Strategic Partnerships Manager

Reports to: Head of Partnerships

Location: West London – currently operating an agile working policy with one core day (Weds) in the office, moving to two days in the office in 2024. Other days can be worked from home or in the office. Some national travel will be required.

Contract: Permanent

Pattern: Full Time (standard hours 9am – 5.30pm)

Closing date: 29/09/2023 at 10am

Interviews: w/c 02/10/2023

Salary: £35,000 to £40,000 (depending on experience)

About the role:

The focus of the Strategic Partnerships Manager role is to drive new school partnership subscriptions and to provide account management to key Academy Trust partners. Working within the Partnerships Team, you will be responsible for ensuring a positive overall experience for schools throughout the recruitment and onboarding stages of the programmes. 

You will be joining an ambitious team, offering opportunities to develop and learn, and to shape the ways we expand our reach and impact to even more schools in a phase of sustained growth for the organisation.

You should be able to demonstrate experience of driving new sales relationships and building long-term partnership opportunities, ideally within the Education sector. Or, you have other experience in the English education sector, having worked as a teacher or subject leader.

We are looking for a driven individual who thrives at problem solving, and is passionate about our mission to make a positive impact in education. If you have the skills needed to succeed in this role, and the desire to make a difference to education in the UK, we look forward to hearing from you!

Key Responsibilities:

• Monitoring and reporting on pipeline progress via our Customer Relationship Management platform (Salesforce)
• Prospecting new, high value sales opportunities and dealing with inbound leads and sales queries from schools
• Working closely with the marketing team to develop tactical campaigns to grow the number of partnerships with new and existing customers
• Hosting termly information webinars and using these opportunities to win new partnerships
• Developing a sound understanding of the wider education sector in the context of curriculum leadership and using this knowledge to enhance sales consultation
• Liaising with the school delivery teams to ensure smooth handover and customer experience once a customer has joined the programme(s)
• Growing and maintaining relationships across an area of England, and recruiting schools and Multi Academy Trusts to our programmes from these areas
• Retaining our current partner schools
• Gathering relevant and useful feedback from partners to build our impact and case study portfolio and growth the value of our strategic partnerships
• Using market insights to continuously improve the experience of partner schools joining for the first time, throughout their onboarding, and renewal processes
• Leading and contributing to cross-team projects that focus on the school experience of joining and renewing our programme

Key Requirements:

• Experience of devising and implementing customer-focused solutions
• Adept at maintaining and developing prospect databases and sales pipelines, reporting on critical success factors
• Understanding of project management disciplines and governance
• Ability to use and analyse data to drive performance
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Experience of using CRM software
• Good IT skills, with specific skill in using Microsoft office applications and other cloud-based systems (e.g.: Google Drives, Zoom, Calendly, Teams, Office365, etc)
• Motivated to continually improve standards and achieve excellence
• Collaborative working style and strong team player

View the full job description and person specification here

About Ark Curriculum Plus

Our mission is to empower teachers to give every young person, regardless of their background, the subject knowledge and skills that will allow them to succeed. We believe that great curriculum design and delivery leads to improved teaching and learner outcomes, which impacts positively on children’s life chances.

Our commitment is to empower and equip schools to provide high quality subject teaching, through curriculum and integrated professional development, to develop young people’s subject mastery.

We are grown out of one of the highest performing Multi Academy Trust’s in the UK. Our connection with Ark gives us our experience and our specialist expertise earned while we developed and taught curriculum across our own network of 39 successful academies in the UK.

Our programmes are now used by over 800 schools in the UK, including the 39 schools in the Ark network, and last year, we received Department for Education funding for our Mathematics Mastery Primary and English Mastery Secondary programmes.

Having pioneered the mastery approach in the UK, we also influenced the adoption by the DfE of a mastery approach to teaching mathematics. It has been proven through independent impact trials that learners on our programmes make additional months’ progress.

Benefits

• 27 days annual leave plus bank holidays, rising with each year of service up to 30 days after 3-years’ service. This entitlement is pro rata for part time employees. This entitlement excludes bank holidays
• Full office closure between Christmas and New Year
• Hybrid working, with currently one day a week in our state-of-the-art office in West London working alongside colleagues
• Regular social events, monthly free breakfast, and daily fruit
• A flexible approach to working with understanding and consideration for work life balance and personal commitments
• As an Ark employee, you will have the opportunity to be part of the TPT (The Pension Trust) scheme, our workplace pension scheme where we make an 11% contribution; you are not required to contribute towards this scheme unless you choose to
• Access to high-quality professional learning throughout your career, offering both face-to-face sessions and a bespoke online learning platform
• Access to Ark Rewards scheme offering savings from over 3,000 major retailers, interest-free loans available for season tickets or a bike, gym discounts offering up to 40% off your local gym and free eye tests

How to Apply:

Apply with a CV and cover letter on our online recruitment portal. Applications to be submitted by Friday 29^th September 2023 at 10am but please note: we will be reviewing applications on an on-going basis and this advert may close earlier than advertised depending on the level of response.

This ATS application form should take no longer 20 minutes to complete. At any time, you can pause, save, and log back in. If you have any difficulty with meeting the deadline for application, please contact recruitment@arkonline.org

Interviews will be arranged as suitable candidates are identified, so early application is strongly advised.

Ark is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people in its academies. In order to meet this responsibility, its academies follow a rigorous selection process to discourage and screen out unsuitable applicants.  

Ark requires all employees to undertake an enhanced DBS check. You are required, before appointment, to disclose any unspent conviction, cautions, reprimands or warnings under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975. Non-disclosure may lead to termination of employment. However, disclosure of a criminal background will not necessarily debar you from employment - this will depend upon the nature of the offence(s) and when they occurred. To read more about Ark’s safer recruitment process, please click this link. 

We aim to build a diverse and inclusive organisation where everyone – staff and students – can do their best work and achieve their full potential. We want to reflect and represent diverse perspectives across our organisation because we know that doing so will make us stronger and more effective. To know more about Ark’s diversity and inclusion commitments, please click on this link.