Events Senior Associate

Events Senior Associate

• Application Deadline: 5 October 2025
• Department: Faculty Planning & Events
• Employment Type: Permanent - Full Time
• Location: Birmingham
• Reporting To: Events Manager
• Compensation: £28,155 / year

Description

Are you skilled in delivering events to a high standard, enjoy balancing budget and delivery constraints?

We're looking for a motivated individual with experience of event delivery across a range of different events to join the team on a permanent basis as Events Senior Associate.

You'll be responsible for supporting the delivery and leadership of a portfolio of programmes in partnership with the Event Managers and wider Faculty, Planning and Events team.

You'll also be responsible for delivering both face-to-face and online events,  ranging from short training sessions for 10 people to large, 5-day long conferences for hundreds of delegates which includes several VIPs.

Who are Ambition Institute?

A great teacher changes the future every day. Especially for children who have had a tough start in life, a teacher can be the critical factor in their success.

At Ambition Institute we help schools tackling educational disadvantage to keep getting better and help their teachers and school leaders to become more expert over time.

That’s how we’ll make sure every child gets a great education and the best possible start in life.

• We train teachers and leaders at all levels to get better at the things that make the biggest difference: what you teach, how you teach it, and how you create the conditions for schools to thrive.
• We share what works. Everyone can benefit from evidence of how great teaching and leadership can improve schools and change lives, so we connect people to the latest research and best practice.
• We champion every teacher and school leader’s potential to develop, as the driving force for sustainable school improvement.

We Would Like You To:

• Lead and support the delivery of a varied portfolio of online and face-to-face events, ensuring a consistently high-quality experience for all participants and facilitators.
• Manage and develop Events Associates, providing line management, task oversight and professional development.
• Plan and organise event logistics, including venue bookings, catering, travel arrangements and supplier relationships, while balancing budget and delivery constraints.
• Innovate and improve event processes by using feedback data, and maintain accurate records, including raising purchase orders and processing invoices using relevant systems

Working in a hybrid way, you’ll be attached to either our Birmingham, London or Manchester office and will report to Events Manager.  In line with our current ways of working, you’ll be expected to be in the office at least 1 day a month, in addition to team days and this may be reviewed by Ambition. 

Skills, Knowledge And Experience

• Our successful candidate will demonstrate their commitment to the mission to improve the education and outcomes of children from disadvantaged backgrounds.
• Experience of event delivery across a range of different events, from small to large, multi-faceted events, with both online and face-to-face delivery.
• Demonstratable task management experience with the ability to lead and empower small teams, including holding people to account whilst supporting their development.
• Ability to use your own initiative to respond positively to change and/or to challenging situations with a desire to seek solutions and make improvements.
• Ability to manage your own complex workload with shifting priorities, using project management experience where appropriate.  
• Ability to liaise successfully across departments, working in a ‘matrix’ style team.
• Excellent communication skills, tailoring and using different approaches relevant to different stakeholders.
• A commitment to very high-quality event delivery, coupled with a high attention to detail.
• Experience managing a budget, and you can deliver events on budget and use creative/innovative and cost-effective solutions to drive best value for money.
• Proficient at using a range of different software such as the Microsoft suite, Salesforce, and Zoom.
• Experience of building culture and ways of working within a team.

What’S In It For You….?

• Competitive annual salary
• Professional development for all staff
• 25 days’ annual leave, plus bank holidays and 'winter shut down’ at the end of December/beginning of January
• Employer pension contribution of 11%
• Agile, hybrid working culture, so you can manage when and where you work
• Staff affinity networks that help keep equality, diversity and inclusion at the heart of our work
• Blind recruitment process to ensure equality and fairness in our hiring
• Enhanced maternity pay after a year’s service
• Shared parental leave package
• Access to free, confidential 24/7 wellbeing and support line
• Comfortable and collaborative workspaces in the city centres of Manchester, Birmingham and London
• Work-from-home technology package to support hybrid working
• Interest free season ticket / bike loans

We don’t expect the person we hire to have all of the following, but this should give you a sense of what would enable you to thrive in this role and in our organisation:

• You care deeply about educational disadvantage and being part of an organisation that challenges inequality
• You have a good work ethic and strive to make a difference in the job you do
• You always give maximum effort to understand and meet the needs of our partners and participants
• You always have a great attitude so we “can do” for all our colleagues, partners and participants
• You are open to feedback and learning because we want to keep getting better
• You work with your initiative to bring new ideas and a fresh perspective
• You are well organised and can prioritise work that will have the greatest impact

• You want a career with a person-centred organisation with a cause at its heart.
• You have a collaborative work ethos, bring warmth and good humour to work and constructive outlook to every situation
• You enjoy working in a fast-moving workplace, with a great support structure around you
• You would like to grow with an ambitious organisation as it progresses over time
• Want flexibility in how you work – splitting your time between one of our offices and remote working and managing your own working patterns to get the job done.

Applications will be accepted for all office locations.

All applications must be received by the closing date 11:59pm on 5 October 2025. Interviews are expected to take place on 15 and 16 October 2025.

We recognise that AI function tools (such as ChatGPT or other generative AI tools) are here to stay and can be helpful for applications including to assist in researching for application responses and to shorten your first draft. However, we are observing a growing trend in the use of AI, and we would caution applicants against relying too heavily on such tools when drafting responses.  

The pitfall of such tools is that they produce generic responses that don’t showcase individuality, specific experiences or real-life examples. This usually results in applications being unsuccessful. We want to evaluate your response, and we will be looking for answers that use examples and experiences that are clearly specific to you. You are more likely to successfully demonstrate your soft skills like communication and teamwork when preparing answers to application questions yourself and this helps mitigate the unintended consequences of AI-generated responses. 

If we suspect you have used AI inappropriately, the panel reviewing your application may adjust how your response is rated. For more details of what we consider to be acceptable use of AI function tools in our application process, please review our FAQs on our careers page. 

We are committed to the safeguarding of children and the most vulnerable in our society and, as such, we are unable to employ individuals with relevant convictions, including the following: a conviction for an offence involving violence or dishonesty, of a sexual nature or against minors, or for any other offence that is relevant to the nature of the services provided by our organisation.

For any questions or queries please review our FAQs | Ambition Institute Careers (pinpointhq.com) in the first instance. If we've not addressed your question in this section, please email us at jobs@ambition.org.uk

As an employer, we have a responsibility to prevent illegal working in the UK by ensuring that our employees have the right to work in the UK. Therefore, as part of the recruitment process to verify your eligibility you will be required to produce relevant documentation.