MENTORING COORDINATOR – PART TIME

Mentoring Coordinator Job Description
Job Title: Mentoring Coordinator
Reporting To: Chief Executive, Positive Changes (Scotland) CIC
Location: Office 10, Commerical Centre, STEP, Stirling, FK7 7RP with some home working possible.
Rate of pay: £22,500 FTE
Hours: Part time – 14 hours per week. This is a fixed term contract ending March 2024 (contract extended subject to additional funding).
The Organisation Positive Changes (Scotland) CIC is an organisation which supports women who have touched the Scottish criminal justice system towards sustainable, paid employment by making and selling exquisite chocolates. One hundred percent of our profits are reinvested to support our work and fifty per cent of our workforce is made up of women who have previously accessed our services. Women can engage with our services: on regular production days; as a participant in our Making Positive Changes programme and/or as part of our mentoring programme.
By engaging with us the women have the opportunity to gain work experience, write a Personal Development Plan, improve their CV and gain workplace skills which will help lower barriers they face when looking for fulfilling employment. Each woman is encouraged to develop their own Personal Development Plan to help her set goals and aims which is her pathway towards a permanent job. The women are involved in all aspects of the making and selling the chocolates and our customers include: individuals for gifts and treats; weddings; corporate organisations for serving and giving as gifts to their clients; restaurants and event companies; and other Public Sector organisations for gifts and serving to their guests.
This post is a fixed-term contract until March 2024 and the intention is the post will be extended, subject to funding.
The Role
The role involves the coordination of the Mentoring programme from all aspects. It was developed from a pilot in 2021 and launched in Spring 2022. The programme supports and encourages women with convictions on their journey to desistence by providing a holistic, wrap around service and providing a fulfilling volunteering experience for volunteer mentors. We want to increase our pool of volunteer mentors to include more people with convictions and attract skilled volunteers who have existing gifts and skills to share which they are keen to develop and grow. We have existing relationships with referral agencies and your role will include strengthening these relationships and providing greater access to volunteers facing barriers to volunteering.
What is RISE mentoring programme?
Volunteer mentors are positive role models who support their mentee to work towards set goals. These goals will support future independence and might involve practical tasks such as learning to get to grips with technology and the moving trends, embed back into society and life, or other mentors will offer career advice, gaining employment, help to build social networks or support educational goals. The women we work with will have different journeys and the mentor’s goal is to individualise their personal goals and define and action plan towards these. Mentoring is known to help the person being mentored to grow in confidence, self-awareness, build better communication skills and learn to
self-reflect through exposure to new and different perspectives. Each woman is paired with a highly trained mentor who supports and encourages her to identify her goals and ambitions in order that she may maximise her potential, develop life skills and become the person she wants to be. In October 2022, the mentoring programme was awarded the Quality Award by the Scottish Mentoring Network.
Duties and Responsibilities
• Advertise, recruit and train volunteer mentors in their role
• Build relationships with potential mentee referrers
• Build relationships with organisations who may wish to put forward a mentor
• Adhere to processes and procedures in accordance with the Scottish Mentoring Network Quality Award standard.
• Evidence the effectiveness of the mentoring programme demonstrating our social impact
• Hold regular 1-2-1 support and supervision sessions with Mentor’s
• Liaise with other partnership organisations to provide the best outcomes for the Mentee’s
• Follow the company safeguarding policies and procedures at all times
• Work with the Service Delivery and Development Worker on cross referrals
• Attend events/fayres to promote the mentoring service where appropriate
• Report monthly to the Board of Directors on progress
• Report quarterly to Impact Funding Partners on progress
Skills and Experience Required:
Essential
Desirable
• Excellent project management skills
• Well organised with great attention to detail
• Able to build relationships with all members of the community
• Excellent IT skills including: Word and Excel, social media and other internet platforms
• Willing to complete Mentoring Coordinator training with Scottish Mentoring Network
• Experience of coordinating a volunteer programme
• Existing relationships with potential referrers
• Awareness of the Scottish Criminal Justice system
Our Team
As a social enterprise we have the chocolate production team in addition to a team of staff and volunteers who help and support women who have touched the criminal justice system. Each team member has clearly defined roles, responsibilities and duties to undertake within and across the organisation. Their collective talent, skills and strengths means that we deliver high-quality products and services to our customers and clients.
We place great value and importance on positive relationships, on our ability to communicate effectively and on our abilities, systems, processes and partnership working to support us in our work. Our aim to set high standards of practice in everything we do.
We are a small, but growing, team who work well together with the primary aim to support the women. Your contribution will be as a valuable member and enhancement of that team. We encourage positive learning using self-reflection to problem solve and learn from our mistakes. As a result, we have a harmonious working environment and it’s a pleasure to come to each day.
The kind of person we are looking for:
• Is passionate about our ethos, goals and aims of the organisation
• Highly organised with great attention to detail
• Is willing to work as a member of the team
• Is willing to pitch in, has a “can do” attitude and to go the extra mile
• Is willing to adapt to our positive learning work ethos
• Has a certain degree of flexibility around working days
• Is reliable with integrity and passion
Application process:
The closing date for applications is 5pm on Wednesday 15th December 2021. If you are interested in applying for this role, please send a copy of your CV and a covering letter detailing suitability for the role to joyce@gracechocolates.co.uk. Please state any preferred hours/days of working and include in your letter what unique attributes you can bring to this role and why you think you are the right person for it.
We encourage applications from all sectors of the community regardless of age, race, religion, sexual orientation as we are an Equal Opportunities employer. All applications will be acknowledged and feedback provided. Successful written applicants will be invited to interview after which the successful candidate will be advised and the role offered.