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BACKGROUND
Magic Breakfast’s mission is to end child morning hunger in the UK now and for good. The latest research suggests that 2.7 million children are at risk of hunger, meaning one in five children don’t have enough to eat. When a child is too hungry to learn, they struggle to concentrate, absorb information, and manage their emotions, causing them to fall behind in their studies.
Magic Breakfast provides a nutritious breakfast to over 300,000 children and young people every school day. We work with schools in areas of high disadvantage, helping staff target children most in need without barrier or stigma.
We are now at an exciting point in our journey as we launch Nourishing Futures, our long-term strategy, which will scale our impact and redefine breakfast spaces not only as places to eat, but as places to thrive.
To support the delivery of this strategy, we are evolving our Business Development function with the creation of a new role – Head of Business Development. This role will enable continue growth and investment from public funding sources, whilst ensuring that we are able and positioned to capitalise on the growing number of commercial opportunities. It will also lead a move towards more innovative and blended income models across England, Wales and Scotland.
Key responsibilities:
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Lead the Business Development function as an innovation hub, proactively horizonscanningfor opportunities across public funding, commercial activity, and philanthropicgiving. Ensure the team can respond with agility and flex resources to pursue the moststrategic and sizeable opportunities, including blended income streams and complex,multi-strand bids or partnerships that span commissioning, corporate, and philanthropy.
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Coach, lead and support the Business Development team (BD Manager England &Wales, BD Manager Scotland, BD Executive), setting clear objectives, KPIs, and expectations for income growth and performance and ensuring a values-driven culture.
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Work collaboratively across the fundraising leadership team to ensure it operates as a cohesive, high-performing unit that acts with agility to plan, pivot and make strategic decisions that maximise opportunities and drive growth.
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Ensure compliance with procurement processes, contracts, GDPR, safeguarding, and relevant charity law, embedding ethical business development across the function and taking responsibilities for operationalising of and adherence to all of Magic Breakfast’s policies and processes.
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Drive growth in public funding by securing contracts with local authorities, devolved governments, health and education commissioners, multi-academy trusts, and other public bodies.
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Oversee the preparation of high-quality tenders, bids, and proposals, ensuring they are evidence-based, competitive, and strategically aligned.
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Identify and pursue complex, multi-strand funding opportunities that bring together commissioned income, philanthropy, and corporate support.
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Apply a strong understanding of Magic Breakfast’s goals, strategies, and business plan to inform Business Development activity, ensuring all initiatives are aligned with organisational priorities and contribute to long-term objectives.
- Conduct annual planning and budgeting in partnership with the Director of Fundraising & Development, setting, measuring, and reporting against agreed KPIs.
Please see job description for reponsibilities.
WHAT WE OFFER
At Magic Breakfast we value our employees and work hard to develop offer a supportive, respectful culture which enables everyone to bring their whole self to work.
APPLICATION PROCCESS
Should you wish to discuss the role before applying please email our People and Culture Team, recruitment @ magicbreakfast. com
Shortlisting - w/c 1st December
Interview 1 - 8th December
Interview 2 - 15th December
We reserve the right to close the vacancy early if a high volume of applications are received. This is to ensure that we can manage application levels whilst maintaining a positive candidate experience. Unfortunately, once a vacancy has closed, we are unable to consider further applications.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.
Thank you!
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This academic year, we will be expanding our work significantly, supporting close to 3,000 young people from Cornwall to Northumberland. The majority of this growth will be through a one-year project we are running in partnership with the Education Endowment Foundation.
This project is a randomised control trial (RCT) of our Peer to Peer coaching programme, where we will be working with an additional 50 new secondary schools. We have seen consistently strong impact from this programme on the attainment, social & emotional development, and school attendance of disadvantaged young people for many years. This EEF supported RCT now gives us the opportunity to test this impact at significant scale, specifically on the maths attainment, maths self-efficacy, and school attendance of disadvantaged Y10 and Y7 pupils.
To support with the delivery of this work, we are looking to recruit a part time (2-3 days per week) Programme Manager based in Cornwall, to start as soon as possible, and deliver programmes through to July 2026. We welcome applications from candidates seeking either a fixed-term or freelance contract, depending on individual circumstances.
You will have end-to-end ownership of your own allocation of programmes, which may involve a mixture of Peer to Peer, Core and LifeCycle programmes. Whilst delivering our programmes you will be required to build excellent relationships with our school and university partners, support with training and developing our undergraduate volunteers, use our evaluation frameworks to assess impact, and lead on conversations related to retention and expansion.
Candidates will be required to travel to secondary schools across Cornwall, with occasional trips to Plymouth and other locations in the South West. Access to a car will be required. At times team members may be asked to travel to a location outside of their region, but this will be rare and sufficient notice and TOIL will be given where appropriate.
The majority of direct delivery in schools will begin in November.
Whilst there is the potential for a permanent role beyond the length of this project, this will be based on our levels of school retention and business development, and so cannot be guaranteed.
You will flourish in this role if you have a genuine passion and ‘knack’ for working with young people and supporting them to succeed, as well as being organised, motivated, and able to think on your feet quickly. If that sounds like you, please get in touch!
Role details Managing and delivering programmes
● Coordinate and run multiple in-school and online programmes, typically requiring travel to schools most working days.
● Set timelines for programme start and finish dates.
● Oversee programme quality and communicate with school staff weekly to provide feedback after sessions.
● Facilitate in-school or digital workshops for groups of pupils, typically Key Stage 3 and 4.
● Plan and organise graduation trips to a local university for pupils on the programme.
● Collect data for monitoring and evaluation purposes, such as pre and post programme questionnaires, attendance records, and pupil and coach feedback.
● Report regularly to the Programmes Team Leader on key performance indicators and programme updates.
● Build and maintain high quality relationships with pupils, schools, and universities.
● Collect data and write impact reports and case studies for each programme. Expanding our reach and impact:
● Ensure retention of schools and universities within the region by delivering high quality programmes, and leading retention, renewal, and expansion conversations with partners.
● Support the growth of our network of schools, Multi-Academy Trusts (MATs), Local Education Authorities, and universities in your region.
● Contribute to programme design, take part in a working group and whole team meetings.
● Gather and create content for social media and marketing materials.
● Running pupil and school leader focus groups.
● Carry out other tasks that are within the scope and spirit of the role.
Person Specification Essential characteristics and experience
Below are the key attributes candidates will need to be confident of demonstrating.
● Passion for social mobility. We have big aims and are looking for those who share our desire to make education fairer in the UK.
● Ability to think on your feet. Delivering programmes with young people can be unpredictable, so you will need to be comfortable working reactively to solve challenges at short notice.
● Programme or project management experience. In particular the ability to be organised, plan ahead, and manage competing priorities and timelines.
● Experience with young people. Comfortable running a session or delivering a workshop with a group of young people from age 8-18. (Please note, the vast majority of our programmes are at secondary phase).
● Relationship building and facilitating. This is a public-facing role so you will be involved in communicating and delivering workshops to groups as well as communicating our mission to a wide range of stakeholders (business leaders, senior members of MATs, universities etc.).
● Excellent communication skills, particularly public speaking. You should be comfortable talking to groups of 5 or 500.
● Ability to make quick and clear decisions.
Desired characteristics and experience
Below are attributes that would be useful in the role. However candidates that have less experience in these areas should not be discouraged from applying.
● Understanding of the specific barriers to social mobility, both nationally and regionally, and the context for the young people we work with.
● Experience of sales or partnership management/development, particularly with schools or universities.
● Experience of working in education settings.
● Existing network of relevant sector contacts in schools and/or universities, or demonstrable ability to quickly establish new connections independently.
Key details Benefits (for employed staff)
● An opportunity to contribute to an exciting charity with scope to input widely and take on new responsibilities.
● 28 annual leave days (pro rata).
● Fridays off during non-term-time (pro rata).
● Access to a 24-hour employee assisted helpline facilitated independently by Health Assured.
● Access to BrightHR perks, including a range of retail discounts. Key Information:
● Annual salary for fixed-term position: £30,579 (pro rata)
● For freelance contracts: day rate typically in the range of £180-£220 per day depending on experience and location. Freelancers will be engaged on a self-employed basis.
● Starting as soon as possible through to week ending 31st July 2026
● Remote role with travel to schools across Cornwall. The majority of working days will require a trip to 1-2 schools in your region.
● Reporting to our Programmes Team Leader
Please note this is a remote based role with regualr travel across the South West.
How to apply
● Please apply with a CV and brief covering letter
● Please include whether you are applying on an employed or freelance basis, your earliest start date, and (if freelance) your proposed day rate.
● There will be one interview round, likely conducted weeks beginning 17th and 24th November
Registered Charity
11 - 20
Coaching young people to be confident, independent and resilient so they can lead the lives they want.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.