Background

As a charity Surrey Youth Focus’ aim is to “significantly improve the lives of young people in Surrey”. Over the past two decades we have worked tirelessly to understand the needs of young people in the county and to innovate, broker and collaborate on projects to address these needs, with some resounding successes.

Surrey Youth Focus is described as the ‘eyes and ears’ of the voluntary youth sector. We have an extensive ‘reach’ and work with, and support, over 70 youth organisations (our members) ranging from large charities to local youth clubs. We also regularly work with Surrey County Council and other Local Authorities, Surrey Police and the Police and Crime Commissioner, Public Health and the Clinical Commissioning Groups, Businesses, Schools and other agencies interested in helping young people.

We are a friendly, hardworking team of five people (four of whom are part-time), and so flexibility/multi-tasking is essential. We all take responsibility for tasks such as answering the phone and doing our own photocopying. Our impact and reputation is very impressive for our size, and we want to keep it that way. We have cloud based computing, giving staff access to emails/files remotely - by desktop/tablet/laptop/phone.

Overall purpose of the role

To project manage some of Surrey Youth Focus’s projects including (but not limited to) youth social action and upskilling sports organisations to increase the participation of young people from deprived backgrounds in mainstream sports organisations.

The ideal candidate will have strong project management and problem solving skills and be able to develop and deliver highly effective projects on time and on budget.

The role will also enable the right candidate to develop new projects based on young people’s needs and explore new ways of engaging young people through the development and creation of resources.

Location: Astolat, Burpham, Guildford, but with some flexibility to work from home when necessary.

Responsible to: CEO

Contract Length: Annual contract, subject to funding.

Hours: Part time, 21 hours a week. Occasional evening and weekend work required. Subject to delivery requirements, we can be flexible about the working pattern. We may be able to offer this as a full-time role if preferred.

Salary: The salary range is £19-22k FTE plus pension at 5% is available.

Person Specification

Principal Objectives/Tasks

1)Tooversee the day to day project management of SYF projects, ensuring effective management, monitoring and reporting on the projects in line with the objectives, timeframe and budget.

2)To work with the CEO and team on the development of new and existing project plans

3)To organise and analyze research surveys – engaging youth organisations, practitioners and young people to gain insight into areas such as public services and mental health.

4)To create and develop resources targeted at engaging with and communicating with young people.

5)To run workshops with youth practitioners and young people around topics such as youth social action.

6)To organise effective events which are well attended and highly regarded.

7)To identify and deliver new programmes to improve outcomes for young people and youth organisations in conjunction with other team members, taking into account financial sustainability

8)To undertake some administrative tasks that may be necessary in the interests of an efficient office such as answering the telephone

9)To undertake such other duties as may be required.

Person specification: Projects Manager

Knowledge and skills:

Essential

Demonstrable interest in improving the lives of Surrey young people, in all their guises.
Strong project management skills - well organized and methodical with experience of managing a range of projects varying in type and size.
Good negotiating skills, and the ability to be persuasive
Strong problem solving skills, with the confidence and knowledge to make key decisions.
Experience of organizing successful events.
Experience of working collaboratively across sectors, and an ability to manage their perspectives and constraints.
Good presentation skills

Knowledge, and experience of research and survey techniques (creating and analyzing surveys).
Experience in the use of monitoring and evaluation tools.
Excellent interpersonal, analytical, written and verbal communication to a variety of audiences.
Experience of budget monitoring.
Excellent competency with Information Technology – Excel spreadsheets, word PowerPoint and database software and a working knowledge of youth technologies incfacebook, twitter, snapchat, instagram
The willingness and enthusiasm to work in a flexible way in a small team within a dynamic and changing environment.

Ability to work well under pressure, prioritise workloads and work both reactively and pro-actively bothindependently and with others.
Ability to travel around Surrey.

Desirable

Experience of leading the development of successful proposals and conceptswould be advantageous.
Previous experience of building own professional networks.
Experience of working in more than one sector – charity, business, public, education.

Qualifications/ Experience

You may be qualified at Level 3 in projects/events management, marketing, business skills, or have a relevant degree and a willingness to “learn by doing”even if lacking much experience.

General

You must be able to manage priorities across quite a wide brief and competing deadlines.

The job is mostly office based, but there may be a need to visit organisationsand companies.You must be prepared to travel to different locations across the county.

Hours will be flexible, and we have a “Family friendly” working policy. Subject to business requirements, sometime off in lieu may be possible during quiet periods such as summer holidays.

More information about Surrey Youth Focus

Surrey Youth Focus is the umbrella organisation for youth charities and voluntary sector organisations across Surrey. We are a registered charity and our goal is: “To significantly improve the lives of young people in Surrey”.

We do this by supporting other organisations who are delivering to young people, particularly our members (75 youth organisations across Surrey). We also encourage collaboration between a wide number of organisations interested in helping young people. Although it is vital that we interact with young people in order to be knowledgeable about the subject, we do NOT regularly deliver directly to young people.Our work includes:

Inspiring Collaboration

Generate opportunities for young people as well as seek solutions to their problems by encouraging collaboration between a wide range of organisations including voluntary and charities, clubs, businesses, schools, local authorities. For example, through our employment project for young people with Special Educational Needs and DisabilitiesEND) we are leading a cross-sector collaboration to identify and overcome barriers to employment for these young people.
Help strengthen youth voluntary and charitable organisations by providing access to knowledge and resources from business, schools, local authorities, etc.

Championing the Youth Sector

Represent the interests of youth charities and voluntary youth organisations to statutory bodies across Surrey and beyond in the furtherance of their work with young people. For example, our CEO sits on the Surrey Safeguarding Children Board and the Surrey Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) strategy board.
Ensure that the youth sector and individual youth organisations survive and thrive in the face of the increasingly tough funding climate, continuing to offer excellent services to young people.
Promote good practice, efficiency and effectiveness of youth organisations for young people and to innovate, explore, develop and assist our members to deliver the best for their young people. For example, our Upskilling Project aims to enable sports organisations to learn how to welcome and work with young people from disadvantaged backgrounds including connections to youth clubs serving disadvantaged young people.

Empowering Young People

Empower the voice of youth and to hear the voices of young people, ensuring that a wide range of young people’s voices are heard. For example, through our project with the Surrey Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner, we are seeking out of the voices of young people across Surrey with a view to improving their relationships with the police.
Collaborate across sectors to engage all relevant parties to help young people be heard and encouraged to take action.
Encourage and support young people to take action to improve the world around them, thus developing confidence and self-belief in the young person’s agency. For example, through our Youth Social Action work, we are supporting schools, youth clubs and other organisations to encourage their young people to identify issues and take action. Our role includes organisation Youth “Soups”, connectivity between organisations and resources.

Surrey Youth Focus has been in Surrey for over 25 years and is highly networked to other organisations, including Surrey County Council. We have very distinguished Patrons to support us.