Trusts & Grants Lead

Salary: £34,540 per annum

Location: Midlands Wide (Birmingham B24, Leicester LE18, Nottingham NG7)

Benefits: 25 days holiday, pro-rata, 5.5% Employer Pension Contribution including Life Cover, Occupational Sick Pay Benefits & Enhanced Maternity, Adoption and Paternity Leave and Pay, plus more

Reporting to: Trusts, Grants & Foundations Fundraising Manager

FareShare Midlands is the region’s largest food redistribution charity, tackling inequality, transforming lives and ensuring no good food goes to waste. We rescue surplus food and redistribute it to 650 local charities and community organisations, feeding 60,000 people every week. We also invest in communities, providing education, training and volunteering opportunities, helping over 700 individuals to date to build a better future. Together, we’re fighting hunger, reducing food waste and creating opportunities across the Midlands.

The Role

The Trusts & Grants Lead is responsible for delivering income from trusts, foundations and statutory funders through proactive prospect research, high quality applications, relationship management and timely reporting, contributing directly to FareShare Midlands’ income targets and growth plans.

• Trusts & Grants Delivery

• Manage a portfolio of trust, foundation and grant funders
• Writing applications and reports
• Budget management for restricted funds
• Working with FSM and FSUK colleagues on bids
• Build strong relationships with programme officers, grant managers, funding panels
• Managing restricted funding compliance
• Coordinating evaluation and evidence collection for funder reports
• Monitoring funder requirements and deadlines

• Pipeline Development & Prospect Research

• Identify a pipeline of new opportunities in trusts, grants, foundations and corporate to secure new income for FareShare Midlands
• Maintain a rolling 12 to 18 month pipeline
• Regular prospect research using databases (e.g. funds online, the charity commission website, idox etc)
• Prioritising opportunities by value, likelihood and strategic fit
• Assisting on project development working with colleagues to build in the needs and preferences of funders to ensure projects can attract support

• Funder Stewardship & Reporting

• Professional stewardship of trusts and foundations funders
• Managing funder communications in line with grant agreements
• Working with the stewardship officer and comms team to identify and develop impact stories and relevant data

• Communication

• Writing funder-facing materials
• Ensuring clarity, evidence and compliance in all submissions
• Coordinating case studies and impact data for bids

• Compliance, Monitoring & Administration

• Application tracker ownership
• Reporting calendar management
• Income forecasting for trusts & grants
• Document management for funder requirements

You will be successful in this role by:

• Consistently securing income from trusts, foundations and statutory funders in line with agreed targets
• Maintaining a strong, well-researched pipeline of trust and grant opportunities
• Submitting high-quality funding applications and reports to deadline
• Achieving a healthy success rate across applications through strong prospecting and proposal quality
• Ensuring full compliance with restricted funding requirements
• Building positive, professional relationships with funding partners
• Providing accurate income forecasting and pipeline reporting
• Bringing creativity and passion in communicating FSM’s central mission to inspire funders to support us

Essential

• Demonstrable experience of restricted funding
• Ability to manage multiple deadlines
• Strong analytical and written skills
• Confidence working with budgets and impact data
• Experience of supporting or developing fundraising partnerships and maximising fundraising opportunities
• Experience of securing gifts from trusts, grants and foundations
• Experience in writing compelling funding applications and impact reporting
• Experience in prospecting for new business and stewarding donors face to face
• Willingness to work flexibly including events and occasional weekends

To subscribe to the ethos, vision and mission of FareShare Midlands

Full clean driving license and have access to a vehicle so that travel between depots or to stakeholder meetings is possible (all travel costs reimbursed)

Skills, knowledge and abilities

• Knowledge of trust, grant and foundation fundraising, particularly around restricted funding
• Excellent communication skills, good persuading skills and good writing skills
• Excellent numeracy skills and use of Excel
• Good relationship building skills, both inside and outside an organisation
• Ability to work to meet objectives and deadlines
• Ability and experience of working well in a team

Values and behaviours

• A commitment to Equal Opportunities
• An appreciation of FareShare Midlands’ mission and vision
• Flexibility of approach and ability to work in a team
• Proven ability to develop and maintain good working relations, with both internal and external audiences

How to Apply:

If you would like to apply for this role, please create a supporting statement to demonstrate your suitability and to explain your interest in both the job and FareShare Midlands. Please send your supporting statement with a copy of your CV.

We continue to strive to ensure that the profile of our staff and volunteers reflects the diverse communities we serve across the Midlands. As such we encourage and welcome applications from all our communities. We particularly welcome applications from people from ethnically diverse backgrounds as they are currently under-represented within FareShare Midlands.

Closing date for applications is Friday 23rd January 2025.