Job description
The Cares Family is an anti-racist, anti-discriminatory organisation. We particularly welcome applications from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic people, people with disabilities and people from lower income and diverse educational backgrounds who may be under-represented in our organisation.
● Salary: £28,000 per year
● Role type: permanent, full time (37.5 hours per week)
● Reporting to: Head of Programmes
● Location: east London (office based in Bethnal Green), with some remote working
● Application deadline: Thursday 29th September 2022 at 11.59pm
● Interview dates: Thursday 13th October
About this role
East London Cares is the youngest of The Cares Family charities and after launching in October 2019, had only six months of face-to-face programmes before the pandemic and lockdown restrictions hit. Nonetheless, East London Cares has connected over 1,000 older and younger neighbours in Hackney and Tower Hamlets, through our core programmes. We’re
excited to now be looking for a new Outreach and Engagement Coordinator to join our dynamic team.
Our unique proactive outreach identifies people most at risk of loneliness in our communities and invites and inspires them to get involved. Young people are recruited through social, digital and employment networks and by the power of sharing positive stories online, while older people are engaged through door-knocking, referrals from community partners and through face-to-face interactions in locations like supermarkets, community centres and GP surgeries. During Covid-19, our outreach has prioritised referrals to and from our many community partners.
In this role, you will work closely with our dedicated team to develop, deepen and expand our outreach and the engagement of our community of east London neighbours. You will meet hundreds of older and younger people, helping to create friendships across the generations, tackling isolation and loneliness amongst both groups, and ensuring our safeguarding, records, and storytelling procedures are upheld to the highest standards.
Key responsibilities
The list below is not exhaustive of all the functions of the Outreach and Engagement Coordinator, but it describes much of what the role is accountable for:
● Leading, planning and delivering East London Cares’ proactive outreach in the community, to introduce new older and younger neighbours to the community and our programmes.
● Overseeing the sign-up process for new younger and older neighbours, leading monthly inductions, and welcoming new referrals.
● Leading retention and re-engagement efforts to ensure neighbours who aren’t regularly attending activities can do so.
● Communicating regularly with our older and younger neighbours, on the telephone, in writing and in person, including home visits and meetings in the community.
● Building and maintaining effective community partnerships in Hackney and Tower Hamlets.
● Establishing strong referral pathways to meet new neighbours, and to introduce neighbours to further local support.
● Presenting on East London Cares’ purpose and core activities to existing and potential partners in the community.
● Creating engaging, powerful communications, including digital and printed material and content, such as blogs, social media posts and flyers.
● Managing the creation and distribution of our monthly email communications with older and younger neighbours.
● Creating weekly social media content that shares the stories of our neighbours and boroughs, and increases exposure to and interest in the charity.
● Leading on our ‘digital divide’ work, which includes matching older and younger neighbours up for tech support and advice.
● Supporting older neighbours with ad hoc tasks to enhance their wellbeing and prevent further isolation. This includes signposting and making referrals to external partners.
● Leading on Outreach-specific specific monitoring and evaluation.
● Keeping our database accurate, up-to-date, and in line with our GDPR processes.
● Supporting the East London Cares and wider Cares Family teams to meet our organisational objectives.
In return we will offer you:
● £28,000 annual starting salary, with a salary band of £28,000-£35,000 offering room for growth.
● 26 days’ annual leave (22 days’ regular leave, plus a day for your birthday and three days between December 25 th and January 1 st when The Cares Family is closed).
● Pension (3% employer contribution through the government’s NEST scheme).
● A staff welfare programme including access to counselling and a cycle to work scheme.
About you
All of the above requires a broad set of skills, and to succeed in this role, you will be:
● Passionate about our mission, philosophy, values and programmes.
● Personally warm, with the confidence to introduce yourself and build conversation with a wide variety of people.
● Patient and persistent, able to use a person-centred approach to encourage neighbours to get involved.
● Approachable, resilient and discreet, with the ability to build trusting relationships while maintaining firm boundaries.
● Proactive in seeking new potential partnerships, neighbours and opportunities within the community.
● Someone who is solutions focussed and able to make informed decisions to best support our neighbours.
● Intentional about genuine inclusion, connected with (and motivated by) east London’s diverse community and helping our neighbours to feel welcomed, valued and visible.
● A confident communicator, both in-person and in-writing, who understands the importance of storytelling in various forms (for example, through social media and blogging) to achieve our mission.
● Adaptable and enthusiastic about working in a fast-growing, fast-moving organisation, and someone who can work confidently both within a team and independently.
● Organised and thorough, with the ability to manage several projects at once.
While the following are not essential, we’re very keen to hear if you:
● Have a good understanding of Hackney and Tower Hamlets, including the culture and socio-economic challenges both boroughs face.
● Speak an additional language or languages.
● Have experience in creating vibrant promotional materials, using Canva or other design apps.
How to apply
This is a task-based application process, so we are not asking applicants for CVs. To apply, please read the tasks attached carefully, and submit your application by 11.59pm on Thursday 29th September 2022. If you have any problems uploading your application, please contact hr@thecaresfamily.org.uk.
TASK 1:
Introducing yourself Please tell us about yourself and why you are interested in this job and East London Cares. Please note that we’d like to learn about you through this task, not just your work history – there will be space to share your experience in the second task. You can submit this as either a video or audio recording no longer than three minutes or a short statement of no more than 500 words, in a Word or PDF document.
Please name your file: [YOURNAME]Task1.
NB if your video or audio file is too large for our application system, please email it directly to roxanne.rustem@thecaresfamily.org.uk after completing your application.
TASK 2:
Understanding the role Looking at each bullet point under the About You section above, please share examples of the skills and experience you have that make you right for this role. Submit your answer in a Word or PDF document no longer than 500 words. Please name your file: [YOURNAME]Task2.
If you’re interested in this role, but you’d like to find out more before submitting an application please email roxanne.rustem@thecaresfamily.org.uk– we’d be happy to answer any questions. Please contact hr@thecaresfamily.org.uk if there is any aspect of the application process that is not appropriate to your requirements, and we will try to accommodate your needs. All appointments at East London Cares and The Cares Family are subject to references, DBS checks, and proof of right to work in the UK.
About Organisation
About The Cares Family
The Cares Family’s mission is to help people find connection in a disconnected age. Our objectives are to reduce loneliness and isolation; improve people’s connection, belonging, purpose and power in a rapidly changing world; and bring people together to reduce social, generational, digital, cultural and attitudinal divides.
Over the last decade our model has grown from a tiny idea in a single place into a national leader. Combined, North London Cares (founded 2011), South London Cares (2014), Manchester Cares (2017), Liverpool Cares (2018) and East London Cares (2019), have connected some 26,000 older and younger neighbours to share over 1 million interactions and 250,000 hours.
Those relationships have had a dramatic impact. 98% of young people involved say they have a stronger connection to the community and 98% say they are able to contribute in new ways. 73% of older people involved say their isolation is reduced; 86% are better able to appreciate the changing world; 77% say their relations with young people have improved. Neighbours report feeling a deeper sense of belonging, and ‘part of something bigger’ than their own lives.
But as the pandemic has shown, loneliness is not just a personal crisis; it’s also a broader public health crisis and a national political crisis too. It affects millions of people – from people working from home or cooped up in university halls, to new parents; middle aged men to digitally savvy teenagers and many other marginalised groups.
This matters deeply, because loneliness causes depression, anxiety, strokes and heart attacks. In a world in which people are increasingly withdrawing from one another and spending less time with people who are not ‘like them’ it is also contributing to wider inequity, stereotyping, polarisation and othering – and the national narratives that perpetuate those separations.
The Cares Family has been improving individual lives and community togetherness for 10 years, and more recently we’ve been growing our work to challenge systemic and cultural norms – through new projects, storytelling and campaigns that are rapidly increasing the profile of our work to help make more lasting change.
In 2018, the then Prime Minister launched the world’s first ever government level loneliness strategy at a Cares Family social club. The same year, our CEO was appointed one of 20 inaugural Obama Fellows, bringing global attention to the issues of loneliness and disconnection and the work we are doing at The Cares Family to reduce them. We have received coverage in The Economist, The Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph and on BBC1’s News at Ten, Channel 4 News and Sky News.
Since the arrival of the pandemic, loneliness and disconnection are better understood than ever and empathy for people experiencing them has increased. The Cares Family therefore has an opportunity to make an even bigger difference in the years ahead. Our current strategy to achieve that is threefold:
● Go deeper with our existing local intergenerational communities to make the biggest
difference we can in people’s lives.
● Spur a national ripple effect across the UK by sharing what we have learned to help
others to develop initiatives connecting their own communities in their own ways, and to
help influence broader systemic, cultural and public behaviour change.
● Consolidate our operations to ensure we make the biggest impact possible.