Senior Programmes Manager

Job Description

We are really pleased to offer this excellent opportunity to join our team in the Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care as Senior Programmes Manager. This is an exciting role and a fantastic opportunity for an emerging senior leader in higher education professional services.

The Senior Programmes Manager will work with the Associate Director (Education) and lead the Faculty’s programme administration functions, including student records, timetabling, student placements, and assessments within the Nightingale Student Hub. They will work closely with the Associate Dean (Practice Learning) and Associate Dean (Assessment and Teaching), leading on strategic enhancements for programme delivery. They will also play a significant part in representing the Faculty in strategic and process improvement projects across the university.

The Senior Programmes Manager will be pivotal to the effective delivery of programme administration and education support for all programmes in the Faculty, ensuring a consistently high level of professionalism, embracing ‘one-team’ working while ensuring high-quality support to our students. The role-holder will be central to ensuring efficient, dynamic, and collaborative working with colleagues and teams across education and students services functions at King’s. They will be instrumental in shaping our shared vision of success, furthering our high quality, high value, professional services culture.

Successful candidates will have a proactive approach to leadership with experience of line management and creating high-performing, highly motivated teams. They will have an excellent understanding of programme administration in higher education, a commitment to continuous improvement, and excellent communication skills.

This is currently a hybrid working role where the role holder will spend part of their working week on campus and part of the week working remotely.

Why choose us

King’s College London is a leading University with nine Faculties. As part of King’s Health Partners, we have an excellent environment for health care interaction and a strong focus on mentoring and career development. The 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF2021) placed King’s applied and allied health research 1st for: overall proportion of research rated 4* (world-leading, the best mark possible), research papers rated 4*, impact rated 4*, environment rated 4*(joint), Grade Point Average and Power.  REF2021 rated as world-leading: 100% of our environment, 86% of our impact and 70% of our research overall. Over 95% of our research overall was rated as world-leading or internationally excellent.

For the last three years, King’s has been number 2 in the world and number 1 in Europe for Nursing (QS world rankings). King’s produces more highly cited research outputs (top 1% citations) on palliative care than any other centre internationally (SciVal).

It includes the Cicely Saunders Institute for Palliative Care, Policy and Rehabilitation, the premier Institute for Palliative Care, bringing together clinical, research and education teams.

Our award-winning NMPC education programmes span pre-registration nursing and midwifery, and multidisciplinary post-graduate taught and research programmes. King’s is the largest provider of health care education in Europe. Our applied clinical and health research transforms therapies, the healthcare experience and outcomes for patients and those important to them, wherever they are cared for.

Successful candidates will have the opportunity to work as part of KCL’s hybrid working model where you can work between your home and the office throughout the week.

We are committed to continually improving the diversity of our workforce, and therefore we encourage applications from all groups. This includes from Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic groups, the LGBTQI+ community, those who are neurodiverse and those with a disability.

King’s considers the professional and personal development of our staff a priority and we offer an inspiring range of opportunities for training and promotion. Our Organisational Development team provide in-house and bespoke learning.

This post will be offered on an indefinite contract.

This is a full-time post.

Key responsibilities

Strategic Enhancement and Change

• Embedding a culture of continuous improvement in teams by identifying and strengthening practice and process, working at a local and university-wide level to define, develop and implement processes, policies, and systems.
• Leading as an agent of change, championing change management activities across the Faculty and university.
• Working in close partnership with the Students & Education Directorate and other university services to ensure the student experience and outcomes are optimised. This will include ensuring that programme management processes and student facing services that drive the student experience are effective and efficient.
• Driving solutions for simplicity and standardisation across teams and processes; to optimise service quality, consistency, and efficiency.
• Representing the Faculty in wider university activities and committees, in support of the Faculty’s interests and engaging with university functions, engaging with relevant stakeholders, groups and committees across the university to influence change.

Programmes Management and Education Support

• Maintaining an overview of student and education services teams and their needs with reference to performance and development, setting expectations and assessing achievement against benchmarks of delivery, agreed timeframes, expectations, key performance indicators and service level agreements.
• Leading the effective planning and delivery of programme administration, ensuring a consistently high level of professionalism.
• Assisting academic and professional services colleagues with programme planning, to ensure teams are supported through planning and resourcing.
• Ensuring all work is carried out in a professional and timely manner, with appropriate confidentiality and sensitivity. To maintain an up-to-date knowledge of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) requirements and to support Freedom of Information and subject access requests.

People

• Demonstrating King’s Principles in Action by contributing to a culture of empowerment, mutual respect, accountability, and continuous improvement.
• Maintaining an oversight of resource deployment in the context of workload, team structure and utilisation of resource in line with the Faculty and university’s strategic plans, reporting on successes and setbacks and providing analysis to inform the changing shape of the service.
• Leading and managing staff with oversight of programme administration, assessments, and student placements.
• Ensuring mechanisms to support career development for staff, including training, PDR reviews, mentoring as appropriate, and on-boarding for new joiners.
• Working flexibly as part of a team, supporting other senior managers in times of high demand, and deputising for the Associate Director (Education) when required.

The above list of responsibilities may not be exhaustive, and the role holder will be required to undertake such tasks and responsibilities as may reasonably be expected within the scope and grading of the post.

Skills, knowledge, and experience

Essential criteria

Experience of working in a higher education management role leading on programme administration. 

Strong interpersonal skills including motivating, influencing, and negotiating with a range of stakeholders.  

Highly solutions focussed, with a demonstrable ability to proactively identify emerging challenges and risks, using data and feedback where needed to make informed, evidence-based decisions. 

Experience of leading on projects for service enhancement, including developing and implementing new policies, systems, and processes.  

Ability to develop and maintain professional networks and make a positive contribution to change at university-level.

Experience of interpreting and translating complex regulations, processes, and information in suitable formats for a variety of audiences, with a considered approach to communication in all forms. 

Proactive and authentic approach, with demonstrable integrity and values in leadership style, strong experience of line management and creating high performing teams, including motivating staff, performance management and maintaining a positive, proactive, resilient culture.  

Proven ability to use initiative, prioritise workloads for self and others, and respond positively to situations arising with limited notice. 

Experience of managing change and supporting teams through changes to structure and practice. 

Evidence of continuous professional development.  

Demonstrates a commitment to promoting equality, diversity and inclusivity for staff and students 

Desirable criteria

Experience of managing administrative support for higher education programmes or courses within a healthcare discipline.

Experience of working in partnership with NHS Trusts to support education services for practice learning.

Candidates are strongly encouraged to specifically address the essential criteria outlined in the Person Specification in their covering letter.

The selection process will include a panel interview and an assessment.

The interviews are provisionally scheduled for the beginning of February 2024.

We are committed to continually improving the diversity of our workforce, and therefore we encourage applications from all groups. This includes from Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic groups, the LGBTQI+ community, those who are neurodiverse and those with a disability.

King’s considers the professional and personal development of our staff a priority and we offer an inspiring range of opportunities for training and career progression. Our Organisational Development team provide in-house and bespoke learning.