Hours: Full-time - 36hours per week
(Will also consider part-time - 28hours a week and flexible working requests)
Location: Fully remote with occasional travel within England
Role Summary
The Community Forest Trust (CFT) supports, enables and champions the work of England’s Community Forests, who are the leading woodland creation network in England. We provide a range of support services for the forests including finance functions, payroll and accountable body for funded projects.
We are seeking a detail-oriented and highly organised Finance and Operations Officer to join our team. You will be responsible for maintaining financial transactions, preparing reports, and ensuring compliance with the organisation’s financial policies and procedures. The ideal candidate will have experience in a finance role, competency with accounting software and a commitment to delivering accurate, high-quality work.
You will also provide support to the CFT Managing Director and team, including diary management, booking travel and accommodation, supporting project delivery and arranging meetings and events. You will possess strong organisational skills, with a focus on providing exceptional assistance to ensure the smooth operation of our daily activities. This role requires the ability to manage multiple tasks efficiently and communicate effectively with a range of stakeholders.
Key Responsibilities
Finance Work
- Check, process and record payments in accordance with agreed procedures, administer invoices and expenses claims received, ensuring they are forwarded for authorisation in a timely manner, correctly coded and posted on the finance system
- Prepare purchase invoices, add to the payment spreadsheet ready for weekly payment run processing
- Run the Weekly Credit Control cycle, ensuring invoices are raised and sent on time and monitoring aged debtors, chasing late payments as required
- Reconcile the credit cards and bank account and ensure the financial system is up to date
- Support the Finance manager in month end procedures
- Draft monthly, quarterly and annual management accounts and finance reports
- Support the preparation of grant claims, ensuring that adequate records are kept
- Assist with year-end audits
- Assist with payroll processing
- Respond and deal with finance queries received internally and externally
Operations Support
- Provide support to the CFT Managing Director and team, including diary management, booking travel and accommodation, taking and drafting minutes
- Provide support for planning and arranging meetings including the CFT Board, Forest Network and with key stakeholders, including agreeing dates, organising venues and catering, distribution of agendas and supporting papers
- Support the Forest Network including arranging ‘all-hands’ briefings and the annual conference
- Ensure CFT’s contacts list is kept up to date
- Provide ad-hoc admin support for CFT projects and programmes
- Manage social media accounts ensuring relevant message sharing and posting to increase engagement
- Manage and respond to general enquiries including via the website, telephone and e-mail
Person Specification
Essential:
- English and Maths GCSE A-C or equivalent
- Proven experience in bookkeeping/similar finance role, including following policies and procedures, processing invoices, supporting the preparation of financial reports, financial reconciliation
- Good working knowledge of key accountancy software such as Quick Books or SAGE
- Administration experience, including providing support for colleagues, arranging meetings/events
- High level of numeracy and financial literacy, comfortable working with budgets and spreadsheets and be able to input data accurately
- Good working knowledge of Microsoft Office packages, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook
- Strong organisational and time management skills
- Excellent communication skills and the ability to liaise with a range of stakeholders
- High attention to detail and accuracy
- Team worker, but also happy to work independently including self-managing remote working
- A ‘can-do’ attitude and uses their own initiative
- Problem solving skills
- Ability to work under pressure, prioritise and meet tight deadlines
- Flexibility with the ability to adapt to the needs of the charity
Desirable:
- Qualification in finance or accounting e.g. AAT
- Experience of using social media in a work context
- Knowledge of social media channels including LinkedIn, Facebook etc and skilled in using them
Other Information
We pride ourselves on being a supportive and dynamic workplace. We aim to support our team enjoy their work and achieve a good work-life balance.
The organisation’s holiday entitlement is 25 days a year (full-time) plus public holidays. We also operate a flexi-time and TOIL system.
CFT has an auto-enrolment pension. Employer contribution to pension is up to 8% match of the employee contribution.
CFT employs around 50 staff based in the Forests but has a small core team of 4, which works remotely and there is no office base. We meet once a quarter in-person and this post will occasionally need to attend in-person meetings and events, including the annual conference.
There is a 6-month probation period.
Recruitment Timetable
Deadline for applications: 12noon Friday 24th October 2025
Interview date: Thursday 6th November 2025
Please submit your CV, with a covering letter that is no more than 2 sides, evidencing how you meet the person specification by the deadline above.
Please note, any CVs submitted without a cover letter will not be accepted.
Due to limited team capacity, if you have not heard back from us by Tuesday 28th October, please assume that you have not been shortlisted for interview.
Thank you for your interest in working for the Community Forest Trust.
We are an equal opportunities employer and welcome applicants from all sections of the community.
Non Charity Employer 
6 - 10
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.
Thank you!
About the opportunity
As Head of Legal, Risk and Assurance, you'll lead three critical disciplines that form the backbone of trust, safety, and risk-informed decision-making at Alzheimer's Society. This is a people-focused leadership role within our Finance & Assurance directorate, overseeing professional teams delivering legal, risk management, and assurance services. You'll bring these areas together as one team, joining the dots to create real impact through compassionate, strategic leadership.
We're in the midst of an ambitious transformation programme, and you'll play a central role in ensuring this change is embedded effectively. Working in close partnership with management and trustees, you'll be a senior, credible, and visible voice. Influencing decisions, elevating standards, and building a culture where risk awareness and legal clarity empower rather than constrain our work.
This role brings together three disciplines, each led by experienced subject matter experts who will report into you. We're not expecting you to be an expert in all three areas. However, you should have significant professional experience in at least one, with strong knowledge and curiosity about the others. Above all, this is a people-focused position. Your ability to lead, develop, and inspire your teams, and those around you, will be just as important as your technical expertise.
If you're a strategic leader who thrives on building relationships, driving continuous improvement, and creating lasting impact in a cause-driven environment, we'd love to hear from you.
About you:
You're an accomplished leader with proven experience in legal, risk, or assurance. You'll bring both technical credibility and a track record of effective stakeholder management and people leadership. You're passionate about developing others, building high-performing teams, and creating an environment where professionals can thrive. You understand that when risk, legal, and audit is done best, it's done in collaboration. Keeping the end goal in mind, and enabling the best possible decisions that protect what matters most.
You'll have:
- Professional qualification in at least one discipline (qualified lawyer, risk professional, and/or chartered internal auditor) with demonstrable knowledge across legal, risk, and assurance areas.
- Significant line management experience, with a track record of leading, coaching, and developing teams through periods of change and growth.
- Proven ability to work in partnership with senior stakeholders, including trustees and executive leadership, providing clear, valuable, and risk-based guidance.
- Experience overseeing professional services that are visible, valued, and proactively consulted across an organisation.
- Strong communication and influencing skills, able to challenge constructively while building strong relationships, and translate complex technical matters into clear guidance for diverse audiences.
- A collaborative mindset and evidenced ability to drive continuous improvement, bringing best practice from across sectors to elevate standards and maturity.
What you'll focus on:
- Leading the legal, risk, and assurance teams, creating a culture of high performance, continuous learning, and professional excellence.
- Working in close partnership with executive management and trustees. Providing strategic advice and reporting on legal matters, risk landscape, and assurance findings to inform critical decisions.
- Driving forward our transformation programme, ensuring governance frameworks support rather than hinder change, and that legal, risk, and assurance considerations are embedded from the outset.
- Elevating the profile and maturity of all three disciplines. Making them visible partners across directorates and ensuring they're proactively consulted on key initiatives rather than brought in as an afterthought.
- Overseeing the facilitation of robust risk management systems, leading comprehensive assurance programmes, and ensuring legal services are professional, credible, and responsive to organisational needs.
- Managing departmental budgets, resource allocation, and capacity planning to ensure your teams can deliver first-class services that enable the Society's strategic objectives.
- Building and maintaining impactful external networks, using horizon scanning and sector best practice to keep the Society ahead of emerging risks and regulatory changes.
- Deputising for the Associate Director Risk and Assurance as required, representing Finance & Assurance at senior forums.
Can you see yourself as a trusted partner who helps Alzheimer's Society navigate complexity with confidence? Are you ready to lead teams where legal, risk, and assurance considerations are increasingly incorporated into decision-making? Can you join the dots between these disciplines to ensure the joint outcomes protect and enhance our ability to transform lives affected by dementia?
To be successful in this position, you may have existing experience in the following roles; Head of Internal Audit, Head of Risk Management, Head of Internal Audit and Risk, Head of Legal and Risk or other similar roles. We also welcome applicants with transferable skills.
Important Dates
The deadline for applications is 23:59 on Sunday 2nd November 2025.
Interviews will begin week commencing Monday 10th November 2025 and will be a 3 stage interview process which will include a presentation task at 2nd Stage.
About Alzheimer's Society
Dementia is the UK’s biggest killer. One in three people born in the UK today will develop dementia in their lifetime.
At Alzheimer’s Society, we’re the UK’s leading dementia charity and the only one to tackle all aspects of dementia by giving help and hope to people living with dementia today and in the future. We give vital support to people facing the most frightening times of their lives, while also funding groundbreaking research and campaigning to make dementia the priority it should be.
Together with our supporters, we’re working towards a world where dementia no longer devastates lives.
Our values make sure that our focus is clear for the challenges and opportunities ahead and remind us of what we all stand for.
Our commitment to Equity, Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
We need to ensure the voices around our table better reflect and understand the communities we exist to serve. We strongly encourage individuals to apply who have a disability, impairment or health condition or individuals who identify as Black, Asian or from another minority ethnic background, as these groups are currently under-represented at Alzheimer's Society.
We want everyone we work with, as a colleague, volunteer, supporter, or someone we support, to feel included and that they belong at Alzheimer's Society.
Our Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy here along with our internal employee forum and Employee Lived Experience network groups help us promote inclusion and belonging, becoming an engaged and inclusive organisation for all our people.
Our hiring process
During your recruitment process we want to make sure that you bring your whole self and can be at your best. We are working hard to ensure our recruitment process is as inclusive as possible, so please do inform us of your experience and anything you think we could do better by completing our candidate survey when you apply. Please also contact Alzheimer’s Society Talent Acquisition Team for application support or any adjustments you might need.
To ensure fairness and consistency to select the best candidate for this role, all our applications are anonymised up until an interview has been confirmed. We recognise the benefits of AI, but if you're considering using it to submit your application, we encourage you to reflect on the value it truly adds. AI tools often lack the personal touch and authenticity that set candidates apart. We want to hear your unique perspective, experiences, and skills, so we encourage you to showcase them in your own voice.
We try to avoid closing roles early where possible, however if we receive a high volume of applications, we may close earlier than the advertised closing date. Should this occur, we will aim to provide you with at least 48 hours' notice.
We are committed to safer recruitment and ensuring the welfare of those we work with, due to the nature of some of our roles, we might need to carry out a DBS check at the relevant level.
Giving back to you
Our employees work hard every day to make a true difference in people's lives. We are proud to support them with a range of benefits, recognition and many options for working agilely, all contributing to a strong work life balance. We also have various learning programmes to support you in your development and help you grow to realise your potential and shape a career with Alzheimer's Society.
You can also visit our Working for Us pages, which give you more information about what it’s like to be an employee at the Society.
Thank you!
Are you looking for a purpose-driven role where your work directly transforms young lives?
We are a life-changing mentoring charity dedicated to supporting young people who have faced an unfair start in life, helping them overcome barriers and achieve their full potential.
About the role
As Surrey Programme Manager, you'll manage, advise and support our Pathways Coordinators in schools and other partner organisations. Your main goal is to make sure our programme is fully integrated and highly effective in schools and with partners across Surrey.
Please note that although this is a remote role, there will be significant weekly travel across Surrey so applicants should be based in Surrey or within easy commutable distance.
Key responsibilities:
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Provide support, development, training, management and motivation to MCR staff in schools and other partner organisations
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Support school integration of the programme and a consistently high quality standard of programme delivery
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Develop and support partnerships with the Local Councils, further and higher education institutions, local business and all MCR stakeholders
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Provide analysis of programme performance, impact and development
About you
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Experience of developing and effectively managing teams and programmes
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Self-motivated and skilled at motivating others
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Experience of or strong interest in working or volunteering in the third sector
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Experience of working within or in collaboration with secondary schools
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Excellent communication and presentation skills
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Attention to detail and ability to prioritise
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Experience of coordinating and analysing qualitative and quantitative data
About us
MCR Pathways is an award-winning charity established in Glasgow in 2007. We currently support over 7,800 young people across the UK who’ve had an unfair start in life, through our community of mentors, donors, staff, and partners. They are united by a shared belief: that every young person deserves someone to help them find their way. We believe in the power of mentoring and that a single connection can change a life.
We connect young people with volunteer mentors who offer support, encouragement and a listening ear. The aim is to empower young people to define their own ambitions, supporting them from aspiration to achievement. It’s more than academic success; it’s about instilling belief, resilience and the chance to thrive.
Mentoring is at the heart of what we do, but not all we do. We create opportunities like career tasters, job shadowing, and work experience helping young people access networks and pathways they might not otherwise reach. We support them into further and higher education, apprenticeships and employment and fulfilling careers helping them live their best life.
MCR Pathways’ values are Respect, Communication, Trust and Growth and they inform everything we do.
Benefits of working for MCR Pathways include: 33 days annual leave in first year rising to 38 days from 2nd year of employment, additional day off for your birthday, Life Assurance - 4 x salary, Living Pension Employer.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.