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Engagement Manager
- Full time
- £24,000
- Scottish Borders, Dumfries & Galloway and Clackmannanshire
- Closing 20th October 2021
- Advertised from 13th October 2021
- FTC until 31st March 2022
Role
3 posts - Scottish Borders, Dumfries and Galloway, Clackmannanshire
Role Reports To: Delivery Leader
Department:Delivery
Overview
Volunteering Matters is a national volunteering and social change charity. We use the unique power of volunteering to resolve some of the UK’s most pressing social issues. In collaboration with local authorities, we have created a programme to support improvement in services for care experienced young people.
The system of public, private and third sector providers across a range of local services tend to be designed for people who are able to engage with little or no support. People of all ages have barriers to engaging in services and care experienced young people can have more barriers than most. For care experienced young people, whilst they have talent and potential, they face some of the starkest outcomes of any group in society given their additional barriers, and a legacy of discrimination, oppression, and a lack of access to resources and opportunities.
What is the problem we are trying to solve? Despite the challenges, there is a considerable growing consensus and momentum around the idea that care experienced young people cannot rely on services and infrastructure that have been designed without their input or have not been specifically designed with their needs in mind.
By making use of the Scottish Approach to Service Design and supporting No One Left Behind Principles, we therefore want to give care experienced young people a voice and an opportunity to influence change by involving them in the design of services and opportunities, providing them a platform to have their voices heard.
Role Purpose
As our Engagement Manager working in one of the above-mentioned local authorities, you will work closely with care experienced young people to empower them to have a voice and to support them to identify and review referral pathways within the local authority. You will provide an independent and improvement-orientated framework to self-assess services relating to care experienced people.
The ambition is then to co-design necessary services to fill gaps, providing a supported pathway for care experienced young people on their journey to sustainable fair work. Finally, we hope to support in re-orientating existing structures, services, commissioning frameworks and pathways to enable improvement whilst offering peer support and learning opportunities for all areas under review.
The role involves working closely in collaboration with local services and within local governance and with the Improvement Service to make positive change. This programme is currently operating in three local authorities in Scotland – Clackmannanshire, Scottish Borders and Dumfries and Galloway, so there will be opportunities for shared learning and peer support.
Key Duties & Responsibilities
- Collaborate with local authority to identify the appropriate and relevant departments and services requiring auditing and review
- You will attract, recruit and support care experienced young people to undertake an audit of pathways and services. Undertaking surveys, observations, questionnaires, and focus groups
- You will work closely with these individuals to identify the current processes and procedures within the relevant services and complete a mapping exercise to what the “exiting care” journey looks like for all care experienced young people
- Together with the young people, you will identify the existing interventions and their effectiveness against the improvement plan
- Create networks and conversations which enable local authorities to learn from care experienced individuals and families and develop collaborative learning opportunities
- You will develop evidence-based findings and recommendations and present back to decision makers to take the first steps of changing the lives of care experienced young people
- Recognise the confidential and sensitive nature of personal information relating to children, young people, and families and how this should be communicated, used, published, shared, recorded, and handled appropriately
- Contribute to the wider Volunteering Matters team, always upholding our values
- Establish and maintain effective working relationships and communication lines with colleagues, volunteers, young people, families, partners, and others
- Administration tasks including maintaining up- to- date, effective and accessible records and the use of Microsoft Office and other software packages
Person Specification
Skills
- A strong passion and commitment to volunteering, our organisational values and flexible working strategy
- Excellent communication and facilitation skills with a strong ability to influence and motivate others
- Excellent people skills, including being able to develop professional and effective relationships with a range of stakeholders
- Excellent organisational and time management skills, including the ability to plan effectively
- Self-motivated, ability to work on own initiative, ability to multi-task, an approachable manner, team player and sound judgement skills
- Excellent administration and IT skills, including the use of Office 365 and Microsoft Teams
Experience
- Awareness and understanding of effectively supporting care experienced young people or families
- Experience in identifying and delivering effective change
- Effective teamwork including building effective relationships with internal and external partners
- Experience of group facilitation/ running activities or events to engage children, young people and families
- Volunteer Management
- Child Protection/Adult Protection and Safeguarding process and policies
- Experience of achieving ambitious goals and targets, completing a high standard of work to meet successful outcomes
Qualifications
Relevant experience and values alignment is more important for this role than specific qualifications
Other
The post will be home based however given the nature of this role you will be expected to work within the local community and be available to regularly engage with care experienced young people in a setting they feel most comfortable with.
Internet access to enable remote working is a requirement. IT equipment and infrastructure will be supplied. Post Covid-19 and in accordance with any social distancing guidelines there may be an expectation to travel across Scotland to engage with colleagues, volunteers and beneficiaries.
This role requires membership of the PVG (Protection of Vulnerable Groups) scheme. Having a conviction will not necessarily cause a bar to employment.
Our Values & Ways of Working:
In all that we do, we embrace a philosophy of ‘Freedom within a Framework’ and are guided by our values:
Empowering, Inclusive, Compassionate, Positive & Straightforward.
This job description is intended to include the broad range of responsibilities and requirements of the post.
It is neither exhaustive nor exclusive but while some variations will be expected, these will be at an appropriate level for the role.
Application notes
Closing date: 12pm on the 20th October
CV and Cover letter to be emailed to kim.maxwell@volunteeringmatters.org.uk
Community and Engagement Team Member – Thinking Space
- Full time
- £28,800
- Hybrid: Scotland (hybrid role based between home and the identified partner locations predominately in Central Belt of Scotland)
- Closing 8th January 2026
Passionate about engaging with young people? Experienced in creating a safe environment and allowing young people to talk about what is important to them? This opportunity is for you!
Join the Why Not? Trust team as a Community and Engagement Team Member – Thinking Space. Due to further development, we are now offering a second full-time appointment.
Thinking Space is a unique initiative funded by The Henry Smith Foundation, designed to support care-experienced young people across Scotland. Underpinned by Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CAT) principles, Thinking Space uses mapping techniques to help young people explore their past, understand how previous experiences and relationships influence their present circumstances, and consider the potential impact on their future.
This confidential and safe environment enables participants to develop positive coping strategies and build resilience. Following your induction and initial training, you will work directly with care-experienced young people in specific locations, offering them the opportunity to reflect on how past relationships may have shaped their sense of self, decision-making, and ability to form new connections. You will also support them in exploring learned coping mechanisms and adopting healthier alternatives.
As part of The Why Not? Team, you will have access to ongoing support and professional development opportunities to enhance your practice and impact. This role will be line managed by the Why Not Trust, Operational Lead. A UK driving license is required for this role. A secondment will be explored if requested.
Everyone's behaviour will be led by the principles of The Why Not Trust.
Why Not Principles
These principles are what underpin all we do; they show our values and shape our behaviours. They make it clear to all what they should expect from us and what we expect from them.
#1 Show respect - everyone is worthy of being treated with a high level of respect. Stigma and discrimination are not welcome, and we will strive to eliminate both.
#2 Be Kind – We cannot control other people’s behaviour, but we can control our own. We will treat people with kindness and use curiosity and listening to understand other perspectives.
#3 Be human – we are all human and no matter how well intended we are, we will all make mistakes, we will own these and learn from them. We will help each other learn by being honest with each other.
#4 Promote the positives – we will focus on strengths and support learning in every way we can. We will celebrate success and recognise achievements. We will recognise everyone is doing their best.
#5 Be ambitious – we will strive for success in all we do, recognise the change we want to make and go for it!
#6 Recruit allies – we will work with others to achieve our aims and support others to achieve theirs.
#7 Champion individual growth – we will support the development of individuals, promote opportunities, and develop leadership qualities.
#8 Keep it real – we will do our best to recognise when we or others are feeling challenged and offer support where we can. We will pull together; no-one is too important to help do what needs done. We will strive to avoid jargon and use inclusive language.
#9 Be storytellers – we will share our learning and tell our generic stories or share themes, where it supports learning. We will not share individual ‘case studies’ or require people to tell their story.
#10 Listen to learn – we will listen to people to learn, not to respond. We will allow others processing time and go at their pace.
Online Info Sessions to find out more about us and the role:
Community Worker - Digital Inclusion
- Part time
- £31,012 pro-rata
- On site: Gorbals
- Closing 19th January 2026
Are you passionate about bridging the digital divide in our communities?
If so, then please see details of the role below
At its heart, the main purpose of this role is to address both the cause and impact of digital inequality within the Gorbals by supporting individuals and communities to gain the skills, confidence and access required. This role will help bridge the digital divide by working collaboratively with third sector partners.
Crossroads Youth and Community Association’s work and values are built on the central belief that “everyone had the right to live gloriously: whatever in society prevents this, should be challenged and whatever in the individual helps should be nurtured”
This role will involve working across the community with young people, families and the wider community.
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Outreach Worker and Cycle Trainer
- Full time
- £24,897
- On site: Recyke-a-bike, Causewayhead, Stirling
- Closing 31st January 2026
About Us
Recyke-a-bike (part of Fallin Community Enterprises) has been in operation since 2005. We began as a small recycling social enterprise that quickly grew into a job club, using bike recycling as work experience for our members. Over the years we’ve seen a lot of growth and now offer training services and cycling outreach work, in addition to our bike recycling and sales through our well stocked and modestly priced shop.
Purpose
To support the delivery of the Bikeability programme in partnership with Cycling Scotland and Stirling and Clackmannanshire local authorities. The Outreach Worker and Cycle Trainer will also support the delivery of all cycling-based activities delivered by Recyke-a-bike.
Responsibilities
Main:
- Delivery of Bikeability Training to Children.
- Delivery of Adult Cycle Training.
- Maintenance of bikes and equipment for each of the following fleets: Stirling, Clackmannanshire, EBike, Practical Cycle Awareness Training (PCAT) and Adult Cycle Training Fleets.
- Managing health and safety within area of responsibility.
- Carrying out risk assessments for Bikeability sessions.
- Planning, risk assessing and delivering other cycle related sessions, events and activities.
- External liason with third parties including schools, local councils, community groups and organisations, as well as charities and businesses.
- Attending team meetings.
- Attending continuous professional development (CPD) training.
Additional:
- Building bikes for the shop when not busy.
- Collecting bike donations for the shop.
- Deliver Doctor Bike services across the Forth Valley when required.
- Assisting other departments where needed.
- Any other reasonable duties consistent with working for a small charitable organisation.
Performance and Impact Advisor – Delivering Equally Safe
- Full time
- £28,000 – £34,000
- Remote: Home-based with the expectation of some travel to the Inspiring Scotland office in Edinburgh and across Scotland for team and external stakeholder meetings.
- Closing 26th January 2026
Inspiring Scotland is seeking passionate and proactive Performance and Impact Advisor to join our Delivering Equally Safe fund team. As a trusted partner to funded organisations, you’ll manage a portfolio of organisations to provide tailored support with budgets, delivery plans, objectives, and monitoring impact.
We’re looking for someone with strong analytical, communication, and relationship-building skills, and a passion for social justice and equality. You’ll work within a collaborative team, contributing to the wider Equality, Inclusion and Human Rights team within Inspiring Scotland. We are a collaborative, supportive organisation that places high emphasis on teamwork and sharing best practice and learning, both internally and externally.
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