Organiser jobs

Citizens UK 

Citizens UK is the UK’s biggest, most diverse and most effective people-powered alliance. We bring communities and local organisations together to work on issues that matter; from campaigning for zebra crossings on dangerous roads, to reforming the immigration system, to the Living Wage campaign. We have a track record of winning change through hundreds of local and national campaigns. We know everyday people have the ability to shape the world around them. We believe that through developing local leaders, we can drive nationwide change and create community-led solutions to big and small problems.

Project Information 

Butetown and Grangetown Neighbourhood Fund project, funded by the Youth Endowment Fund. More details here: Neighbourhood Fund | Youth Endowment Fund 

Citizens Cymru Wales has developed an innovative approach to reducing youth violence with community organising at its heart, working across four unique assumptions:  

• ‘It takes a village to raise a child’  

• ‘Anger without power leads to rage’  

• ‘Recognising the need to address Adverse Community Experiences’  

• ‘If you are not at the table, you’re on the menu’  

In 2021 it developed a community led action plan to address youth violence in the neighbourhoods of Butetown and Grangetown. This work then secured £1m funding from the Youth Endowment Fund (YEF) to demonstrate how community organising can improve the lives of children and young people. Across Grangetown and Butetown, almost 2500 people were listened to, and issues workshops took place from which seven interventions were identified including Mental health, Additional Learning Needs and Literacy, an Employment partnership, Sports and diversionary activities and local microgrants. Each intervention is led by a local community-based organisation. At the heart of the work is building a hyperlocal community organising alliance.  Underpinning the work is the development of a Youth Action Zone, a youth-led multi-agency partnership to support young people in the neighbourhood for the long term. The project is in its final year of delivery and needs a locally based project manager to support the current organisations to fulfil the action plan and build a long-term legacy.

Main Responsibilities 

This is a unique role, focused on project management but embedding community organising. As project organiser for Butetown and Grangetown Neighbourhood Fund you will support the project aims, enabling core partners and intervention leads to fulfil the action plan and build a legacy for the long term. Alongside this, you will develop a craft of community organising, working closely with civic organisations based in the neighbourhoods, understanding local power and building partnerships with wider stakeholders, and developing local institutions and youth leaders. All of this should ladder up to building the power of the broader Cardiff Citizens alliance. 

You will embed the ethos of community organising across the project and its legacy by: 

• developing the leadership of people within local organisations - our 'leaders' who lead the campaigns we work on 

• helping them to collectively identify the changes they want to see and create strategies to win those changes 

• strengthen institutions’ own abilities to achieve their missions. 

• Support leaders in connecting the hyperlocal work to the Cardiff Citizens alliance – developing their capacity to work with other leaders and civic institutions across the city to develop collective ambitions and actions (leading up to the 2027 Local Authority elections). 

We envisage the role to be roughly 2 days project management and 1 day Community Organising, but given the nature of the project, these will naturally bleed into one another. 

Working as the Project Organiser for Citizens UK, your main responsibilities will include: 

Career Pathways Headings 

Build and manage projects and achieve work targets effectively 

• Project manage the YEF/Citizens UK Neighbourhood Fund project in the neighbourhoods of Butetown and Grangetown

• Support the delivery of four interventions (Mental health, ALN & Literacy/Sports and Police action team) including due diligence, accountability, measurement and impact monitoring. 

• Ensure good governance; setting up stakeholder meetings and working with community leaders to develop the agenda and actions 

• Develop an understanding of place-based systems change and support system behaviours across the project, including feedback, collaborative leadership and shared power 

Develop and manage external relationships 

• Maintain and extend local relationships and partnerships with community and civic organisations and wider statutory power 

• Map and develop an ecosystem of strategic relationships at the local level

• Ensure the YEF work is embedded within the local ecosystem of support for young people.

Communications 

• Support the interventions with communicating the impact of their work individually and collectively 

• Create comms outputs that communicate the work of the YEF project for internal and external stakeholders 

• Represent the organisation effectively to external audiences in meetings and at events

Generate income and resources 

• Support the interventions to seek additional funding to continue their work beyond 2027 

• Support local organisations to increase their capacity  

Identify and develop relational leaders prepared to act with others for the common good and support them through a cycle of action and training in our curriculum 

• Conduct 5 relational one-to-ones per week 

• Identify and discern actual and potential leaders with the passion and ability to drive change

• Achieve significant development of primary and secondary leaders; nominate new leaders for training on the Citizens UK core taster curriculum and for National Training

• Attend Citizens UK 6-day training to further understanding the method of Community Organising used by CUK 

• Teach sessions of the core taster Community Organising curriculum at a local level (supported by a senior Organiser) 

Strengthen institutions and develop a broad-based neighbourhood alliance 

• Ensure good understanding of the basic interests and traditions of typical member institutions

• Support the development of the Cardiff Citizens alliance 

• Support with running institutional development campaigns in a range of organisations in the local area 

Personal Specification 

(D) Desirable, (E) Essential 

Qualifications 

Bachelor’s degree in any subject (D) 

Qualification in a subject of relevance to community work or community organising (D) 

Experience 

• Evidence of having acted in a leadership role with peers or in local community activities (e.g., organising clubs or societies) (E) 

• Experience of project management; evidence of having set up and/or delivered projects on time and to standard (E) 

• Able to demonstrate previous experience of ‘learning by doing’ in a work or project environment; evidence of being open to feedback and comfortably coachable (E) 

• Experience of building consensus between diverse stakeholders to drive progressive change (D) 

• Previous campaign experience (D) 

Key skills and knowledge 

• Excellent interpersonal awareness – ability to listen well and appreciate a viewpoint or opinion that is different from one’s own (E) 

• Excellent concern for impact – ability to adapt own behaviour to address the needs or concerns of someone else (E) 

• Good communication skills – able to speak with conviction and passion; and to make a logical argument (E) 

• Excellent time management skills with the ability to juggle a wide range of competing demands (E) 

• Strong IT skills to include MS Office (E) 

• Understanding of policy and campaign landscape in the UK, particularly around young people, community empowerment and neighbourhoods (D) 

Personal qualities & values 

• A self-starter with ability to take initiative and work independently (E) 

• A passion for justice (E) 

• A positive enthusiasm for working with faith congregations, trade unions, schools, and other community organisations (E) 

• An interest in and experience of politics and public life (E) 

• Able to work in a team (E) 

• Willingness to work within accountable relationships (E) 

• Self-motivated and adaptable (E) 

Our Organisers and some project teams work closely with our member institutions and will be expected to attend member events that take place in the evenings and occasional weekends. We operate a Time Off in Lieu approach and have very flexible working arrangements to ensure a good work-life balance. 

The successful applicant will be required to undertake a satisfactory Enhanced DBS check. DBS checks are renewed on a 3-year cycle. 

About the application process 

We work within diverse communities bringing people together. In line with our Inclusion value, we would love to see applications from LGBTQIA+ people, people from racialised communities, people living with disabilities and people of faith, all to better represent the communities we work in. We want our employees to have the working conditions that allows them to fully participate, be able to be their best authentic selves and thrive doing so, and we have employee networks to support staff. Even if you don’t quite meet all the required criteria still consider applying, as we invest in our employees and support them to develop the skills and knowledge required to deliver their role.

For questions and reasonable adjustments regarding your application including information in a different format, or our recruitment process, please email us.

About the role
We are excited to recruit a Community Organiser for our Newport Parent Power project. This role offers a meaningful, paid professional development opportunity. The Brilliant Club will work in partnership with Jesus College, University of Oxford, King’s College London and the University of South Wales to engage with parents in Newport. Newport Parent Power is an established project which utilises the community organising-based model first created by King’s College London and Citizens UK with South London Parent Power.

Parent Power supports parents and carers to develop skills in community organising and advice and guidance on accessing higher education, empowering them to make change to support their children’s future and ensure that they have a fair chance in education and their future careers.

Working with us, the Community Organiser will:

• Support local pupils from underrepresented backgrounds by empowering their parent/carers to become higher education experts;
• Receive community organising training from Citizens UK and develop transferable skills;
• Build campaigns to combat local educational barriers with parent/carer communities;
• Join a nationwide community of community organisers making a significant impact on university access.

About you
The role will best suit someone who:
Essential

• Has knowledge of challenges faced in Newport’s communities.
• Has a demonstrable passion for furthering The Brilliant Club’s mission.
• Can adhere to information security policies included in the charity’s ISO 27001 manual (information security training provided).
   

Desirable

• Has prior experience of community focused work.
• Understands the current climate in the UK school system and some of the challenges young people and parent/carers might be facing.
• Understands the barriers young people face to university access and some of the ways these might be overcome.