Governance Officer

Avalon Housing has an exciting opportunity for a Governance Officer to support the effective governance of a Housing Trust.

Working across the Group, you, as the Governance Officer, will advise on changes to policy and practice to ensure that we achieve the highest standards of good governance, including ensuring compliance with all regulatory requirements.

You will provide high-quality governance support, including ensuring that our board and committee meetings are well-planned, supporting the chair in running them effectively, and producing high quality and accurate minutes.

The Governance Officer role has two primary duties:

• To ensure the smooth running of governance meetings (including Board meetings, and associated committees) including preparation for and efficient running of the meetings and follow up activity, working closely with the chair and the leadership team.
• To play a full part as a member of the Governance Team in ensuring that governance across the Group demonstrates the highest standards of transparency and accountability and is compliant with charitable objectives and regulatory requirements.

As the Governance Officer, you will have an excellent working knowledge of governance principles and practice, particularly in relation to Registered Housing Providers, Community Benefit Societies, Charities and Companies Limited by Guarantee.

With in-depth knowledge of organisational governance within a registered housing provider, you will be able to maintain effective communications with the Executive, Chair and Board Members, and to form relationships that engender trust and openness.

Able to maintain complete confidentiality, you will be highly professional and take a transparent approach to supporting and challenging Board Members on matters of governance.

Other requirements include:

• Experience of and confidence in working with senior-level boards.
• Knowledge of the Social Housing sector
• Being highly organised with significant administration experience.
• Ability to take high-quality, accurate minutes.
• The ability to make good decisions and solve problems to improve the service the team provides.
• Very high level of competency in using standard software packages (including Microsoft 365) and experience of using meeting pack production software.
• The ability to quickly interpret and translate data.
• High level of competency in time management skills.

Applications are welcome from all, regardless of age, disability, marriage or civil partnership, pregnancy or maternity, religion or belief, race, sex, sexual orientation, trans status or socioeconomic background. We positively encourage applications from people from marginalised backgrounds, including but not limited to those with experience of living in poverty.

We are committed to being an anti-racist organisation and operate an anonymised recruitment process so that bias is eliminated from the shortlisting process.

In support of our approach to flexible working, we are happy to receive applications from those seeking full-time employment, as well as those who may want to share the role on a part-time basis. When making your application, please state whether you want to be considered for either full or part-time work and, if part-time, the number of hours per week you would be looking for.

We’re at our best when we’re continually building on trust, showing we care and making a difference – and hope others will do the same. So, for those roles which allow it, we’re developing a more blended approach to how and where you work. This means you can expect to work flexibly between the office and home (with an expectation of two days a week in your home office).

We are a Disability Confident Employer. This means that we are committed to the recruitment, progression and retention of disabled individuals. We shall also offer interviews to disabled candidates who meet the minimum criteria for the job. If you have a disability, please tell us if you would like to be considered for an interview under the Disability Confident Scheme. If you have any additional needs and need reasonable adjustments to be made to the interview process, please let us know.