Head of Social Impact

Head of Social Impact
Location: London, Kings Cross (Hybrid)

At RS we’ve been solving engineering problems for over 80 years: big ones, small ones, easy and difficult ones. We turn the ‘what ifs’ into the ‘why nots’, the impossible into the possible.  

Our purpose? Making amazing happen for a better world.  

We're a FTSE listed, market-leading, global brand renowned for our extensive engineering service and product solutions. We send out a parcel every 2 seconds, to over 130 countries. We provide over 700,000 in-stock and over 3 million unstocked products to more than 1.2 million customers. 

We are one team
We deliver brilliantly 
We do the right thing 
We make every day better

These are our values. They unite our 9,000 global colleagues and differentiate us from our competition. They are a mix of how we work today and how we must step up for the future. Most importantly, it is one set of values shaped by our people, for our people.

We are looking for an accomplished social impact leader to take our vibrant Youth and Community programme to the next level of excellence. Your mission will be to extend our social impact for young people and communities across our global footprint while supporting our wider strategic progression. Key to this will be deepening strategic stakeholder engagement (internally and externally), aligning our Youth programme more closely with our People and Customer strategies, and developing measurable benefits for RS and our stakeholders.  

About the role:

This is an exciting opportunity to lead the RS Youth and Community programme, developing the skills of future engineers and innovators and supporting our communities worldwide. This role is integral to our business, driving our purpose of making amazing happen for a better world, enabling our strategy, driving brand advocacy, achieving our 2030 ESG goals and delivering more value for all our stakeholders.

Our Commitment to Championing Youth and Communities:  We are committed to inspiring the next generation of engineers and innovators and supporting our communities worldwide to improve people’s lives and create a more sustainable world. Our 2030 goals include:

• Supporting the skills development of 1 million young engineer and innovators
• Improving 100,000 lives through our global social partnership, currently with The Washing Machine Project 
• 50% of our people to use their 2 volunteering days p.a. to make a meaningful impact in their communities 

Inspiring Young Engineers and Innovators: Our extensive network and partnerships with educational institutions, including over 5,000 universities, schools, and colleges worldwide, enable us to support the development of young engineers and innovators from the start of their higher education through their early careers and beyond. By championing skills development and inspiring purpose-driven engineering solutions, we aim to create meaningful career opportunities for young industrialists to make a difference. We are also building a talent pipeline for RS and the wider industry, distinguishing the RS brand and driving early brand advocacy, all while strengthening our strategic partnerships with our customers.

Supporting Communities: We are committed to empowering our employees to make a positive impact in their communities. Through our global social impact partnership with The Washing Machine Project, our global community fund and employee volunteering programmes, we foster a culture of giving back to the communities in which we operate, as well as the personal growth and experience of our people. 

What you will be doing:

 Develop a gold-standard youth and community strategy, initiatives and investment plan across our global footprint, which extends our social impact for young people and communities, while enabling strategic progression and commercial value creation for RS and our stakeholders.

• Create a stronger social value proposition aligned to the RS brand and strategy with tangible and measurable benefits for RS and our stakeholders.
• Lead, develop, and engage your team of youth and community experts who sit within the wider ESG team.
• Inspire and build relationships with regional and functional teams across all levels of our global matrix organisation. Encourage input into the development and delivery of the programme, create alignment, and mobilise their support to deliver greater social and business benefits.
• Enable key RS markets to localise and implement our youth and community programme to have a positive impact on young industrialists, develop talent pipelines for RS and our customers and create RS brand advocates. 
• Work closely with the RS people team to create a closer talent pipeline connection, enabling highly skilled young students to join RS and supporting our long-term strategic workforce plan.  
• Build and nurture relationships with key external stakeholders – young people, universities, youth groups, charity and agency partners, customers and suppliers.
• Track, monitor and report on progress and outcomes using relevant metrics and KPIs, ensuring that data can be audited and reported with confidence.
• Partner with our marketing, communications and ESG teams to develop and execute a robust marcomms strategy to enhance stakeholder engagement and value-add, at a global, regional and country level.
• Nurture vibrant youth communities that strategically help us to grow our brand and encourage students and young professional engineers to act as RS brand advocates.
• Be a thought leader on social impact topics across our marcomms channels and represent RS at industry forums, conferences and events.

What we are looking for from you:

We are a looking for an accomplished social impact and commercially astute business leader, who is a strategic-thinker, social entrepreneur and mobiliser. You will have ability, passion and energy to elevate our Youth and Community programme to new heights, by extending our social impact, creating closer alignment with our strategy and delivering long-term value creation for all our stakeholders. The ideal candidate will have:

• Proven experience in developing and leading social impact programmes that deliver meaningful and measurable, social and business benefits.
• Strong leadership and strategic planning skills.
• Proven experience of leading and delivering in complex, commercially-orientated matrix organisations, preferably global.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder mobilisation and leadership abilities.
• A passion for purpose and values, and ideally, a thought leader in education, skills and community development.

We are RS Group

At RS we’ve been solving engineering problems for over 80 years: big ones, small ones, easy and difficult ones. We turn the ‘what ifs’ into the ‘why nots’, the impossible into the possible.  

Our purpose? Making amazing happen for a better world.  

We offer service and product solutions. We send out a parcel every 2 seconds, to over 130 countries. We provide over 700,000 in-stock and over 3 million unstocked products to more than 1.2 million customers.  

We want people like you, as you are curious about things, you like doing things differently and also in a human way with empathy. Because that’s exactly how we partner with people – our customers, suppliers, colleagues and communities – to solve problems.  

We’ll also invest in your development and wellbeing – because building a more diverse and inclusive culture, being ethical, responsible and committed to our Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) action plan is at the heart of everything we do. 

Come and join us and over 9000 employees worldwide – and we’ll help you to think big, do more and unleash your brilliance, so you do amazing things too.

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