Volunteering Matters

At Volunteering Matters we use volunteering’s unique power to bring people together and build stronger, more resilient communities across the UK.

We bring people together to resolve some of society’s most complex issues. From social isolation and loneliness; improving health and wellbeing; building skills, confidence, and opportunity; to ensuring young people can become change makers in their community, the impact that we make is great. And we won’t stop until everyone in the UK has the opportunity to thrive.

People-led and impact driven, we are a national charity that is deeply embedded in local areas across the UK. We operate in five regions: London and the South East; Wales and the West of England; East of England; the Midlands and North West England; and Scotland and North East England. We also have an Employee Volunteering Team with over 25 years’ experience, acting as a broker to provide tailor-made solutions to employers. We turn local knowledge and energy into action and progress, building stronger communities and a better future for all.

This is an exciting time to be joining the team. We’re changing the way we work to meet new ambitions and make sure our impact continues to grow alongside out business.

Role Purpose

ProjectScotland, part of the national charity Volunteering Matters, supports people to get on in life through the power of volunteering. We are looking to recruit a talented, dynamic, and professional Mentor Project Worker, to join our team in West Lothian. The right candidate would be someone who can work flexibly, and can demonstrate an understanding of, and commitment, to our organisational values.

Young people we support include those facing multiple barriers or disadvantage. Our support helps them to achieve positive outcomes for their future. As our Mentor Project Worker, you will work closely with our partner organisations locally to deliver a high quality, impactful mentoring service across West Lothian.

The Employability Advisor will be responsible to the Lead Practitioner (Young Parents) and will work as a member of OPFS Lanarkshire Employability Service, to provide employability support for young parents facing additional barriers to entering suitable employment, education, and training opportunities through one-to-one meetings and group work sessions.

Main Purpose of the job

To provide capacity building and infrastructure development support to ethnic minority (EM) third sector organisations in the Glasgow City Council area.

Specific Duties and Responsibilities

• To work with EM organisations across Glasgow and provide infrastructure and capacity building support based on their need.
• To use the CEMVO Scotland diagnostic toolkit (DTK) to conduct an initial analysis of the organisation producing a report with recommendations to further capacity.
• To co-produce an action plan based on priority areas and execute the action plan with the organisation
• To evidence and collate a ‘portfolio’ for each organisation to document their journey.
• To provide appropriate training based on need to further the organisation’s capacity
• To attend networking meetings and strategic development forums to ensure issues facing EM organisations and communities are highlighted
• To develop close working links with funders, statutory and public bodies to identify opportunities for ethnic minority third sector organisations to attract funding.
• To contribute to monitoring and evaluation processes to ensure that the capacity building programme is running to schedule and meeting targets.
• Provide regular project progress updates to line management.
• To encourage co-operative and joint working within the EM third sector and to work with organisations to assist them in promoting good management practices.
• To contribute to the development of the CEMVO Scotland third sector databases as appropriate.
• To work evenings and weekends on an occasional basis as required.
• To undertake such other relevant duties as may be required from time to time and which are compatible with the main purpose of the post and its level of responsibility.
• To provide regular and end of year reports to the line management and to funders when requested

Person Specification

Essential

• Knowledge and at least 2 years’ experience of providing capacity building support within the third sector – such as business planning, marketing, funding application support, robust financial systems, good governance.
• Good communication and inter-personal skills
• Good written communication / report writing skills
• Experience in designing and delivering capacity skills training in good governance, business planning and marketing
• Knowledge and experience of the funding arena in Scotland and experience with submitting project proposals to funders
• Excellent self-management skills, working to tight deadlines, demonstrable experience in managing a portfolio of clients/organisations over a period
• Commitment to the development of the ethnic minority third sector, as well as a good understanding of race equality and issues affecting the sector
• Ability to network and advocate for EM communities and organisations
• Successful track record of achieving positive outputs in managing projects
• Good organisational and IT skills

Desirable

• Proficiency in using online meeting platforms such as Microsoft Teams or Zoom.