Support & Development Officer for Group Services & Individual Services

PLEASE NOTE THERE ARE TWO JOB DESCRIPTIONS

1.Support and Development Officer: Group Services

Report to: Group Services Team Manager

Salary: £27,000

It would be desirable, but not essential, if you were based in the East Midlands, as there may be some light touch engagement work that may be required to support the teams in this area.

Job Purpose

You will ensure the success of our group activities that reduce the loneliness of isolated older people. You will support the volunteers who provide group services, including face to face tea parties, activity groups, other social gatherings, and online groups, ensuring that they feel confident, safe and supported to have a positive experience and build rewarding and constructive relationships with older people. You will work with volunteers from their point of application to Re-engage to the time they leave us, and with older people referred to our services, providing support and advice to ensure they have a positive experience. You will be able to see the difference we make to people’s lives, through helping volunteers successfully to reduce the loneliness of the older people referred to us.

It would be desirable, but not essential, if you were based in the east of England, as there may be some light touch engagement work that may be required to support the teams in this area.

Job Description

Volunteers

• Provide online induction and onboarding support for hosts, drivers, group co-ordinators (GCs) and other volunteer support roles as needed, enthusing volunteer applicants and ensuring they are well prepared for their Re-engage journey
• Ensure volunteers successfully progress through the automated onboarding process, supporting with calls, emails and answering queries as needed
• Support volunteers to make a positive impact through their roles by being available to troubleshoot worries and concerns
• Provide low level signposting, welfare and safeguarding support for volunteers involved in group activities
• Check in with GCs, hosts and drivers after their first Tea Party, Activity Group or social gathering, providing support and advice as necessary
• Connect volunteers and groups with opportunities such as Talking Tables or Corporate offers to ensure a thriving ecosystem of social groups
• Respond to email and phone queries forwarded by the welcome and safeguarding teams
• Participate in an ongoing rota of training sessions and drop ins for GCs, drivers and hosts, including sharing information around vacancy filling, engagement tools etc.
• Contribute to the creation and sharing of regular resources, news articles and fun activities for volunteers to use at social gatherings, whether in person or online
• Work with Communications to identify potential case studies and media stories
• Provide light-touch engagement support to recruit to vacancies where not a current organisational priority, including helping with Facebook posts, emailing referral partners, posting volunteering activities, and providing volunteer recruitment materials to volunteers
• Update the Volunteer Vacancy List and work with colleagues to share intelligence
• Work with colleagues to help deliver against organisational targets, including prioritising specific services or regions as necessary
• Use CRM system and dashboards to manage workload, ensuring records of older people and volunteers are kept up to date

Older People

• Carry out welcome calls to onboard older people into our group services
• Signpost or refer older people to other services if we are not the best fit for their needs
• Check in with older people who are in one of our services who need additional support (e.g. low mood, ongoing issues)
• Provide low level signposting, welfare and safeguarding support for older people
• Carry out 6 monthly check-ins and needs assessments for those older people identified as having high level or more complex needs
• Update OP vacancy lists and work with colleagues to share intelligence
• Check OP expressions of interest to identify potential clusters, co-ordinating with Engagement and Fundraising

Person Specification

Experience

• Comfortable with communicating on the phone with people of all ages
• Experience with Microsoft Teams, Sharepoint, Dynamics and using a CRM system to capture, store, and retrieve information
• Experience working in a fast-paced environment, working to deadlines and meeting performance related targets

Skills and Knowledge

• Great problem-solving and lateral thinking skills
• Ability to put older people and volunteers at their ease over the phone
• Ability to juggle multiple tasks at once, managing your time effectively and efficiently
• Understanding of confidentiality and GDPR and its implications for using a CRM and interacting with older people and volunteers
• Excellent interpersonal, written and verbal communication skills
• Understanding of safeguarding
• Committed to using technology to find solutions and to improve performance

Behaviours

• Ability to stay calm under pressure
• Attention to detail
• Desire to support older people who are experiencing isolation and loneliness
• Committed to engaging and empowering volunteers and older people

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2. Support and Development Officer: Individual Serviceswith deputising duties for Welcome Officer

Reports to: Individual Services Team Manager

Salary: £27,000

Job Purpose

To ensure the success of our one-to-one services, which reduce the loneliness of isolated older people. You will support the volunteers who are providing these services, including our Call Companions services, ensuring they feel confident, safe and supported to have a positive experience, and build rewarding and constructive relationships with older people. You will work with volunteers from their point of application to Re-engage to the time they leave us, and with older people referred to our services, providing support and advice to ensure they have a positive experience. You will be able to see the difference we make to people’s lives, through helping volunteers successfully to reduce the loneliness of the older people referred to us.

You will also deputise for our Welcome Officer during periods of annual leave, sickness or in times of high demand. This will entail managing our front of house, answering the main phoneline and our inbox and providing excellent and timely customer service.

Responsibilities

Volunteers

• Carry out online Call Companion and other individual services inductions, enthusing volunteer applicants and ensuring they are well prepared for their onboarding process
• Ensure volunteers successfully progress through the automated onboarding process, supporting with calls, emails and answering queries as needed
• Support volunteers to make a positive impact through their Call Companion role by being available to troubleshoot worries and concerns
• Check in with volunteers who have just started making their calls to provide advice and support as necessary, including providing call backs to volunteers who request a check in, to ensure they can continue to support their older person successfully
• Provide low level signposting, welfare and safeguarding support for volunteers
• Respond to emails and phone queries forwarded by the admin and safeguarding teams
• Participate in an ongoing rota of training sessions and drop ins for CC volunteers
• Contribute to the creation and sharing of regular resources, news articles and fun activities for volunteers to use during calls
• Work with Communications to identify potential case studies and media stories
• Spot check Togetherly calls to ensure matches are well supported
• Work with colleagues to help deliver against organisational targets, including prioritising specific services or regions as necessary
• Work with colleagues to identify opportunities to recruit new volunteers and older people into our services
• Use our CRM system and dashboards to manage workload, ensuring records of older people and volunteers are kept up to date

Older People

• Carry out welcome calls to onboard older people into our Call Companion Services
• Signpost or refer older people to other services if we are not the best fit for their needs
• Check in with older people who are matched and who need additional support (e.g. low mood, ongoing issues)
• Provide low level signposting, welfare and safeguarding support for older people
• Carry out 6 monthly check-ins and needs assessments for those older people identified as having high level or more complex needs
• Manage rematching process

Welcome Officer

When necessary, you will deputise for our Welcome officer:

• Ensure all telephone enquiries are answered promptly and resolved or passed onto the relevant team
• Ensure all inbound emails are answered promptly and resolved or passed onto the relevant team
• Triage safeguarding and welfare concerns and queries, passing details to the safeguarding team or other staff as relevant
• Ensure incoming calls and emails are accurately recorded on our CRM system
• Ensure identity checks for volunteer applicants are handled smoothly and accurately recorded on our CRM system
• Check references across volunteer applications and ensure they are accurately recorded on our CRM system
• Triage Hootsuite enquiries on social media, answering basic queries and forwarding more complex queries to colleagues
• Check our CRM task lists regularly and support teams to ensure enquiries are answered in a timely manner
• Make outgoing calls, including "unable to make contact” calls to older people and their volunteers, matches who haven’t made recent contact, and others, sending emails and letters as necessary and ensuring our CRM system is updated .

Person Specification

Experience

• Comfortable with communicating on the phone with people of all ages
• Experience with Microsoft Teams, Sharepoint, Dynamics and using a CRM system to capture, store, and retrieve information
• Experience working in a fast-paced environment, working to deadlines and meeting performance related targets

Skills and Knowledge

• Great problem-solving and lateral thinking skills
• Excellent interpersonal, written and verbal communication skills
• Ability to put older people and volunteers at their ease over the phone
• Ability to juggle multiple tasks at once, managing your time effectively and efficiently
• Understanding of confidentiality and GDPR, and its implications for using a CRM and interacting with older people and volunteers
• Basic understanding of safeguarding
• Committed to using technology to find solutions and to improve performance

Behaviours

• Ability to stay calm under pressure
• Attention to detail
• Desire to support older people who are experiencing isolation and loneliness
• Committed to engaging and empowering volunteers and older people

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About Re-engage

Re-engage is a charity that is positive about older age and committed to reducing loneliness so that people can have social lives and friendship groups however old they are. We inspire and enable meaningful connections and shared experiences within communities across the UK for people over 75 facing loneliness and social isolation.

Our volunteers work together to create better communities and help to enrich the lives of our members. Older people who may have felt very alone now feel valued as individuals, continue to form friendships, and have groups that give support. We make sure that people know they are important well into their old age.

We are proud of our values - positive, innovative, transparent, evidence-based, and accountable - and of our ethos of bringing generations together.

Our vision is a world where no one is ever too old to make friends and enjoy social interaction.

Our mission is to work within communities to end social isolation and loneliness in older people.

Re-engage is committed to growing a staff team that enjoys coming to work every day and gets satisfaction out of being part of delivering significant impact to the lives of older people. We all work remotely, and we don’t let that stop us from getting to know each other and enjoying down time together. Our wellbeing programme includes multiple interest groups: music, books, hobbies etc as well as coffee and catch ups, quizzes, mindfulness, and other group activities. Everyone is encouraged to get involved in working groups and staff networks, all of which contribute to us getting to know each other. We have strong values and promote behaviours that underpin all we do.

How we recruit

Don’t meet every single requirement? Studies have shown that women and people from ethnic minority backgrounds are less likely to apply to jobs unless they meet every single qualification. At Re-engage we are dedicated to building a diverse and inclusive workplace, so if you’re excited about this role but your experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we’d encourage you to apply anyway. You may be just the right candidate for this or other roles.

Re-engage uses the Hireful platform which helps remove unconscious bias for a forward-thinking, fair, and objective alternative to traditional hiring. Instead of using your CV alone, we'll be asking you to answer questions to test essential skills needed for the role. The responses are then anonymised and reviewed in a random order by members of our team. This enables us to make data-driven assessments focused on someone's ability, rather than their background.

The Hireful platform also asks some demographic questions before you start your application. We never see these responses with your application. We only see summary statistics to help us check if our candidate pool is balanced and if everyone has an equal chance to get hired irrespective of their background. If you prefer, you can easily opt out of answering these questions.

The closing date is midnight on Sunday 20 September 2026, and interviews will be held week commencing 28 September 2026 and week commencing 5 October 2026.