People Development - Strategic Lead

Permanent, Full Time 

Benefits: Private medical insurance, staff Electric vehicle scheme and generous pension, life assurance and annual leave entitlement Full time 35 hours per week  

Closing date for applications: 9 July 2023 

First interview: 27 July 2023  

Second Interview: 3 August 2023 

If you are a brilliant Learning and development professional looking for a new and exciting challenge with the opportunity to work for one of the UK’s best loved charities, then this could be the perfect role for you! 

You will be supporting a strategy group and working with strategic people across the Wildlife Trust federation to ensure we invest in a high-skilled and diverse staff and volunteer network, you will be part of our strategic transformation to build a federation wide learning culture.  

This is your chance to be a core part of driving our ambition to unlock the potential of our people through leading learning and development, cultural and HR best practice at RSWT and across the Wildlife Trust federation. We know The Wildlife Trusts is a great place to work and volunteer and with your help we can further embed this view across the sector. 

You’ll work alongside the wider Wildlife Trust People Team to deliver innovative learning and talent solutions, building an environment where our people can continuously develop to be their best. Creating a HR, Learning and Development strategy will be a key focus along with evaluating the effectiveness of current training initiatives and assessing the potential for apprenticeships and other training opportunities across the movement. 

Who we are 

We are a grassroots movement of 46 independent Wildlife Trusts, supported by a central charity, The Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts. We have more than 900,000 members, 35,000 volunteers and 3,500 staff across the UK. We are at an exciting moment in our 110-year history, with an ambitious new strategy setting out a vision of nature in recovery, with abundant, diverse wildlife and natural processes creating wilder landscapes where people and nature thrive. 

The next 10 years will be critical in determining what kind of world we will all live in. We need to urgently reverse the loss of wildlife and put nature into recovery at scale if we are to prevent climate and ecological disaster. This will require big, bold changes in the way we think and operate, and the development of a strong, collaborative culture. It will require an increase in collaboration and working together, underpinned by strong systems and data. 

The Wildlife Trusts are on a mission to bring about a people-powered nature and climate recovery by empowering people to take meaningful action for nature, and to create an inclusive society where nature matters to everyone, everywhere. We are ambitious in our desire not just to slow, but to reverse the declines in nature. Together we have developed a bold, new collective strategy which outlines our vision and the actions we will take to restore nature over the next eight years. 

About you 

We are seeking a passionate Strategic Learning and Development professional to join us, you will have a proven track record of taking a lead in driving forward organisational change around learning and development in a complex organisation. Your role will be to evolve and deliver our learning and development strategy and you will have experience of sourcing Leadership Development programmes. Excellent communication, negotiation and interpersonal skills are essential, with the ability to work collaboratively with cross-functional teams. You will be a natural influencer and you will be highly personable and able to build effective stakeholder relationships, internally and externally, at all levels. 

You will support, lead and facilitate a number of working groups across The Wildlife Trusts to harmonise terms and conditions and produce a suite of resources including volunteering best practice and a wellbeing framework. 

You will enjoy working in a fast-paced environment, be organised and resourceful and be able to think strategically as well as having a great attention to detail. You will have a clear passion for our cause and have excellent listening, collaboration and facilitation skills to help bring everyone together to ensure that we deliver to the highest standards and achieve the best outcomes for nature. 

To excel in this role, you should be highly motivated and detail-oriented you will develop and execute learning strategies, design and deliver training programs, assess development needs, and track learning effectiveness. You will have current knowledge of learning and development methods and you will need to collaborate with employees and managers to support career development and manage budgets. 

A proven commitment to and understanding of the not-for-profit sector would be desirable but is not essential. 

This is a new and ambitious role which will evolve following your appointment so you should be excited by the flexibility and opportunities to take an innovative approach. 

The Wildlife Trusts value passion, respect, trust, integrity, pragmatic activism and strength in diversity. Whilst we are passionate in promoting our aims, we are not judgemental and are inclusive. We particularly encourage applications from people who are underrepresented within our sector, including people from minority backgrounds and people with disabilities. We are committed to creating a movement that recognises and truly values individual differences and identities. 

RSWT take our Safeguarding responsibilities extremely seriously. Please click here to read our commitment statement 

As a Disability Confident employer, we are committed to offering an interview to anyone with a disability that meets all the essential criteria for the post. Please let us know if you require any adjustments to make our recruitment process more accessible. 

This role maybe subject to a DBS check