School Estate Manager

Wood Plc; Witney; On-site; GBP 80,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

An educational institution seeks a School Estates Manager to oversee compliance, manage a team, and shape the future of its estate. The role requires strong leadership skills and a background in estates management to ensure safety, compliance, and high service standards. You'll be pivotal in developing a comprehensive School Estate Management Strategy, directly enhancing the experience of students and staff.

Qualifications

• Practical estates/facilities professional with strong compliance knowledge.
• Experience in a regulated setting, preferably in education/public sector.
• Confident in managing staff and contractors with high service standards.

Responsibilities

• Lead estate compliance and assurance activities.
• Oversee premises helpdesk and cleaning contract.
• Monitor KPIs and manage budgets for maintenance.
• Develop and lead the estates team.

Skills

Estates management

Compliance knowledge

Team leadership

Data analysis

Education

NEBOSH/IOSH certification or equivalent

Job description

As School Estates Manager, you'll be the lead practitioner for our buildings and grounds: the person who makes sure the estate is safe, compliant and fit for purpose. You'll oversee planned and reactive maintenance, manage estates contracts (e.g. cleaning, statutory inspections), run the premises helpdesk, and drive service standards using clear KPIs.

You'll line-manage a 5-person estates team, enabling them to deliver, while you focus on assurance, improvements and readiness for projects.

Key responsibilities include:

• Lead estate compliance and assurance: Act as Responsible Person for fire safety and Duty Holder for asbestos/water hygiene, ensuring all statutory checks, risk assessments and remedial actions are completed to standard.
• Manage estates operations: Oversee the premises helpdesk, cleaning contract, planned/reactive maintenance and estate readiness for lettings and events.
• Drive improvement and value: Monitor KPIs, manage budgets for maintenance and grounds, compile quotes/business cases, and lead estates-side continuous improvement and sustainability reporting.
• Lead and develop the team: Line-manage the estates team, ensuring recruitment, induction, performance and training build a resilient workforce.

To be successful, you'll need to be a practical estates/facilities professional with strong compliance knowledge (H&S at Work, Fire Safety Order, asbestos/Legionella). You should be organised, calm under pressure, and comfortable juggling compliance, projects and day-to-day operations.

Additional requirements include:

• Confident managing staff and contractors; able to set clear standards and follow through, as well as maintaining high standards of service delivery.
• Data-minded, able to use KPIs to spot trends and drive improvements.
• NEBOSH/IOSH (or equivalent/willingness to work toward) and solid hands-on experience in a regulated setting (education/public sector desirable).

Why join Wood Green School? This is an exciting time to shape the future of our estate. You'll play a central role in developing a new five-year School Estate Management Strategy, aligned with the Trust's emerging strategy, and have the opportunity to review current ways of working and implement improvements.

Your work will directly protect teaching and learning, improve the experience of students, staff and the community, and ensure value for money in everything we do. If you're ready to lead a safe, compliant, high-performing school estate, and enjoy seeing the impact of your work every day, we'd love to hear from you.