Senior Evaluation Manager

Contract: 24 months full-time (Fixed term contract)

About the Youth Endowment Fund

We’re here to prevent children and young people becoming involved in violence. We do this by finding out what works and building a movement to put this knowledge into practice.

All of us will experience violence at some point in our lives. For many children, it is a daily reality. Each year, tens of children are killed, hundreds are hospitalised, 1 in 5 teenage children are victims and the majority admit to feeling afraid of violence. It scares them when they travel home from school, prevents them from going out and makes the most vulnerable feel like they don’t matter. It is taking lives, traumatising families and dividing communities. It robs potential, progress and hope. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

The Youth Endowment Fund exists to try and permanently change things. To succeed, we must build an exceptional body of knowledge about violence affecting young people and how we reduce it. This knowledge has to be both rigorous and highly relevant to those making decisions about how to support vulnerable young people. We need to find out what works and what doesn’t through evidence synthesis, data analysis and qualitative research into children’s lives. We need to convert this into highly accessible content on what works, how delivery organisations need to change their practice and how the systems they operate in need to be reformed. We then need to work with the right people that can make change happen, across systems, policies and practice, to have a real impact on reducing violence affecting children’s lives.

The evaluation team contributes to the design and implementation of the fund’s various funding rounds. The team is also responsible for assessing, appointing, monitoring, and the quality assurance of rigorous impact evaluations from experts in the field. The Senior Evaluation Manager will play a key role in leading evaluation work. The post holder will also lead a team of evaluation managers, ensuring they have the support to deliver a portfolio of evaluation projects.

Key Responsibilities

The core of your job is to ensure that we are excellent at evaluation, so that we can find out the very best ways to prevent young people and children from becoming involved in violence.

Evaluation

Working with the Head of Evaluation the post holder will:

• Implement the processes for assessing the quality of evidence underpinning applications to the fund and making funding recommendations to the Grants and Evaluation Committee.
• Shape the evaluation approach for individual grant rounds, including leading on this for a small number of rounds.
• Act as a source of expertise on the statistical underpinnings of YEF’s evaluation work, including on issues such as power calculations, regression analysis and missing data.
• Lead the delivery of YEF’s evaluation work, designing, commissioning and managing complex and large-scale RCTs and QEDs
• Be responsible for YEF’s evaluation policies and reporting templates, ensuring they remain consistent and fit for purpose.
• Be responsible for the ongoing development of YEF’s commissioning guidance.

Team management

The post holder will likely lead the recruitment, management and development of a team of evaluation officers and will:

• Ensure they have the knowledge, skills and support to carry out their work effectively.
• Provide regular feedback and coaching on written outputs.
• Supervise and project manage the team’s evaluation work, providing quality assurance and monitoring of progress against project plans and project budgets.

Collaborative working

The post holder will contribute to the wider YEF team and will:

• Be accountable to YEF’s Fund Leadership Team for the delivery of evaluations, on time and on budget, including reporting on risks and issues.
• Work closely with colleagues across YEF and specifically the Programme team.
• Ensure high-quality evidence is at the heart of all YEF activity and that the evidence we produce is communicated in a clear and accessible way which will drive sustainable change.
• Support the management of YEF’s panel of evaluators and expert panel

General

The post holder may be involved in other elements of YEF's projects, working with senior colleagues to commission, scope and deliver projects.

Please visit our website for the full 'About you' section.

While it is not a criterion, we are especially interested to hear from applicants who have lived experience of youth violence.

It’s also important to us that the people we hire do not discriminate. We believe in being inclusive and giving everyone an equal chance to succeed. Applications are welcome from all regardless of age, sex, gender identity, disability, marriage or civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, religion or belief, race, sexual orientation, transgender status or social economic background.

The office is based in Central London. Those living in and around London are expected to be in the office for a minimum of 2 days per week. If you live outside of London and work remotely, you’ll be expected to work from the London office 2 days per month.

As part of our commitment to flexible working we will consider a range of options for the successful applicant. All options can be discussed at the interview stage.

To Apply

To apply, please send a CV, cover letter, ensuring that you complete the application questions and the monitoring form via our application page by 5:00pm on Monday 6th July.

You will also be required to provide proof of your eligibility to work in the UK.

Personal data

Your personal data will be shared for the purposes of the recruitment exercise. This includes our HR team, interviewers (who may include other partners in the project and independent advisors), relevant team managers and our IT service provider if access to the data is necessary for performance of their roles. We do not share your data with other third parties, unless your application for employment is successful and we make you an offer of employment. We will then share your data with former employers to obtain references for you. We do not transfer your data outside the European Economic Area.