At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead a team to transform data use in grassroots football and deliver impactful insights.
- Company: Join The FA, the heart of English football, at iconic Wembley Stadium.
- Benefits: Enjoy free lunches, event tickets, medical cover, and a hybrid working model.
- Other info: Diverse workplace promoting inclusion and personal growth opportunities.
- Why this job: Make a real difference in grassroots football while developing your career.
- Qualifications: Strong analytical skills, experience in data management, and stakeholder engagement.
The predicted salary is between 47250 - 57750 £ per year.
The FA's Grassroots Division is looking for a Grassroots Data & Intelligence Manager to transform how we use data, delivering the insights and decision-support tools that help shape decisions and maximise impact across grassroots football.
This role is a 12 month fixed term contract, with the possibility of extension, dependent on further funding.
What will you be doing?
- Lead a team of Grassroots Data Analysts, setting standards for technical quality, stakeholder engagement, and professional development.
- Own the Grassroots Data & Intelligence roadmap, managing intake, triage, and resource planning to maximise delivery and impact.
- Work with Grassroots and County FA stakeholders to define the requirements for Place Profiles, a core enabler of the next phase of Grassroots Football.
- Work with stakeholders, including technical teams, to define, prioritise, and integrate relevant external data sources including ONS, health, demographic, and local authority datasets.
- Oversee the planning, development, and maintenance of Place Profiles, ensuring outputs are accurate, actionable, user‑friendly, and aligned with best‑practice data storytelling.
- Drive adoption of Place Profiles, leading feedback workshops and UAT, and delivering training, demos, and guidance to build capability across the Grassroots Division and County FA network.
- Investigate and leverage AI and advanced analytics to enhance insight delivery, proactively identifying, testing, and embedding tools that automate analysis, improve accessibility, and make complex data easier to understand.
- Champion data governance and quality, working with technical teams to improve data pipelines, resolve quality issues, and maintain documentation.
- Build strong relationships with senior stakeholders, understanding their needs, challenging assumptions, and building a culture of data‑driven decision making.
- Executes additional tasks as required to meet the FA's changing priorities.
- Comply with all company policies and procedures to ensure that the highest standards of health, safety, and well‑being can be maintained.
- As part of the FA's commitment to ensuring a safe environment for everyone in football, every employee will be required to complete a DBS check.
The level of the check required will be based on the activity of the specific job role and in line with legislation and government guidance.
What are we looking for?
Essential for the role
Skills
- Strategic Thinking: Comfortable linking analytical work to organisational goals
- Prioritisation & Decision‑Making: Skilled at managing competing demands, making evidence‑based trade‑offs, and communicating priorities confidently
- Stakeholder Management: Strong relationship‑builder able to challenge constructively, manage expectations, and adapt communication to senior audiences
- Problem‑Solving & Framing: Able to translate ambiguous questions into clear analytical briefs and shape the approach for the team
- Technical: Applies advanced Power BI and Excel skills, with strong knowledge of SQL and/or DAX
Experience
- Leading an analytics or insight function, including managing backlogs, pipelines, or portfolios of insight work
- Working with cross‑functional technical teams (e. g., data engineering, digital technology) to improve data pipelines and models
- Integrating and analysing data from multiple sources and managing complex datasets
- With the end‑to‑end ownership of a dashboard ecosystem
- Presenting insights in compelling ways, using storytelling, visualisation best practices, and non‑technical language
Beneficial to have
Skills
- Familiarity with advanced analytics practices, such as forecasting, segmentation, or geospatial analysis
- Familiarity with new and emerging data analytics tools and platforms including AI
- Background in sport, participation‑focused organisations, or place‑based insight, especially involving datasets like ONS, Active Lives, or local authority data
Experience
- Developing people through clear guidance, feedback, and career support, building both technical and soft‑skill capability
- Influencing senior leaders through compelling insight storytelling and evidence‑based recommendations
What's in it for you?
We are committed to ensuring everyone can flourish in their roles.
To achieve this, we have unique office spaces under the arch of the iconic Wembley National Stadium, which is the home of English Football.
We are also delighted to offer a world‑class, Elite Performance Centre, St.
George's Park in Staffordshire, which is an exceptional setting to develop and inspire high‑performing England teams and leaders.
We pride ourselves on offering a competitive salary as well as great opportunities to develop and grow in your role.
But that is not all; we also have a range of exciting benefits, some of which can be found below:
- Access to event day tickets at Wembley Stadium, alongside a host of regular internal events throughout the season, encourages you to connect and learn with your colleagues and look after your mental health and well‑being.
- Free, nutritious lunches at Wembley Stadium and St. George's Park.
- Free private medical cover.
- A contributory pension scheme.
- An additional 'Thank You' day's leave, volunteering days, as well as 25 days of annual leave (based on a full‑time, permanent contract)
- A hybrid working model which offers greater flexibility.
For more information on what it is like to work at The FA, please visit our FA Careers page, https://www. thefa. com/about-football-association/careers
Currently, we are working within a hybrid working model whereby the expectation is to work from your contractual location for part of the week, and as and when required by the team.
The remaining days can be worked remotely.
We will continue to monitor this model, and it may be adjusted in future if deemed necessary.
The contractual location of this role can be found on the FA Careers page.
We are a diverse workplace, aspiring to represent football across the country.
The Football Association actively promotes inclusion and diversity, encouraging you to be the best version of yourself at work.
We welcome applications from everyone and are proud to be an equal opportunities employer.
If you have any particular requirements in respect of the recruitment or interview process, please mention this during your application.
As part of the FA's commitment to ensuring a safe environment for everyone in football, every employee will be required to complete a DBS check.
The level of the check required will be based on the activity of the specific job role and in line with legislation and government guidance.
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Grassroots Data & Intelligence Manager - 12 month Fixed Term Contract employer: The Football Association
The Football Association is an exceptional employer, offering a dynamic work culture that prioritises professional development and collaboration within the FA Learning division. As a Casual Quality Developer, you will benefit from extensive opportunities to enhance your coaching skills while contributing to the growth of the coaching workforce in a supportive environment that values your insights and experiences.
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We think this is how you could land Grassroots Data & Intelligence Manager - 12 month Fixed Term Contract
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We think you need these skills to ace Grassroots Data & Intelligence Manager - 12 month Fixed Term Contract
Some tips for your application 🫡
Highlight Your Data Projects:When applying for a temporary data science role at The Football Association, make sure to showcase any relevant projects you've worked on. Whether it's a personal project, an academic undertaking, or contributions to an open-source initiative, detailing these experiences can really set you apart and demonstrate your practical skills.
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Show Your Flexibility:Since this is a temporary role, it's important to convey your adaptability and willingness to learn. In your cover letter to The Football Association, emphasise how quickly you can get up to speed with new tools or projects. Highlight any previous experiences where you've had to adjust to new environments or challenges.
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You might face technical questions on tools relevant to data science, like Python, R, or SQL. Prepare to solve a problem live—perhaps they'll ask you to write a simple query or code snippet. It’s cool to talk about them, but we need to show we can do it in practice, especially in a temporary role where quick results matter.
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Since this is a temporary position, emphasise your ability to learn quickly and adapt to new tools or workflows. Share examples of how you've thrived in fast-paced environments before, and how you can hit the ground running at The Football Association.
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Bring your portfolio to the table—showcase projects where you've leveraged data science techniques to solve problems. Whether it’s a GitHub repository or a set of case studies, having tangible examples of your work will help you stand out and show what you bring to the team at The Football Association.
