Find your place in the field of good food

Our goal is to connect good people with good food. We advertise sustainable food jobs and training opportunities to help jobseekers and employers find each other.

Roots to Work is a project of Sustain: the alliance for better food and farming.

Job description

Hours: 2 days (16 hours) per week

Duration: 18 months

Location: This is a working from home role, and the candidate should be based in the UK and have capacity for regular travel for work, events and meetings.

Working days: The person in this role is required to work Tuesdays, as that is when the majority of Membership Team meetings happen. The rest of the hours can be worked flexibly within the working week. 

Remuneration:* £12,979.20 gross annual salary PAYE (£32,448 pro rata). With 1.5% annual increase, subject to review. Statutory pension contribution and holiday allowance.

Website: landworkersalliance.org.uk

*The LWA has a pay parity policy and flat payment structure, with all workers paid at the same rate.

The Landworkers’ Alliance (LWA) is a grassroots union of farmers, growers, foresters and land-based workers operating across the UK. Our mission is to improve the livelihoods of our members and create a better food and land-use system for everyone. We have a vision of a future where producers can work with dignity to earn a decent living and everyone can access local, healthy and affordable food, fuel and fibre - a food and land-use system based on agroecology and food sovereignty that furthers social and environmental justice.

Mode of Working:

The working mode in the LWA is relatively autonomous and the function of the staff in the LWA is to design, develop and deliver work plans and projects that include coming up with team objectives and targets and creating strategies to deliver work inline with the objectives, priorities and targets set by the LWA Coordinating Group (Board of Directors), and LWA membership and LWA staff.

The LWA does not have a centralised office and our staff work remotely but may be required to attend meetings that take place in various locations around the UK. Reasonable travel costs will be covered in addition to the salary. Candidates must have the skills and confidence to work remotely as part of a diverse team and demonstrate a proven capacity to self-manage and work autonomously.

We work to create a supportive working environment that accommodates staff with caring roles, in particular those with child care responsibilities, and/or other responsibilities or needs. We can offer flexible working hours within the working week, and are willing to negotiate additional unpaid leave over the school summer holiday period.  We also offer a bonus additional paid week of annual leave around Christmas and New Years to support all staff to be able to take a break and holiday over December- January.

We are committed to our Equality and Diversity Statement and we welcome and encourage applications from anyone interested in this role who feels they have the relevant experience and skills. We would like to particularly encourage those from under represented and marginalised groups to consider applying for this role.

The use of personal IT equipment is required for this role. If this poses a challenge for you we encourage you to get in touch (contact details below) as we do not wish this to be a barrier to applying. 

Role overview and job description: 

The LWA now has over 2400 members across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and we continue to expand and recruit more members and supporters. Part of our vision is to improve the livelihoods of our members. A gap in our provision towards this aim has been an offering of more direct support and services which have to date been variable and dependent on geographical and sector limitations, often based on available grant funding. 

Over the growth of the LWA there have been many ideas of services we can offer members and where support is needed and what the LWA is best placed to offer as a grassroots member-led alliance. Ideas to date have included offering advice and support around planning, fundraising, business development, tenancy negotiations, conflict mediation, employment law and more. There have also been desires to establish services such as insurance packages, pension schemes, bulk buying discounts and more tangible member benefits.

The purpose of this role is to investigate what a coherent services and support offering to our membership could include, what it would look like and how it could be financially viable. 

The role will entail first conducting a feasibility study for support and services - including;

• Mapping the current offering by the LWA and other organisations in the movement
• Conducting research with our members of their needs and analysing the findings
• Market research of identified areas for potential services and support
• Investigate potential for peer to peer models of support vs bought in expertise
• Bringing in external expertise as needed 
• Based on findings, creating a detailed, costed and scheduled project plan

The outputs of the role would be: 

• A well thought out and modelled business/project plan detailing the cost and benefits of a membership support and services offer
• A finance plan - whether through a fundraising strategy, an overhaul of our membership fee structure or other income generation ideas.
• A costed out timeline for next steps and implementation
• Role description(s) and support for recruitment process 
• Presentation of the findings of the feasibility study to membership, training and operations team, and sign off of the project plan by the coordinating group

We are seeking a confident and skilled community facilitator, researcher and project manager with business planning experience who understands the complex issues and dynamics surrounding food, farming, forestry and landwork in the UK. 

Person Specification: 

We hope to appoint someone for this role who has the following skills or experiences:

• Strong communication and facilitation skills
• Business planning experience
• Service & support delivery/coordination
• Understanding of membership structures. 
• Strong financial and analytics skills 
• Research and writing skills
• The ability to work in a diverse team, develop work plans, monitor progress, self manage and keep organised, work autonomously where necessary and report on work done
• Skilled in using multiple communication tools
• An understanding of the history, objectives, members and vision of the LWA
• Knowledge of the organisations working on food and farming in the UK
• A passion and demonstrable commitment to movement led change to develop food sovereignty and agroecology

If not all of these specifications are met, external expertise can be brought in to aide the project so please don’t be put off if your experience doesn’t fully meet these criteria; we are interested in hearing where you would look to find appropriate external support to bring these skills to the work where appropriate to your particular skills and experience.

Application information

How to apply 

In order to address any potential unconscious bias in our selection process we are committed to anonymising applications. Please provide your name and contact details in the main body of your application email only. Please remove your name and contact details from your CV, responses to questions and any other supporting documents.

Please send (max) 3 pages written cover letter, or alternatively (max) 5 minutes audio / video to demonstrate how you meet the above person specification, making sure to address each point and providing evidence where appropriate. 

Also attach a short CV (max 2 pages), as above this can be written, or an audio or video file, and the contact details of two people we can approach for references. 

Please send your application to: admin@landworkersalliance.org.uk with ‘Member Services’ in the subject heading. 

We aim to contact all applicants individually but as we are a small team working part-time this may not practically be possible. If you have not heard from us by 10th February 2024 please assume that unfortunately you have not been selected for interview this time. 

If you have any questions, or would like to discuss any aspect of this role in advance of applying please contact admin@landworkersalliance.org.uk. Please email well in advance of the closing date.

Start date: March 2025 

Closing date for applications: Friday 31st January 2025       

Interview period:  W/C 6th February 2025

Please mention Roots to Work when applying for these jobs