Vacancies

Schoolreaders is the largest in-school reading support charity in the country, supporting children in every county in England.

Our vision is that every child should learn to read well.

One in four primary school children in England fail to reach the expected standard of reading by the age of 11. This leaves them unable to access their secondary education fully, which will have life-long consequences.

Schoolreaders exists to change this. Schoolreaders recruits, trains, places and supports volunteers to go into local primary schools and provide free, weekly, one-to-one reading support for children, prioritising those who need this extra support the most.

One quarter of all primary schools are registered with us requesting volunteers, and our trained volunteers currently support more than 42,000 children one-to-one every single week. With demand for our support continuing to grow there is much more to do.

Job purpose

This is an exciting new role, critical to our charity’s plans for growth. As Senior Relationship Manager you will develop and deliver engagement strategies that strengthen relationships, enhance supporter journeys and grow sustainable income in support of the charity’s mission to ensure all children, regardless of background, leave primary school being able to read well.

Combining strategic planning with hands-on delivery, you will lead our Individual Giving and emerging Legacy programmes, developing campaigns and stewardship activities that generate sustainable income. You will oversee a programme of fundraising and supporter engagement events ensuring they strengthen relationships, enhance the supporter experience and contribute to income growth.

Person profile

For our charity, the ideal candidate will be:

• A natural relationship-builder.
• A practical fundraiser with proven delivery experience.
• A confident and tenacious communicator, able to engage and inspire supporters through conversations, written communication and you’ll not be afraid to pick up the phone!
• Comfortable working independently without large teams.
• Confident writing engaging supporter-focused copy tailored to different audiences.
• Digitally aware (email marketing, CRM, social media).
• Organised and self-motivated.
• Genuinely motivated by improving young people’s future opportunities.
• Experience in a small or medium-sized charity is an advantage.
• Experience of Legacy marketing.
• Experience of community/events fundraising including supporter-led and stewardship activities.
• Ability to balance strategic oversight with operational support.

Role responsibilities

• Support the Head of Fundraising in developing and delivering short, medium and long-term fundraising plans and budgets, monitoring income and expenditure.
• Champion the growth of long-term sustainable income.
• Analyse donor data to identify trends, opportunities, and areas for growth.
• Produce financial updates and information for the Head of Fundraising as required.
• Lead individual giving activity, including online appeals, with a strong focus on stewardship, embedding a clear strategy for acquisition, retention and lifetime value growth.
• Develop fundraising/stewardship opportunities with our 4,000 volunteer readers.
• Develop and deliver high-quality, creative and effective new fundraising products and initiatives, and drive forward innovation in fundraising.
• Optimise third party and online fundraising channels including annual Big Give campaigns.
• Create, develop and lead the emerging Legacy Giving programme.
• Oversee the effective use of the fundraising CRM (Salesforce), ensuring data integrity, reporting accuracy and GDPR compliance.
• Oversee the planning and delivery of community and challenge events, ensuring excellent supporter stewardship whilst delegating day-to-day operational delivery to the Community and Events Officer.
• Monitor the performance of community and events fundraising activity against agreed income and participation targets, taking action to maximise results and ROI.
• Line manage and support the Community and Events Officer, providing regular supervision and objective setting.
• Ensure all supporter records are kept up-do-date on the database and adhere to all relevant legislative and regulatory obligations relating to fundraising.
• Grow year on year supporter income, in line with agreed budgets.

Person specification

• A practical fundraiser with proven experience in raising income from individual giving.
• Experience in delivering fundraising campaigns that recruit, engage, inspire and retain donors.
• Strong relationship building skills with high emotional intelligence.
• A creative, growth oriented and commercially minded approach.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including crafting compelling impact stories.
• Proficient in using CRM (ideally Salesforce) to input, segment and analyse donor data.
• Line management experience (formal or informal).
• Strong analytical skills and attention to detail.
• Exceptional time management within a dynamic environment.
• Organised and self-motivated.
• Comfortable working independently without large teams.

To find out more about this lovely role please contact us via the form on this page.