Job Title: Mental Health Project Officer

Salary: £26,623 pa + £3,000 pa London Weighting

Hours: 37.5 hours per week (some unsociable hours required, flexibility and part-time available for the right candidate)

Contract: 12-month FTC (with possibility of extension)

Based: South London                        

Do you believe in people and want to win meaningful change? Do you care about mental health? Join the South London Citizens team - one of the most diverse and talented organising team in the world - to help drive South London Listens, our innovative community-led mental health project. 

The role will involve training communities to support each other, developing campaigns to improve mental health services, and enabling community organisations to become hubs.

You will have the opportunity to learn the craft of community organising with migrant and refugee communities, schools and young people, families and more, and to break down the systemic barriers causing poor mental health. You will get to work with colleagues who hold  strong values of camaraderie, and a dedication to constant learning and evaluation.    

The role will involve working with UK Minority Ethnic (UKME) communities and we strongly encourage applicants from UKME backgrounds to apply. Read below for further details about Citizens UK and the role.

Citizens UK

Citizens UK is a people power alliance of diverse local communities working together for the common good. Our mission is to develop leaders, strengthen civic organisations and make change. Our 550 member communities are deeply rooted in their local areas and connect every day to the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. Through the method of community organising we enable people experiencing powerlessness to develop their leadership and come together with the power and strategy to make change. 

This leads to hundreds of neighbourhood improvements - from zebra crossings outside primary schools to renovated public toilets in cemeteries. And it leads to some of the biggest campaign impacts in the UK, such as winning over £1.5 billion of wages through the UK Living Wage campaign, securing a legal cap on the cost of credit to control exploitative lending, and ending the detention of children for immigration purposes. We enable local campaigns to grow into large-scale social change projects such as the Living Wage Foundation, Parents and Communities Together (PACT), Sponsor Refugees, and Refugees for Justice, that form an integral part of our theory of change. The most prominent of these is the rapidly growing Living Wage Foundation with a network of nearly 9,000 accredited Living Wage Employers across the UK. 

Purpose

South London Citizens (SLC) is working with the three mental health trusts across South London - SLaM, SWLStG’s and Oxleas [JC1] - organising community leaders to take-action on the systemic causes of mental ill health in their communities.

The Project Officer will be responsible for working with the South London Listens (SLL) core project team of community organisers and leaders in South East London to ensure the pledges made by the mental health trusts, local authorities, and communities themselves in the 2021 South London Listens Summit are prioritised and implemented.  

Supporting the Project Manager, South London Listens, the Project Officer will coordinate and help deliver the training for the Be Well Hubs programme, input into and create engaging communications for South London Listens and deliver on administrative and event coordination tasks. The role will have a geographic emphasis on this work in Lewisham, with the Project Officer supporting the Lewisham Associate Organiser, delivering 5 community Be Well Hubs and supporting the Associate Organiser with South London Listens Lewisham related responsibilities.    

Main Responsibilities

Working as a member of the South London Citizens Team your main responsibilities will include:

Contribute towards the achievement of SLC and the SLL Project strategic objectives

Work together with the South London Listens Project Manager to:

• Coordinate our mental health campaign in South East London 

• Contribute to a good working relationship with South London Listens project managers based at South London and Maudsley NHS Trust 

• Ensure that related project work in South East London, focusing on the borough of Lewisham, contributes to South London Citizens’ wider mental health strategy. 

• Implement Citizens UK’s policies, procedures, and values in own work.

• Supporting project delivery & achieve work targets effectively 

Help to build and grow the South London Listens project ensuring achievement of project targets and overall goals, specifically:  

• Develop and establish 5 Be Well mental health hubs in Lewisham with local leaders from community institutions.

• Support in the coordination and delivery of Be Well Hubs training to meet our overall training targets for South London.

• Report on\track key performance indicators according to the project reporting schedule. 

• Event coordination for SLL’s actions, trainings, and meetings.

• Support the sharing of good practice across all SLC  

Support the Project Manager in developing and implementing South London Listens, specifically:

• Carrying out admin tasks to ensure effective coordination between community organisers working on South London Listens.

• Supporting the Project Manager in the running of internal meetings and internal communications to ensure the South London team are on track to deliver their targets.

Learning and expertise

• Develop a solid understanding of the craft of Community Organising to inform Project Management of a community organising initiative

• Schedule an average of two 1-2-1 relational meetings into your daily schedule as a core part of your professional practice. 

• Take opportunities to learn from the South London Citizens team the craft of community organising, incl. attending local training.

• Keep abreast of new developments within the mental health field

• Apply new learning to work and respond effectively to feedback

• Develop and manage external relationships 

Contribute a good working relationship with SLaM and Oxleas NHS Trusts: 

• Ensure that work in South East London contributes to South London Citizens’ wider mental health strategy.

• Respond effectively to queries or requests from stakeholders, with a particular focus on Lewisham community leaders. 

Communications:

• Communicate and work effectively within the team, ensuring that information and messages are reliable shared.

• Support the Programme Managers in providing regular and appealing, communication materials.

• Represent Citizens UK effectively to external audiences in meetings and at events. 

• Deliver any allocated actions from the comms plan on time and to standard. 

Generate income and resources:

• Contribute to plans and proposals to grow sources of income\ resource.

• Take careful stewardship of the team\Citizens UK’s resources

 Person Specification

 REQUIREMENTS (ESSENTIAL=E, DESIRABLE=D)

QUALIFICATIONS

• Bachelor’s degree in any subject (D)

• Subject of relevance to community work or community organising is desirable (D)

EXPERIENCE

• Previous campaign experience (D)

• Evidence of having acted in a leadership role with peers or in local community activities (e.g. organising clubs or societies) (E)

• Experience of project management; evidence of having delivered work on time and to standard (E)

• Able to demonstrate previous experience of ‘learning by doing’ in a work or project environment; evidence of being open to feedback and comfortably coachable (E)

KEY SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE

• Excellent interpersonal awareness – ability to listen well and appreciate a viewpoint or opinion that is different from one’s own (E)

• Excellent concern for impact – ability to adapt own behaviour to address the needs or concerns of someone else (E)

• Good communication skills – able to speak with conviction and passion; and to make a logical argument (E)

PERSONAL QUALITIES & VALUES

• A self-starter with ability to take initiative and work independently (E)

•  A passion for justice (E) 

• A positive enthusiasm for working with faith congregations, trade unions, schools and other community organisations (E)

• An interest in and experience of politics and public life (E) 

• Able to work in a team (E)

• Willingness to work within accountable relationships (E) 

• Self-motivated and adaptable (E)

 The successful applicant will be required to undertake a satisfactory Enhanced DBS check. DBS checks are renewed on a 3-year cycle.