Expenditure team leader jobs in Reading, berkshire
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We are seeking an exceptional leader to be our next chief executive, leading a respected and influential membership organisation at the heart of a thriving grassroots movement.
You’ll be working to build on the success we’ve seen and strong position and voice we have established for ourselves and our members, as a leading force for inclusive and sustainable transport and communities.
You’ll bring an impressive track record in values-based leadership, a proven ability to engage and inspire grassroots change-makers, strategic partners and policy-makers, and a deep belief in the importance of community-led change towards a sustainable, equitable future.
About us
Community Rail Network is a national not-for-profit organisation, which is in the process of applying for charitable status, supporting a growing ‘community rail’ movement, which helps communities get the most from their railways, promotes sustainable and inclusive travel, coordinates volunteering and place-making, and brings people together.
Community rail is made up of 77 community-based organisations, and around 1,300 station volunteer groups and other community-led initiatives around Britain. Their activities range from creative projects for young people, to advising train operators on service improvements, to building travel confidence among marginalised groups, to biodiversity projects at stations, to promoting greener tourism by rail.
Our enthusiastic team of 24 works from home in dispersed locations, but we come together regularly in person and online. We work collaboratively to support members, provide training, events and resources, run campaigns, and champion community rail and its insights. We believe in helping everyone reach their potential while having a good work-life balance.
About this role, and your main responsibilities
Our current CEO is moving on after nine years in role, leaving the organisation, team and wider movement in a strong and empowered position to deliver on the next phase of our development.
Your opportunity is to lead the organisation, and to deliver on our new five-year strategy setting an ambitious course for the future during a period of major transformation for our railways and the wider transport system. You will ensure that we are:
- clear in our identity and our independence, and seen as thought leaders in our field;
- are supporting our members and stakeholders to meet their changing and diverse needs; and
- ensuring the financial and operational resilience of the organisation in an environment that is undergoing a period of rapid change.
As CEO, you will lead a passionate and experienced senior leadership team with three direct reports, while working closely with and reporting into our Board, key partners and funders, and ensuing an engaging, empowering, tenacious approach across all we do.
Advocacy of community rail and its benefits will be high on your agenda, and you will be working closely across multiple stakeholders including UK and devolved national governments, regional and local authorities as well as forging collaborative partnerships with like-minded organisations.
Maintaining our community-centric ethos, you will need to ensure we're effective in enabling members to unlock greater value from the railways at a grassroots level, while drawing on their insights to affect wider change. With hundreds of member groups and organisations across Britain delivering life-changing, place-enhancing work, you will have a solid foundation to build on, to take community rail forward and expand our impact in the years ahead.
Last, but not least, you will be responsible for ensuring the strong and effective governance of the organisation, modelling our governing principles, values and behaviours, and ensuring that we have robust financial and resource management in place.
Skills, competencies and qualities
- Exceptional leadership skills, including a proven ability to lead, develop and grow third sector organisations or multi-faceted teams delivering complex activities, projects and campaigns;
- Excellent communication and external leadership skills: articulate, assertive, with the ability to work diplomatically and persuasively with stakeholders at all levels;
- Experienced in acting as the public face of an organisation, such as through the media, public speaking and high-level meetings, and using evidence and storytelling to articulate and champion a cause;
- Politically astute, with knowledge of and commitment to social inclusion, social justice and sustainability, and a sound grasp of the importance of public transport, sustainable travel, and community-led action;
- A proven ability to influence policy and decision-makers, and to identify influencing opportunities, ideally in relation to community development, sustainability and/or transport, including sharing community insights;
- A strong track record in income generation and development, building strong funder relationships and delivery partnerships, managing programme or organisational budgets and controlling expenditure;
- Experience of working with and/or reporting to a board, ideally in a not-for-profit and/or membership context;
- An empowering, engaging approach to leadership, management and change-making;
- Resilient, pragmatic and determined, with the ability to work under pressure, seize emergent opportunities, manage risk, and support others dealing with competing priorities.
Other information
The role will involve extensive travel within Britain as part of building your profile and that of the organisation with central and devolved government in Scotland and Wales, and increasingly with the devolved regions of England.
There is flexibility on location given the requirement to travel and that your office will be home-based. You will need to travel to in-person quarterly team meetings (usually in London or West Yorkshire) and to Board meetings which alternate between online and London. It is expected that travel will be by public transport and easy access to the rail network is therefore required to ensure journeys can be made sustainably.
This is a full-time position, 37 hours per week. We use a flexi-time system with core hours 10am-3pm, and are committed to being a flexible, supportive and understanding employer. This is a permanent position with a probationary period of six months.
Benefits: 25 days annual leave plus bank holidays (rising up to 30 days, plus Bank Holidays, in line with long service); pension with employer contribution of 7%; and access to Employee Assistance Programme.
Successful applicants will need to provide proof that they have the right to work in the UK and provide two references.
Community Rail Network is an equal opportunities employer. We welcome applications from disabled people and Black, Asian and other minoritised groups, who meet with the skills and competencies for this role. We will provide reasonable adjustments for interviews as required.
Applications by Tuesday 12 May 2026 (23:30) with two attachments: your CV and a covering letter of up to two sides of A4 summarising why you are the ideal person for this job and relevant experience and competencies. Please include a daytime phone number and an email address and identify your notice period in your cover letter.
First interviews take place 21-22 May 2026 online. Second interviews will be in person, Monday 1 June 2026, in London. Candidates invited for interview will be contacted by phone about a week before. Due to limited resources, we are unable to provide feedback to other candidates.
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Non Charity Employer
21 - 50
Championing the community rail movement | Connecting people and their railways | Creating inclusive, empowered, sustainable and healthy communities
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.
Thank you!
Actively Interviewing
This organisation is scheduling interviews as applications come in. They're ready to hire as soon as they find the right person. Don't miss your opportunity, apply now!
Our amazing team at Alana House are looking for a Women’s Centre Team Leader to join the team.
Would you like to make a lasting difference to women facing multiple disadvantages? Our award winning trauma recovery service empowers and enables women to access the support they need.
Position: Women’s Community Project – Alana House Team Leader
Location: The role is based in our Reading office with hybrid flexible working arrangements to provide for working at home and in the office
Contract: Permanent full time – 37 hours per week Monday to Friday. Working pattern to be agreed within the hours of: Monday to Tuesday 8.30am-5pm | Wednesday 8.30am-7pm | Thursday 8.30am-5pm | Friday 8.30am-4pm
Salary: Starting salary in the range of £35,502 to £43,389 per annum
Alana House is PACT’s flagship community project that uses a holistic approach to support and empower women. We offer a confidential, women-only, non-judgemental space and our services are delivered for women by women to ensure a safe, comfortable and trauma informed environment for those accessing support.
About the role:
As the Women’s Centre Team Leader, you will be responsible for leading a team of Key Workers to achieve the positive engagement of service users which leads to positive outcomes. Your responsibilities will include:
· manage a team of Key Workers: monitoring performance and progress to ensure KPIs and goals are met
· contribute to identifying, training and supporting service user representatives and peer mentors
· act as the first point of contact for women referred to our service and conduct structured assessments to understand needs
· regularly meet with women to provide dedicated emotional and practical support
About you:
As the Key Worker Team Leader, you’ll bring highly demonstrable people management skills to encourage, motivate, support and develop a team and monitor and manage performance, along with an in-depth knowledge of issues facing justice involved women and those at risk of entering the justice system.
If this sounds like you please visit our website and apply today to join a collaborative and dedicated team who are part of something truly meaningful.
For an informal discussion about the role please visit the advert on our website for contact details for Sabina, Alana House Manager.
Early applications are encouraged as we may review and appoint on an earlier basis if a successful candidate is secured.
Closing date: 9am, Monday 11 May 2026
All opportunities with PACT are based in the UK, and you must be eligible to live and work in the UK.
Other roles you may have experience of could include: Senior Family Support Worker, Family Key Work Leader, Senior Key Worker, Women’s Support Worker Leader, Women’s Key Worker Manger, Domestic Abuse Support Worker Manager, Domestic Abuse Key Worker Leader, IDVA, ISVA, Probation Services Manager, etc.
Safeguarding is at the heart of everything we do at PACT. We have robust measures and best practices in place to safeguard and protect the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults and we take pride in maintaining outstanding safeguarding standards.
Anyone joining our team is subject to PACT’s safer recruitment pre-appointment enquiries, including a Disclosure Barring Service (DBS). The role description provides information on what our safer recruitment enquiries include and the level of DBS required to work in the role.
Registered Charity
an adoption charity and family support provider helping hundreds of families every year through outstanding adoption and adoption support services
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.
Thank you!
Employment Type: Full time
Location: Remote · Multiple locationsIreland · UK
Salary: £62,000 - £72,000 (GBP)25 days holiday plus other benefits.
Seniority: Senior
Closing date: 9:00am, 4th May
About GLAN
GLAN is an independent non-profit organisation made up of lawyers, investigators and campaigners. We pursue legal action against powerful actors involved in serious human rights violations and environmental harms, working across borders with international and local grassroots organisations.
Our vision is justice across borders.
We are a fully remote team - our committed colleagues are spread across multiple countries, and we have offices in Ireland and the UK.
We currently work across three key focus areas:
- Accountability for Atrocity Crimes
- Environment and Climate Litigation
- Abuses in Value Chains
About the role
The Chief Operating Officer at GLAN will play a crucial role in steering the team in the successful implementation of the charity’s organisational strategy, and will be responsible for ensuring the day-to-day smooth running of the organisation – in order to build a sustainable, compliant, resilient and well-governed organisation.
The ideal candidate
We are looking for an experienced leader with a proven track-record of delivering financial oversight and overseeing complex budgets and projects to completion in a fast-paced environment. We are looking for someone who possesses excellent people skills, who is emotionally intelligent and can guide a dynamic team remotely.
The Chief Operating Officer will be responsible for the delivery of core services and will manage a core team of staff to deliver Finance, HR, Fundraising, Communications and Governance.
The ideal candidate will have demonstrable experience in a similar role, with in depth understanding of how charitable, purpose driven organisations operate. You must have excellent leadership skills, a solid grasp of data analysis and performance metrics, financial planning and budgeting skills, and an advanced understanding of business planning, budget and project management.
Key Responsibilities
Senior Leadership
- Lead the Senior Leadership team in the implementation of our revised organisational strategy 2027-2030.
- Ensure organisation-wide financial oversight and operational business planning.
- Provide guidance and support to GLAN’s team.
- Deputise for the CEO when necessary and take ownership of high-level decision-making.
Operational oversight
- Maintain operational oversight so that legal, advocacy, funding and finance align with GLAN’s organisational strategy.
- Oversee and facilitate the flow of information between the legal and operational teams so that our legal case works aligns with finances, commitments to funders, team capacity, and communications plans.
- Ensure that systems enable on-going monitoring of expenditure so that fundraising and finance are aware of gaps/underspends.
- Help ensure cases/teams are sufficiently resourced in terms of staff capacity.
- Ensure joined up working, and provide strategic guidance when challenges arise.
People and culture
- Provide strong leadership to ensure a professional and healthy working culture.
- Build on GLAN’s existing commitments to a working culture that is in line with our values, overseeing team-wide consistency to HR line-management, 1:1’s, annual 360 reviews and performance.
- Oversee recruitment, onboarding, performance management, and staff development and staff feedback.
- Ensure policies on anti-racism, equality, diversity, inclusion and wellbeing are embedded in how we work.
- Support the embedding of GLAN’s values across GLAN’s work.
- Oversee relationship and dialogue between GLAN’s SLT and Trade Union representatives.
Governance and Board relationships
- Lead on ensuring that GLAN is compliant with our legal, regulatory, health & safety, data protection / GDPR and employment law obligations.
- Ensure we have all necessary policies in place and take the lead on coordinating the establishment and review of existing and further policies. Oversee the regular review of GLAN’s risk management frameworks and our risk register.
- Oversee GLAN’s governance structures (internal reporting, Board meetings etc.), ensuring decisions are well informed and documented.
Financial oversight
- Oversee financial operations: budgeting, forecasting, cash flow, expenditure controls, financial reporting, payroll.
- Ensure compliance with accounting standards, audit requirements and donor / funder financial reporting obligations.
- Manage relationships with external accountants, auditors, banks, and financial service providers.
- Ensure best practices are followed and financial risk is identified and managed appropriately.
Operations
- Ensure the smooth running of IT, data protection, office management. Managing relationships with our external providers.
Person Specification
Essential
- Minimum of 8 years of experience in senior leadership roles, delivering successful organisational financial oversight- with expertise in business planning and complex project management.
- Demonstrable experience of high-level budgeting, forecasting, auditing, proven accountability for ensuring financial sustainability and compliance.
- Minimum of 10 year’s line management experience.
- Excellent strategic thinking and planning skills, able to bridge between high-level strategy and operational detail.
- Sound judgement, risk-management and governance experience; familiarity with compliance, data protection / GDPR, employment law etc.
- Exceptionally organised and able to manage multiple priorities.
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills; ability to present complex operational, financial or legal information clearly.
- Strong collaborative approach, ability to work across teams, offer guidance to other senior level staff, and clear people management skills.
- Expertise in ensuring compliance with relevant legislation, policies, and procedures, particularly in the charity sector.
- Understanding of UK charity law and governance, including experience with Board of Trustees.
- Aptitude in decision making and problem solving, and confidence in providing guidance to boards and CEO.
- Warm, people-centred and positive approach.
- Emotionally intelligent, able to self-reflect, be honest and conduct open conversations with sensitivity.
- Solution-orientated, able to anticipate and resolve challenges.
- Strong alignment with GLAN’s values and our mission.
- Strong commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion and committed to GLAN’s ongoing anti-racist learning and practice.
- Commitment to developing an organisational culture in which our team thrives and we can achieve meaningful impact in our work.
- Ability to handle difficult situations and handle confidential information.
- Ability to balance GLAN’s operational priorities with our values.
Desirable
- Experience of operating in non-profit / mission-driven / legal organisations.
- Previous experience working in a human rights or environmental protection focussed setting.
- Legal or compliance experience.
- Experience of change management and scaling teams or systems.
- Experience of hybrid / remote team leadership .
- Experience of supporting culture building.
- Experience of working to decolonial commitments.
- Experience of delivering organisational change programmes.
- Legal or compliance experience.
- Experience of change management and scaling teams or systems.
- Experience of hybrid / remote team leadership
- Commitment to equity, learning and continuous improvement.
- Knowledge of HR practices and employment law.
- Fundraising experience.
- Accountancy qualification, Leadership or management qualifications, Project management qualifications e.g. Prince2
Equality, Diversity & Inclusion
We particularly welcome applications from candidates with lived experience of the issues that GLAN works on. We strongly encourage applications from disabled candidates, older candidates, and Black and racially minoritised candidates, who are currently underrepresented in our organisation. We use an anonymised recruitment process to ensure fairness. Each applicant will be individually assessed against the essential criteria regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, religion, or belief. We will use positive action on the basis of race and/or disability in case of a tie break situation.
Our values
Decolonial - We are committed to building decolonial, anti-racist, and anti-oppressive approaches at GLAN.
Collective Power - We believe lasting change is built through collective action and power sharing.
Responsive - Working across interconnected global systems that are ever in flux, we aim to be adaptable, nimble and responsive to make the biggest impact we can.
Steadfast - We know the kind of change we want to see won’t happen overnight, that’s why we strongly value patience and persistence.
Self-Reflective - We recognise the power and privilege we hold as an organization. We’re committed to fostering a culture of honesty, reflection, and continuous learning, constantly examining how we work within the system and why to help us strengthen both our organisation and the movements we support work within the system.
How to apply
To apply, please use our application portal. Applications are due by 9am 4 May 2026. We will not review applications sent via LinkedIn or email.
GLAN does not use AI to review applications, and we ask candidates to avoid its use in this process. We want to read about people’s experience in their own words.
If you need any reasonable adjustments, including this job pack to be sent in a larger font, in order to apply for this role, please contact us.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.