Trading officer jobs in Manchester

Product Lead – HOSTHub  

(Operational Product Delivery) 

Reports to: Operations Director (Head of Delivery) 
Contract: 1.0 FTE (Temp to Perm) 
Location: Remote (UK or International) 

Role Purpose 

The Product Lead – HOSTHub is responsible for identifying, prioritising, and resolving day-to-day product challenges across HOST’s digital platform. 

HOSTHub serves as the operational backbone of the organisation, enabling delivery across finance, legal, partnerships, and hosted partner services. In this role, the Product Lead ensures the platform functions effectively in practice—by understanding user needs, surfacing issues early, and driving the design, prioritisation, and rapid delivery of solutions. 

While contributing to the longer-term product vision in collaboration with the leadership team and development partners, the primary focus remains on operational product delivery. This includes managing fortnightly sprint cycles, maintaining a dynamic and prioritised backlog, and ensuring continuous alignment between user requirements, internal processes, and platform capabilities. 

The role requires a highly hands-on individual who thrives at the intersection of users, internal teams, and developers, with the ability to translate real-world challenges into clear, actionable product decisions. 

Core Responsibilities 

1. Product Problem Identification and Prioritisation 

Lead the ongoing identification of friction points, inefficiencies, and system gaps across HOSTHub use cases, including those impacting hosted partners, funders, and internal staff workflows. 

Maintain a dynamic, prioritised backlog of product issues and enhancements, informed by user insight and operational impact. 

Work closely with delivery teams across finance, legal, partnerships, and community support to understand how the platform performs in practice and where it falls short of user needs. 

Translate operational challenges into clear, well-defined product requirements that are actionable for development teams. 

Ensure prioritisation is driven by delivery urgency, risk exposure, and opportunities for efficiency, rather than abstract feature development. 

2. Sprint Management and Delivery Execution 

Own the end-to-end delivery of the product, managing fortnightly sprint cycles. 

Set sprint priorities, create and refine tickets, and ensure all development work is well-scoped, logically sequenced, and ready for delivery. 

Collaborate directly with development contractors to run sprint planning, stand-ups (where applicable), and sprint reviews. 

Validate completed work against real user workflows before release to ensure quality and usability. 

Maintain clear visibility of progress, risks, and dependencies, escalating blockers and trade-offs to the Operations Director as needed. 

Provide bi-weekly sprint reports outlining delivered outcomes, outstanding issues, and upcoming priorities. 

3. User Engagement and Feedback Loops 

Establish continuous feedback loops with both internal users (staff teams) and external stakeholders (hosted partners and funders). 

Conduct structured user conversations to understand how systems are used in practice, not just how they were designed to be used. 

Validate proposed solutions with users prior to development where appropriate, ensuring alignment with real needs. 

Ensure user insights consistently inform backlog prioritisation and shape sprint scope. 

Maintain a clear view of user satisfaction grounded in qualitative feedback, not just survey-based metrics. 

4. Cross-Team Operational Alignment 

Act as the central point of coordination across product, delivery teams, and external developers. 

Ensure HOSTHub effectively supports real operational workflows across key service areas, including Project Hosting, Hosted Grantmaking, and Capacity Building. 

Partner closely with Finance, Legal, and Partnerships teams to align system functionality with compliance, contractual, and reporting requirements. 

Identify and resolve misalignments between team processes and platform functionality, either by adapting the system or clarifying and standardising ways of working. 

5. Development Oversight  

Manage the day-to-day relationship with the development team, ensuring requirements are clear and issues are addressed promptly. 

Ensure all development outputs are practical, functional, and aligned with real operational needs. 

Avoid over-specification and unnecessary complexity, prioritising simple, implementable solutions. 

Track defects, rework, and technical debt, incorporating them into sprint priorities where they have a meaningful operational impact. 

6. Data, Workflow, and System Effectiveness 

Ensure HOSTHub captures and delivers data that is accurate, actionable, and aligned with reporting requirements. 

Identify and implement opportunities to automate key workflows, reducing manual effort across teams. 

Partner with internal stakeholders to ensure system logic supports compliance and audit requirements in day-to-day operations. 

Maintain clear, practical documentation of key workflows and system behaviours to support effective operational use. 

7. Risk, Compliance, and System Integrity 

Work closely with the Legal Lead and Operations Director to ensure product decisions do not introduce unmanaged risk. 

Prioritise data protection, security, and system reliability as core product considerations. 

Ensure compliance requirements, including data protection and financial controls, are embedded in how the platform operates in practice. 

Take clear ownership of system incidents or failures, coordinating response and ensuring timely resolution and follow-through. 

8. Contribution to Product Direction 

Contribute to longer-term product thinking, including roadmap development and the ongoing evolution of the system. 

Provide grounded input to strategy based on observed user behaviour, operational constraints, and delivery realities. 

Ensure product direction remains focused on solutions that are practical, scalable, and genuinely valuable to users. 

Key Relationships 

Internal: Operations Director, Finance Team, Legal Lead, Partnerships Director, Community Support Team, Data Analyst, Training Lead. 

External: Developers, technical providers, hosted partners, funders. 

Performance Indicators 

Reliable delivery against sprint commitments, with a clear connection to resolved operational issues. 

Reduction in recurring user-reported problems across key workflows. 

Demonstrable improvements in system usability and efficiency for internal teams and hosted partners. 

A well-maintained backlog with clear, transparent prioritisation rationale. 

Strong alignment between platform functionality and operational delivery needs. 

Timely identification and effective resolution of system risks and critical defects. 

Required Experience 

5–8 years’ experience in hands-on product management or product delivery roles, with clear ownership of day-to-day execution. 

Proven experience managing sprint cycles and working directly with developers to deliver iterative improvements. 

Strong track record of identifying user needs and translating them into effective product solutions. 

Experience working with complex operational systems involving multiple user groups and workflows. 

Ability to operate effectively in environments with evolving and loosely defined requirements. 

Comfortable working across technical and non-technical teams, acting as a practical bridge between them. 

Familiarity with system integrations, workflow tools, and data-driven platforms (e.g. CRM systems, finance platforms automation tools) 

Strong prioritisation skills, with the ability to balance urgency, impact, and feasibility. 

Clear, structured communication style, enabling effective coordination and delivery clarity across teams. 

About Us

The Early Education and Childcare Coalition unites the voices of parents, children, providers, early years professionals and the wider business community, working together for investment and reform of early education and childcare in England.

We believe that we all benefit from a well-functioning early education system and we all have a role to play in ensuring it works for children, parents and the economy.

We are backed by some of the most high-profile campaign and research organisations in the UK. Our members span providers, parent groups, trade unions, the business community and NGOs. Together, we use our collective voice and research to build public and political support for change.

This is an exciting time to join the Coalition. We have experienced significant growth in recent years and, with early years firmly on the political agenda, we expect this to continue.

About the role

• Hours: 30 hours per week (this can be worked over 4 or 5 days). We will consider other working patterns with a minimum of 3.5 days per week worked over 4.
• Duration: Two-year contract, renewed subject to funding
• Location: Home-working, can be based anywhere in the country
• Salary: c. £53,820 per annum FTE (£43,056 pro-rata for 4 days)

We are a remote team, with most colleagues based outside London. This role will support the whole organisation and requires occasional in-person meetings such as in-person team planning days which you will be expected to travel to.

We work flexibly and understand the realities of balancing work with caring commitments. We trust you to manage your time, but expect most hours to be worked within core office hours. To support effective remote working, all staff work on Thursdays.

This is a senior, cross-cutting leadership role sitting at the heart of the organisation. You will lead on operations, finance, HR and organisational systems, while working closely with the Executive Director and Senior Leadership Team (SLT) and the Board to ensure the Coalition is sustainable, well-run, and set up for growth and impact.

About You

You are an experienced operations leader with a strong track record of building and running effective organisational systems, ideally within a charity, social impact or policy environment.

You are equally comfortable developing strategy and rolling up your sleeves to deliver. You bring strong financial and organisational management skills, and are motivated by enabling high-impact teams to thrive.

You have experience working at senior leadership level and are confident operating across a small, fast-paced organisation where priorities can shift quickly. You are a systems thinker who can spot gaps, create structure, and improve how things work.

What You Can Expect to Be Doing

Function leadership

• Work as part of the Senior Leadership Team
• Contribute to organisational strategy, planning and growth
• Support organisational decision-making, balancing operational, financial and strategic priorities

Develop operations and organisational systems

• Oversee the day-to-day running of the organisation, ensuring efficient and effective operations
• Develop and implement systems, processes and policies to support a scaling organisation
• Take ownership of organisational infrastructure (e.g. CRM, internal systems, workflows)
• Improve internal coordination, planning and ways of working across functions

Financial management and sustainability

• Oversee day-to-day financial operations, including reporting, invoicing and payments
• Support organisational financial planning, forecasting and scenario modelling
• Work with external accountants/bookkeepers and ensure strong financial controls
• Support the Executive Director and Board on financial governance and decision-making

People management

• Ensure the organisation has robust HR systems in place, ensuring they reflect changes in legislation, support staff wellbeing and development and foster an inclusive and positive culture
• Lead recruitment, onboarding and staff contracts
• Support performance management, team development and organisational culture

Programme and contract management

• Oversee operational delivery of programmes and projects
• Manage funder agreements and contracts, ensuring compliance and reporting
• Support programme leads with planning, delivery tracking and coordination
• Strengthen systems for delivery and accountability

Governance and organisational support

• Support effective governance, including Board coordination and reporting
• Ensure strong administration of meetings, papers and decision-making processes
• Strengthen alignment between governance, strategy and operations

Cross-organisational leadership

• Act as a central coordination point across policy, campaigns, research and communications
• Support other heads of function to deliver effectively through strong operational systems
• Identify and address organisational capacity gaps, particularly in admin, finance and infrastructure

Person Specification

Essential

• Experience of working at senior leadership level
• Strong experience in operations and financial management
• Experience establishing or improving systems and organisational infrastructure
• Experience of HR processes and people management
• Experience supporting governance and working with senior stakeholders
• Ability to operate effectively in a small, fast-paced and growing organisation
• Strong organisational, problem-solving and communication skills

Desirable

• Experience in a charity, coalition, membership or policy organisation
• Experience supporting organisational growth or scaling
• Experience managing CRMs or digital systems
• While not essential, we would welcome applications from candidate who have either a HR or a financial qualification i.e. CIPD qualified or AAT qualification or similar level of experience and knowledg

The application process

Please apply with a CV and cover letter (no more than two pages) by the listed closing date. No agencies please. We recognise that the use of AI technologies can be useful in reducing the work that goes into job-hunting, however, we kindly request that you use your cover letter to evidence that you have understood the requirements of the role and provide examples of how you can meet the criteria.

The EECC is committed to equity, diversity and inclusion. We use anonymous recruiting during the application process and we use positive action under section 159 of the Equality Act in relation to disability or race. This means that if we have two candidates of equal merit in our process, we will seek to take forward the disabled or Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic candidate in order to diversify our staff team.

We regret that our small team does not have capacity to respond to unsuccessful applicants individually.

Timeline

• Closing date: 23:30, Thursday 11th June
• Notified for interview by: Tuesday 16th June
• Interviews: We expect this to be a two-stage interview process with first interviews held on either 24th or 25th June and second stage interviews arranged an agreed time.