Help shape the future of Edinburgh’s greenspaces

What would Edinburgh and the Lothians look like if everyone could access quality greenspaces that support their health and wellbeing?

That’s the ambition behind the work of Edinburgh & Lothians Greenspace Trust (ELGT).

For more than 30 years, we’ve been working with communities and partners to create and improve greenspaces across the region – delivering practical projects that benefit people and nature, support biodiversity and climate resilience, and help people connect with their local environment.

We’re now looking for up to five new Non-Executive Directors to join our Board and help shape the next chapter of ELGT.

Bring your experience. Make a difference.

We’re looking for people who can bring experience, insight and constructive challenge to our Board, and who share our commitment to the role greenspaces can play in creating healthier, more connected communities and a better environment.

We’re particularly interested in people with experience in

1. Finance & Financial Sustainability

Financial management, accounting, audit, governance, risk and financial sustainability.

2. Strategic Fundraising & Income Generation

Fundraising strategy, securing investment and developing sustainable income.

3. Biodiversity, Woodland & Nature

Biodiversity, woodland management, nature restoration and environmental policy

4. Organisational Change & People

Understanding how organisational strategy, change and workforce decisions affect people, organisational capability and long-term sustainability.

These are our current priority areas, but they aren’t the only things we value. If you bring different experience, perspectives or skills and share our commitment to ELGT’s vision, we’d love to hear from you.

You don’t need previous Board experience. We’ll provide a full induction and support you to contribute effectively as a Director and Trustee.

The role is unpaid, with reasonable expenses reimbursed, and involves around half a day a month on average including four Board meetings a year, the AGM and some additional supporting activity.

We are looking for an experienced and motivated Project & Partnership Manager to lead the delivery of an innovative programme supporting vulnerable households affected by the Radio Teleswitch Service (RTS) switch-off.

Working with a wide range of internal and external stakeholders you will oversee the end-to-end customer journey, ensuring vulnerable householders receive the practical support they need to overcome the barriers to having their meter upgraded while remaining connected to their energy supply. As the Project Manager you will be responsible for mobilising and delivering the project from start to finish ensuring it is delivered on time and within budget.

This role sits within Changeworks Retrofit Delivery team, and you will be working alongside specialists with a proven track record in delivering large-scale retrofit programmes. A skilled project team will be on hand to provide technical expertise, operational support and guidance throughout the project lifecycle.

To deliver this project, we are looking for someone with strong project and partnership management skills and a proven ability to bring people together to deliver successful outcomes. You will be collaborative and solutions-focussed with an ability to manage competing priorities to ensure the vulnerable people supported by this project have a positive experience.

The role is offered on a fixed term basis, for a period of 2 years.

About us

Changeworks is a great place to work. We hold Investors in People Platinum accreditation (something only a few organisations in Scotland have), and our staff overwhelmingly would recommend us as an employer too.

The Climate Emergency has resulted in ambitious national targets to reduce carbon emissions from the built environment and reduce rates of fuel poverty. This has driven a significant increase in the number of pilot and large-scale interventions delivered by Changeworks and external organisations in this area. These include area-based domestic energy efficiency retrofit and decarbonisation projects and programmes.

We are a growing organisation, and this role is crucial to the delivery of our ambitious objectives. We want to decarbonise homes in Scotland on a massive scale, and that needs talented individuals like you to help us deliver on our objectives. You’ll receive full training plus coaching and mentoring.

We offer a wide range of staff benefits including flexible working, bike to work scheme, an excellent pension scheme and 26 days paid holiday plus 9 public holidays per year.

At Changeworks, we welcome and encourage applications from everyone.

Are you passionate about empowering communities who are most affected by the climate crisis but whose voices are least often heard to take action? We support communities most affected by air pollution, increasing temperatures in the Global South and the transition away from fossil fuels to ask for systems change through community organising techniques. Do you understand the theory of Community Organising and have you had experience of educating, skilling up and supporting communities to campaign for change? If so we’d love to hear from you!

We are particularly keen to hear from people who experience marginalisation and minoritisation or who are often excluded from decision-making processes. For example, people of colour; people from working-class backgrounds; people from LGBTQ and migrant communities; care-experienced young people and people with disabilities.

Background

Parents for Future Scotland is a grassroots group of parents seeking to make climate action the norm among all parents in Scotland. We are in the midst of a big step change, increasing our influence and reach across the country, and we need you to help us in doing that. This post is based in Glasgow and will operate mainly in Glasgow and Edinburgh. It is open to anyone who can commute.

We run programmes in schools and in partnership with other charities to reach communities who are most affected by climate change and to support them to take local action. This work is delivered by our programme team. This role will build on the programme work taking place by joining people up, on-boarding them into our movement and skilling them up to mobilise and campaign. Through this process we hope to create local groups within our movement who are skilled and able to take action on climate change to realise our vision of a climate-safe future for every child and our goal of a just transition away from fossil fuels in Scotland.

We operate in Aberdeen, Glasgow and Edinburgh. We have a Community Organiser in Aberdeen, therefore this role will support the growth of volunteers and movement members in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

It will require availability at weekends and in evenings.

The role:

Develop existing movement members to become an inter-connected, powerful movement of skilled individuals supporting each other

• Refine the on-boarding process and look at the viability of it becoming volunteer-run and/or having a buddy system for new members.
• Create materials on how movement members gather other families in their locale in order to create a local group and pilot this.
• Support the Parents For Future Scotland team to utilise volunteers within their roles in order to improve capacity and increase buy-in within the movement.
• Posting on our WhatsApp channel regularly to our members to create discussion about current events relating to climate or intersectional topics which provoke discussion around members’ thoughts/feelings which may lead to people taking action and create an atmosphere of community.
• Host at least 2 events in the year which support members to meet in-person and get to know each other. Look at whether these events could be organised more regularly through volunteers.
• Post regularly on socials and implement a newsletter for members.
• Keep our membership database up-to-date in line with GDPR alongside the Admin Manager.
• Alongside the Fundraiser, Programme Manager and CEO, feed into the implementation of a new CRM system which will track movement members’ journeys.

Broadening participation within the movement space, centering the voices of those least often heard

• Work closely with our Programme Manager to center the voices of Global Majority communities within the movement.
• Working with the Air Pollution team in Glasgow to set up community events in 5 communities where we have been successful in establishing bike and walking buses. Events will invite participants in these schemes, plus the surrounding community, to identify what concerns them regarding climate and support them to create a group to take action.
• Building the skills/capacity of groups formed; supporting power mapping, delivering training to skill-up key community members to take effective action and build and grow power.
• Maintaining fantastic relationships with groups and keeping them informed of PfFS’ actions / asking for support from them at key times.
• Deliver our workshop training to new self-employed staff team members

Developing and implementing our new campaign on retrofit and community energy

• Implement an action plan for our new campaign which will work effectively with partners, mobilise our movement and challenge decision makers.
• Work with the Programme Manager and the rest of the team to ensure that our campaign messaging/actions are being publicised within our Air Pollution and Climate Voices programmes.

Essential experience

• You will have had a substantial career building communities’ capacities and centering voices of those least often heard
• You will have a good understanding on the intersectionality of the systems that perpetuate climate change and an understanding of the changes needed to tackle this
• You will have a proven track record of creating trusting relationships that result in transformational and change
• You will have had experience of identifying skills-gaps and creating training which bridges these gaps which effectively inspire the confidence and abilities of trainees.
• You will have proven experience of creating strategy and tactics which add value to the organisations in which you have worked.
• It would be desirable if you have worked in an organisation which campaigns.
• It would be desirable if you have a qualification in or have received training in community organising techniques.

Essential personal attributes

• Passion, drive and enthusiasm in our ability to tackle the climate crisis through system change and an understanding of what this might require.
• Excellent collaborative skills and good emotional intelligence. You will be required to work collaboratively across the team, therefore insight into how teams work, their pressures and how to get the best out of everyone is essential. You will also need to build trusting, motivating and inspiring relationships with movement members and have excellent collaboration with partners.
• Flexibility to work in a changing landscape in a small charity.
• Strategy - to bring ideas and creativity and to understand how these fit within the wider strategic goals of PfFS
• An ability to take instruction and to work independently/take self-responsibility

What we offer

• 3 days per week for 46 weeks at £200 per day at £27,600 for the year. We are hoping to move to a staffing model within two years, therefore the likelihood of extension for the successful candidate is very high.
• We offer a flexible working environment
• Working from home (we are in the process of finding an office in the next few months. Due to the role working so closely with colleagues we would recommend that this role spend time at the Glasgow office once established)
• We are a fledgling organisation so your skills/expertise will help shape our direction
• You will work closely with the CEO, who will support you throughout
• The role will entail travelling across the Central Belt. The bulk of work will take place in Glasgow therefore being able to travel to Glasgow regularly is essential.

Help Build the Next Act at The Fort Theatre

Have you ever wanted to help run your own theatre?

Theatre gives people somewhere to escape, to laugh, to be moved, and sometimes to explore things that are difficult to talk about anywhere else. We think communities should have places where that can happen.

At the Antonine Theatre Group (ATG), we have one of those places: The Fort Theatre in Bishopbriggs, just one stop from Glasgow Queen Street by train.

We're an amateur theatre company run entirely by volunteers, with something relatively unusual: our own theatre. We produce several shows each year, while also looking after and developing the venue that makes them possible.

This year, our programme has included Bull by Mike Bartlett, Chatroom by Enda Walsh, God of Carnage by Yasmina Reza and 2:22: A Ghost Story by Danny Robins, alongside our annual Christmas pantomime, Hansel & Gretel. So, as you might gather, we're not afraid of a bit of variety.

We're now looking for new volunteer trustees who can bring professional or creative expertise to ATG and help us shape what The Fort becomes next.

Who we're looking for

First, an important point: we're not looking for one miraculous person who can do all the things below. We're looking for several people, each bringing skills or experience in any one of these areas. If you recognise yourself in one of them, we'd like to hear from you.

• Finance and accountancy- You might be an accountant, finance professional or someone with experience of budgets, financial reporting, financial controls and longer-term financial planning. If a reconciled spreadsheet gives you quiet satisfaction, you'll fit right in.
• Fundraising and income development - You might have experience of fundraising strategy, grant applications, trusts and foundations, corporate partnerships or developing new sources of charitable and earned income.
• Governance and organisational development - You might have experience as a company or board secretary, in charity governance, developing policies and procedures, or establishing a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (SCIO). We're seeking to become a SCIO, and we're particularly interested in someone who can help us strengthen our governance and support that transition as ATG develops.
• Theatre and the creative industries - You might bring dramaturgical or other professional creative experience, a strong understanding of stagecraft and theatre-making, or established networks across theatre and the wider creative industries in Scotland. We're looking for someone who can bring a wider creative perspective into the room and help us think ambitiously about the work we put on our stage.
• Theatre technology - We're interested in people with a strong understanding of modern theatre technology who'd be excited by the opportunity to help modernise a working community theatre. You might already work professionally in the sector, be studying technical theatre or theatre production, or have developed practical experience in lighting, sound or video elsewhere.

What being a trustee involves

This isn't a trustee role where you turn up six times a year, read the papers, say something sensible about risk and disappear again.

ATG has no paid staff, so our trustees are hands-on. You'll help shape the organisation's direction and use your particular expertise to help make things happen.

The Management Committee meets around six times a year, and we'd normally ask trustees to be able to contribute around two hours a week outside those meetings.

You'll be helping to run a charity with its own theatre, an active programme of productions, finances, licences, members and volunteers. There are real responsibilities involved, but also a genuine opportunity to influence what a small cultural organisation and its theatre become over the coming years.

A board role, but also a creative community.

This is perhaps the unusual bit.

You won't just be joining a board. You'll be joining a theatre company and a creative community.

If you want to, you can audition for a play, direct a production, work backstage, design lighting or sound, build a set, help choose future productions, or learn something you've never tried before. You'll meet people who share an interest in theatre and, we hope, make some friends along the way.

No previous performing experience is required.

None of that is compulsory. If you'd prefer to contribute your expertise as a trustee and watch the shows from the audience, that's absolutely fine.

But we think there's something fairly special about being able to serve on the board of a theatre on Thursday and find yourself rehearsing on its stage on Monday.

You don't need previous trustee experience, and you don't need a background in amateur theatre.

What we're looking for is relevant skills or experience in at least one of the five areas above, sound judgement, and an interest in helping a volunteer-run theatre thrive.