Social Impact Director

Location

Coventry | United Kingdom

Job description

Social Impact Director

Reference Number: XL200

Closing Date: 24th March 2024

Hours: 37.5 hours

Rate of Pay: £60,000 – £65,000

CV Life makes a difference to lives in Coventry through partnerships in sport, activity and culture – we want to recruit someone exceptional to challenge us and ensure there is lasting social impact in everything we do. 

Our new Social Impact Director will join the senior leadership team reporting directly to the CEO of CV Life with a potential salary of £65k and additional benefits.

They will lead on our external partnerships in the city, ensuring our impact strategies fit with citywide frameworks, highlighting how programme delivery can contribute, and identify where future delivery could be focussed and shaped towards achieving impact outcomes.

The successful candidate will be energetic, intelligent, reflective, adaptable, and confident – with a real desire to build the partnerships that will have an impact in a city of huge potential, but with a range of layered inequalities and challenges.

More details on the role, the ideal person, and the recruitment process can be found below.

To apply: send your CV and cover letter to [email protected] video file transfer link e.g. wetransfer answering the following question: What do you think the challenges will be in achieving social impact in this role?

Job Description

Reporting to: Chief Executive Officer

Scope

Coventry Sports Foundation and Culture Coventry Trust are operating as CV Life, so that the scope of this Job Description as a CV Life document extends to cover the employment contracts held with either Coventry Sports Foundation or Culture Coventry Trust.

Overall purpose and objective of the role:

To be responsible for connecting and dovetailing with other relevant city strategies / partnerships in Coventry that have a focus on positively impacting people’s lives, livelihoods, and living, to influence the development of insight and clearly defined priorities.  Leading on CV Life’s external partnerships in the city, and ensuring that CV Life’s own impact strategies fit with citywide frameworks, highlighting how CV Life programme delivery can contribute, and identify where future delivery could be focussed and shaped towards achieving impact outcomes. 

Undertaking a key strategic internal role, reviewing the activity of CV Life’s founding partners Culture Coventry Trust (CCT) and Coventry Sports Foundation (CSF) at venues and in outreach work, and making constructive recommendations to ensure the agreed purpose of CV Life is continually met.

Main duties of the role:

External Responsibilities

1. Establishing, growing, nurturing and being part of the city partnership scene; being the ‘face’ of CV Life within these partnerships; and working to create city frameworks.
2. Ensure that CV Life’s impact strategies fit with citywide frameworks, highlighting how CV Life programme delivery can contribute, and identify where future delivery could be focussed and shaped towards achieving impact outcomes.
3. Representing CV Life in city wide strategic conversations regarding social and community impact.
4. Contributing to the development of coordinated and collaborative city wide strategies to address identified inequalities and areas of under representation.
5. Working with external partners to identify where CV Life could provide additional resource and added value to city wide programmes that address the challenges of those most in need of ‘life and living’ enhancement.
6. Working with external partners to coordinate meaningful insight from which strategic decisions can be made for the development of programmes and services within CV Life.
7. Identifying external funding opportunities, where successful bids could enhance outcomes and impact, and coordinating the necessary funding applications or bids.

Internal Responsibilities

1. Review the effectiveness of internal work towards achieving our purpose and seeking partnerships that can be mutually beneficial, playing a key role in checking and challenging the organisation to ensure that it remains innovative and true to its values.
2. Make constructive recommendations to colleagues that can widen and deepen the impact being made by CV Life.
3. Work with other city partners to ensure that CV Life remains true to its mission, purpose, and values, making constructive collaborative and strategic recommendations for change where greater impact could be achieved. 
4. Identifying and partnering with other organisations in the city – particularly Coventry City Council in respect of the One Coventry strategy – where there is potential for collaborating towards the desired impact outcomes.
5. Collating and evaluating existing impact evaluation and measurement across CV Life. 
6. Developing impact evaluation and measurement that builds on the above, and critically examines the effectiveness of the organisation in meeting its mission and purpose in the communities of Coventry.
7. Providing measurement and impact reporting for CV Life – including for Board updates and external reporting, including an Annual Impact Report.
8. Articulating to colleagues the CV Life philosophy of impact, and highlighting their role in capturing evidence that can assist in assessing and reporting impact.
9. Ensuring that there is a feedback loop internally where the insight and impact measurement feeds into those involved in delivery and assists in service improvement and innovation.
10. Working across all departments internally to challenge and create focus around impact.
11. Defining key demographics / target areas for the greatest impact, in line with city wide priorities.
12. Contributing to CV Life annual business planning to ensure that impact is recognised and articulated as a core priority.

Leadership Responsibilities

1. Working alongside the Chief Executive, Operations Director, Finance Director, Cultural Director, and Corporate Services Director as a key member of the CV Life Senior Leadership Team.
2. Playing a corporate role within the Senior Leadership Team bringing unique perspectives and expertise to discussions, but also contributing and adding value across all areas of the business.
3. Attending Board meetings and producing any necessary reports / plans / insight to inform decisions and discussions at Board level.

This job description is neither exhaustive nor exclusive and may be reviewed and updated depending upon operational requirements and staffing levels.

Responsibilities for all employees

• To embrace and lead by example on the Company’s key values of PRIDE, PASSION and PERFORMANCE or those that might at any time be subsequently re-defined.
• To support the Company’s commitment to providing a safe environment for children, young people and vulnerable adults, ensuring awareness of the Company’s Safeguarding Policy, Procedures and Practice Guidance, and to be vigilant, reporting any safeguarding concerns without delay. 
• To undertake all duties and fully comply with all of the Company’s general standards and those relating to the specific requirements of the role.
• To take care of their own health and safety and that of others who may be affected by their actions at work, and to co-operate with health and safety matters to help everyone meet their legal requirements.
• To co-operate with managers and colleagues to ensure environmental responsibilities are complied with.
• To carry out tasks at a range of sites that are either operated or managed by the Companies / Trusts or where services are delivered by the Companies / Trusts 
• To be involved in any aspects or opportunities for sharing of good practice, expertise and responsibilities within the Companies / Trusts. To generally help promote the work and public image of the Companies / Trusts, always maintaining high standards of customer service and personal appearance. 
• To attend and fully engage with all internal training and development requirements and opportunities, and maintain such qualifications as required by the demands of the role.
• To interact positively with customers adopting a friendly and professional approach at all times.
• To comply with the General Data Protection Regulations when dealing with, maintaining, sharing and storing information.
• To undertake other duties as specified, which are appropriate to the qualifications, experience and general level of the post.

Person Specification

Essential Personal Attributes

• Excellent communicator to various levels of internal and external representation.
• High levels of self-motivation and organisation.
• The energy to drive the impact of CV Life externally and internally, and to build that energy for change with colleagues.
• A reflective, adaptable intelligence to assess and interpret findings in a nuanced way, and then report findings in a clear and positive format.

Essential Knowledge and Experience

• Experience in a senior role, ideally in an organisation that demonstrates positive social impact.
• A deep understanding of layered inequalities; the systemic factors behind them; and a desire to contribute to change.
• Experience in partnership working, analysis of insight, and the shaping of strategy.
• A background in critical assessment of organisational impact, and reporting of the evaluation to both internal and external audiences.
• Familiarity of working in Coventry or a city with a similar complexity of inequality challenges and opportunities.
• Experience in developing city wide / partnership strategies that seek to address inequalities through collaborative delivery programmes.

Essential Special Skills

• The self-motivation to learn, listen, and then to act with no fear of failure.
• A systematic and analytical approach to work, and ability to create and explain robust new systems for impact measurement and analysis. 
• A pioneering individual, with cutting edge thinking, open minded understanding, and the ability to look beyond the obvious – challenging traditional insight and conventional wisdom.
• A respected representative of the CV Life values and the catalyst for internal change, supporting colleagues to be more impactful and remain true to those values.
• A skilled builder of partnerships externally and internally: listening, finding common ground, understanding motivations, and seeking mutual benefit.

Special Circumstances

• Ability to work unsociable hours including evenings, weekends, and Bank Holidays.
• Ability to travel between sites.
• Interest in working with underrepresented and disadvantaged community groups/individuals.

If you have any enquires, please email: [email protected]

Job tags

Salary

£60k - £65k per annum