Community Engagement & Volunteer Development Lead

FAMILIES INFOCUS (ESSEX); Chelmsford; On-site; GBP 28,000 - 34,000; Full time

Job summary

Families InFocus (FiF) Essex seeks an experienced Community Engagement Manager to strengthen connections between our professional families support team and a broad community network of volunteers, peer supporters and Community Builders. The role focuses on empowering parents, building confidence and expanding advocacy opportunities.

You will develop roles, provide supervision, and help create pathways for volunteers to grow into community leadership while aligning with FiF’s SEND-focused mission

Qualifications

• Experience of developing, supporting or leading volunteers.
• Structured supervision and safeguarding experience.
• Ability to build trusting relationships with diverse stakeholders.
• Experience in community or family support is beneficial.

Responsibilities

• Fostering engagement: helping parents move from receiving support towards greater confidence, self-advocacy, connection and participation.
• Developing people: recruiting, welcoming, training, mentoring and supervising volunteers, peer supporters and Community Builders.
• Creating meaningful roles: matching people's skills, experience and aspirations to opportunities where they can genuinely make a difference.
• Building safe frontline capacity: developing volunteers who, with the right training, supervised practice and competency assessment, can contribute to Parent Advocacy, peer support and related work.
• Building community: creating opportunities for parents to connect, participate, contribute and lead.
• Supporting existing communities: developing relationships with parent groups and community organisations and identifying ways FiF volunteers can complement existing efforts.
• Developing our internal community: helping staff, volunteers and people with lived experience feel part of one connected Families InFocus community.
• Demonstrating impact: helping us understand and evidence how our work builds trust, confidence and belonging in SEND communities.

Job description

Families InFocus (FiF) Essex seeks an experienced Community Engagement Manager to strengthen connections between our professional families support team and a broad community network of volunteers, peer supporters and Community Builders. The role focuses on empowering parents, building confidence and expanding advocacy opportunities.

You will develop roles, provide supervision, and help create pathways for volunteers to grow into community leadership while aligning with FiF’s SEND-focused mission