Deadline: 10am, Monday 29th September

Our employability team deliver a suite of careers focused programmes and activities to school and university aged young people. This includes Pathways to Law, Pathways to Banking and Finance and Pathways to Engineering, each providing young people with support and expertise in accessing higher education/apprenticeships, work experience opportunities, and skills development. Each programme hosts a national residential conference, giving students the chance to live and learn in a university environment. During the conferences our students have the opportunity to network with industry professionals, take part in a range of skills sessions and project, receive expert guidance on studying and careers, and experience university life through social activities and overnight stays in student halls.

We’re looking for a highly organised individual with a proven track record in event management to lead on the delivery of our residential conferences. Alongside our in-person residential activities this role will also coordinate some online activity for the Pathways to Medicine programme and a lead on a range of projects designed to enhance the impact of the Sutton Trust employability activities.

The post will report to our Senior Programmes Manager for Employability, working closely with the wider employability team, including line management of an intern/assistant and matrix management of team members when required.

Main duties

Designing and delivering the Trust’s residential conferences, currently one event per year for each Pathways programme (Law, Banking & Finance, and Engineering). This includes

• Organising and managing event logistics, such as venues, catering, facilities and accommodation
• Designing activities, content and timetables in line with the programme Theory of Change
• Ensuring residential conferences are risk assessed and run in accordance with latest health and safety guidelines
• Ensuring all activities are planned and delivered in line with safeguarding polices and best practice standards, maintaining a safe and supportive environment for all participants
• Overseeing all residential conference administration and pre-event processes, including attendee selection, communications, and requirement gathering
• Managing relationships and coordinating delivery with multiple programme stakeholders including university partners, employers, session facilitators and volunteer speakers
• Managing the residential programmes budget
• Line management of the Employability intern/ assistant, and effectively delegating work for other support staff as required

Responsibility for onsite delivery of each residential conference, this will include:

• Overseeing events of between 90 – 150 students, including multiple overnight stays
• Being the primary contact for staff, volunteers and partners
• Overseeing the recruitment, onboarding, training and management of temporary conference staff; managing staff teams of up to 70 people
• Ensuring all activities and events are run on time and on schedule
• Responding to student concerns and pastoral issues
• Ensuring the appropriate training and staff are in place to embed a proactive safeguarding culture at all events

Further year-round responsibilities will include:

• Co-ordinating additional online events and activities across the suite of Pathways programmes, including Pathways to Medicine
• Contribute to the annual safeguarding review and improvement process led by DSOs
• Lead on a range of employability related projects focused on enhancing the impact of our employability initiatives.
• Managing the MEAL (monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning) and reporting process for residential and relevant online activities
• Modelling best practise in utilising the Trust’s CRM system and data sharing portal - including suggesting changes to drive efficiencies and data collection
• Other duties as necessary from time to time

Person Specification

We welcome applications from individuals who have experience in:

• Designing and managing large scale events - for over 100 delegates across multiple days
• Leading young person-facing events and activities, including awareness of best practice in supporting student needs
• Leading on robust and responsive processes for safeguarding young people, ideally in a residential setting
• Managing relationships with both contracted and voluntary delivery partners as well as diverse stakeholders
• Managing and delegating work to a team of staff to achieve delivery outcomes
• Problem solving and adapting to achieve goals
• Monitoring, evaluation and continuous improvement of process and delivery
• Budget management
• Delivering online events and activities (desirable)
• Working within or an understanding of the not for profit sector;

We are also looking for an individual who:

• Is sympathetic to the aims of the Trust and its mission to address educational disadvantage
• Demonstrates a high degree of initiative and leadership when delivering projects and events
• Has strong organisational skills including the ability to multi-task and prioritise
• Excellent verbal and written communication and strong analytical skills
• Has first-class interpersonal skills - a natural ambassador able to represent the Sutton Trust in a range of settings
• Is eligible to work in the UK (see here for information about right to work)

Terms of Appointment

• Contract: Full-time, Permanent
• Salary: £42,025-£44,000 per annum
• Working location: Minimum of 2 office days per week
• Office location: The Sutton Trust, 9th Floor, Millbank Tower, 21-24 Millbank, London, SW1P 4QP. Our home working policy gives staff the option to work from home for up to 60% of the time, with approval from their line manager.
• Hours: The standard working hours are 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday and may also be required to attend events / meetings outside of their normal working hours during weekday evenings and occasionally at weekends
• DBS check may be required


Scroll down to find out about our staff benefits!

Please note that your application should be submitted in one go - you can view the questions by clicking on the link if you would like to prepare in advance.

Interviews

Applications should reach us by 10am, Monday 29th September, with first round interviews held over Zoom on 7th October, and second round interviews held at our London offices on 14th October.

Safeguarding statement

The Sutton Trust believes that a child, young person or vulnerable adult should never experience abuse of any kind. We all have a responsibility to promote the welfare of all children and young people and to keep them safe. Therefore all posts undergo a safer recruitment process, including but not limited to, disclosure of criminal records where necessary and eligibility to work in the UK. We have procedures in place to promote safeguarding and a safe culture at the Trust.

Contextual recruitment

The Trust is committed to ensuring equality of opportunity and that all applicants receive equal consideration for employment. We strongly encourage individuals from all backgrounds, including those underrepresented at present at the Trust, to apply for this role. As such we particularly welcome applications from people with disabilities, Black, Asian or Minority Ethnic backgrounds, LGBTQ+ and from different socio-economic and educational backgrounds. We are committed to being an inclusive and welcoming place to work and know that greater diversity will lead to even greater results for the young people we support.

We are committed to providing reasonable adjustments for disabled candidates throughout our recruitment process and during employment.

We also operate contextual recruitment at the Sutton Trust. Our application process gives you the option to include information about your background, such as whether you were eligible for free school meals, whether your parents went to university, or whether you attended a state school. For more examples and information on contextual recruitment, please see our website.