Job description

Department / Student Services
Location / Manor House, Moulsecoomb
Job title
Post number / Entrepreneurship Advice Manager
SS5143
Grade / 6
Responsible to / Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship)
Main areas of responsibility
1. / To manage and deliver the one-to-one entrepreneurship advice service open to students, staff, and alumni (our service users), providing specialist information, advice, guidance, and mentoring to service users who are in the process of starting up, or developing, a business or social enterprise.
2. / To deliver a variety of extra-curricular and co-curricular entrepreneurship workshops and presentations, working in partnership with academics, colleagues within Student Services, other professional departments, and Students’ Union societies, in order to develop the entrepreneurial skills and ideas of diverse groups of service users.
3. / To manage the day-to-day operations and events of the beepurple Entrepreneurship Programme.
4. / To manage the marketing and communications of the beepurple Entrepreneurship Programme
5. / To participate in business development projects when deemed appropriate by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
6. / To maintain continuing professional development through research, training and engaging with innovative practice.
Specific duties / 1. / To manage and deliver the one-to-one entrepreneurship advice service open to students, staff, and alumni (our service users), providing specialist information, advice, guidance, and mentoring to service users who are in the process of starting up, or developing, a business or social enterprise.
1.1 / To manage the appointment schedule for service users who request a one-to-one entrepreneurship advice session.
1.2 / To give individual, specialist entrepreneurship advice to service users, in person or via email/telephone/internet, in relation to business start-up and business development matters.
1.3 / To provide in-depth guidance and advice on intellectual property protection issues for service users who are in the process of starting up or developing a business.
1.4 / To review business plans, marketing plans, and start-up funding applications submitted by service users, and to comment and edit them accordingly – depending on the individual needs of the service user.
1.5 / To provide entrepreneurship advice which reflects best practice in business support, related to the lean start-up philosophy.
1.6 / To provide start-up funding advice, and to carry out start-up funding searches for individual service users – depending on the individual needs of the service user.
1.7 / To produce and write up relevant actions plans
to enable the service users to move their ideas
forward and develop their ventures, in
agreement with service users themselves.
1.8 / To develop and monitor an impact measurement system which enables the enterprise team to identify the progress of service users accessing the one-to-one entrepreneurship advice service, and to measure the tangible impact of that support for reporting and funding purposes.
1.9 / To be aware of best practice in business support, information, advice and guidance, and use practical entrepreneurship advice tools and action plans for delivering business support to clients.
2. / To deliver a variety of extra-curricular and co-curricular entrepreneurship workshops and presentations, working in partnership with academics, colleagues within Student Services, other professional departments, and Students’ Union societies, in order to develop the entrepreneurial skills and ideas of diverse groups of service users
2.1 / To plan, write, and facilitate extra-curricular and co-curricular entrepreneurship workshops offered to students and alumni on a wide variety of business start-up and entrepreneurship-related topics, responding effectively to a wide variety of backgrounds, learning styles, additional support needs and group sizes.
2.2 / To liaise with relevant internal and external stakeholders (including academics, colleagues from Student Services, the Students’ Union, local entrepreneurs, and local employers) to ensure workshop material is current, relevant to the learning needs of our service users, and reflects good practice in the field of entrepreneurship education.
2.3 / To review with academics the course content and delivery of career and personal development learning outcomes – relating to entrepreneurship – through the framework of the Career Planning Agreement.
2.4 / To advise and assist academic staff in integrating the entrepreneurship learning outcomes into their courses to ensure they are evident and transparent to students and staff to meet course validation criteria.
2.5 / To use contacts within schools to raise awareness of the support role of Student Services, and in particular of the support role and service delivery of the entrepreneurship team available to students and alumni.
2.6 / To be aware of and understand the information, advice and guidance provision of other services within Student Services and across the university, to enable appropriate and timely cross-referral of students, staff, entrepreneurs and employers.
2.7 / To be aware of and contribute to the ‘student-centred’ approach for support for students and staff within the university, prospective students and graduates.
3. / To manage the day-to-day operations and events of the beepurple Entrepreneurship Programme.
3.1 / To be responsible for providing independently an efficient and highly professional enquiry and signposting service to students, alumni and local businesses who contact the entrepreneurship team, offering specialist advice as and when required, or relaying enquiries to the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
3.2 / To be responsible for maintaining and updating the entrepreneurship team’s contacts database.
3.3 / To collate data from the database for the purpose of report-writing and press requirements, on a quarterly basis for the senior managers, and as and when requested by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
3.4 / To monitor, evaluate and implement changes and improvements to processes and procedures of data collection ensuring an effective service that achieves agreed service level standards, as set by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
3.5 / To ensure the objectives for the service are met, within agreed resource allocations and timescales.
3.6 / To attend and participate in monthly entrepreneurship team meetings.
3.7 / To be responsible for the event management of the beepurple events, and the Santander University of Brighton Enterprise Awards ceremony.
3.8 / To be responsible for writing events briefs, identifying relevant resources (finance and staffing), and carrying our risk assessments in preparation for all events.
3.9 / To be responsible for monitoring the expenditure incurred for specific events, and to work effectively within budgets for events set by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship)
3.10 / To coordinate any staff (from the Careers Service) who offer their assistance at the events and to develop operational schedules for all staff assisting at those events.
3.11 / To manage and organise logistics for events including booking venues, catering, travel and audio visual equipment, as well as room preparation and clearance.
3.12 / To attend the Beepurple workshops and activities in an events management capacity.
3.13 / To gather evaluation and feedback from service users to ensure an effective service delivery that achieves agreed service level standards as set by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship) and the Careers Service.
4. / To manage the marketing and communications of the beepurple EntrepreneurshipProgramme.
4.1 / To write the beepurple Entrepreneurship Programme’s annual marketing and communications plan, and accompanying operational marketing activities and targets.
4.2 / To deliver and maintain the annual marketing and communications plan effectively, on time and within budget in liaison with the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
4.3 / To analyse data from existing research and initiate primary market research, both qualitative and quantitative, to provide an evidence base to inform decision-making.
4.4 / To monitor the success of the beepurple Entrepreneurship Programme’s communications and amend the marketing and communications plan accordingly.
4.5 / To be aware of political and legislative changes affecting Higher Education and Entrepreneurship Education, and to monitor and feedback any noticeable trends in expectations and attitudes from students, staff and parents, to enable the university and Student Services to respond accordingly in service provision.
4.6 / To write press releases, blog posts, and emails for marketing campaigns and press coverage, and to contribute to marketing material development in various media (e.g. via e-newsletter, websites, online university social media marketing channels, the Students’ Union, and press etc.) for internal and external audiences.
4.7 / To participate in outreach activities promoting the beepurple EntrepreneurshipProgramme within the university across all collegesand departments, and at external business engagement events.
4.8 / To ensure web and social media-based communications are up-to-date, including writing accessible and engaging news and announcements.
5.0 / To participate in business development projects when deemed appropriate by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
5.1 / To scan regularly the environment within the business support industry and in the entrepreneurship education field in order to spot opportunities for potential business development projects.
5.2 / To participate in the generation of ideas for potential commercial income streams for the beepurple Entrepreneurship Programme.
5.3 / To carry out desk-based research when analysing and validating potential opportunities to develop commercial income streams, when directed by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
5.4 / To work on specific business development projects – related to the team’s entrepreneurship work – which generate commercial income, as and when directed by the Business Development Manager (Entrepreneurship).
6.0 / To maintain continuing professional development through research, training and engaging with innovative practice
6.1 / To undertake research using a variety of sources including websites, business support industry information, and student and graduate entrepreneurship statistics, from professional bodies and associations including the National Centre for Entrepreneurship in Education (NCEE), Enterprise Educators U.K. (EEUK), the Higher Education Entrepreneurship Group (HEEG), and the Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services (AGCAS).
6.2 / To keep abreast of new and innovative approaches in entrepreneurship education and guidance and incorporate into the service delivery as appropriate.
6.3 / To participate actively with the professional organisations (NCEE, EEUK, HEEG, and AGCAS) by attending conferences on professional practice.
6.4 / To identify and undertake relevant training courses as appropriate delivered by – but not limited to NCEE, EEUK, HEEG, and AGCAS.

Selection criteria:The criteria below indicate the qualities that are needed to do the job well. Candidates for the post will be selected according to the extent to which they satisfy them. Evidence of potential will also be considered. Most of the criteria must normally be met in order to qualify for selection.

ESSENTIAL:

Knowledge/qualifications:

  • Understanding of the key stages of the business start-up and business development process.
  • Understanding of the four main areas of intellectual property protection, and associated legalities.
  • Understanding of the learning and resource needs of student and graduate entrepreneurs who are in the process of starting up or developing a business.
  • Ability to think and plan strategically.
  • Ability to write, review, and edit business plans.
  • Ability to write, review, and edit marketing plans.
  • Ability to analyse perceived market opportunities.
  • Ability to think creatively and originally.
  • Knowledge of other working areas of the university which are relevant to the work of the enterprise team.
  • Knowledge of appropriate external stakeholders, (including business support services, professional bodies and resources available to students and graduates who are starting up a venture).
  • An undergraduate degree or equivalent level of studies.

Project management skills:

  • Understanding of monitoring and evaluation processes.
  • Experience of evaluating the service delivery of projects.
  • Experience of project planning (including research, information and data retrieval).
  • Ability to plan and deliver long-term project work.
  • Effectively and efficiently whilst meeting agreed priorities.
  • Ability to solve problems and develop plans successfully.
  • Ability to work flexibly and respond to changing priorities at short notice.
  • Ability to work independently and use own initiative.
  • Experience of suggesting and making improvements to the service delivery of a project.

Administrative skills:

  • Competence in database administration (e.g. data input and data collection).
  • High level of numeracy and knowledge of principles of statistics.

Financial management:

  • Budget management experience.
  • Experience of administering payments.

Events management:

  • Experience in planning, organising and running events within Higher Education and/or commercial environments.

Communication skills:

  • Ability to communicate with diverse audiences from inside and outside the university (e.g. students, graduates, academic staff, senior level staff and external business contacts, and support staff from other central departments).
  • Competence in marketing and communications in a large organisation.
  • Clear, concise, accurate written and oral communication with particular ability to explain complex processes and procedures to diverse audiences.
  • Strong presentation skills with the ability to give clear presentations and promotional and motivational talks.
  • Ability to write effective, clear and concise reports, press releases, and case studies.

Service:

  • Demonstrated knowledge of and commitment to relevant service standards.
  • Understanding of and commitment to customer care.

Self-motivation:

  • Meets objectives on own initiative.
  • Committed to continuous self-development.
  • Ability to manage their time and make decisions without supervision and using their own judgment.

Teamwork:

  • Works co-operatively with others, achieving objectives and mutual satisfaction.

Management of others:

  • Has experience of managing volunteers who work on specific projects for a limited period of time.
  • Has contributed to the successful development of service levels and met them through motivation and effective teamwork with colleagues, guaranteeing equality of opportunity.

Response to change:

  • Keeps abreast of developments in University policy and activities as well as developments in the business community and contributes effectively to implementation of change.
  • Ability to keep up to date in more than one area.

Technical skills:

  • High level of computer literacy, including familiarity with standard office software and the internet.
  • Fast, accurate keyboard skills.
  • Detailed, accurate presentation and editing skills.
  • Skills in managing websites with inbuilt Content Management Systems.

Physical:

  • Able to use display screen equipment extensively, according to health and safety guidelines.
  • Able to undertake all the physical requirements of the job; travel to a variety of external locations; frequent visits to all areas of the university; according to health and safety guidelines.

Occasional out of hours working (evenings during term-time) will be required.

DESIRABLE:

  • Experience in starting up, or working in, a small to medium-sized enterprise.
  • Insight into the needs and priorities of staff and students in higher education and business, perhaps gained through study or work.
  • Understanding of the actual and potential relationship between Higher Education, business, and industry.

This job description sets out the duties of the post at the time it was drawn up. Such duties may vary from time to time without changing the general character of the duties or level of responsibility entailed. Such variations are a common occurrence and cannot of themselves justify a reconsideration of the grading of the post.

Ref:CG

Date: 22/12/2015