Head of Collaboration Partnership

About the role

Post: Head of Collaboration Partnership

Total positions: 3

Contract: Permanent (subject to probationary period)

Hours: Full-time

Compensation: Up to £65,000. Comprehensive pension scheme (up to 6% employer contribution), cash plan healthcare package, and professional development budget.

Location: Hybrid. We are recruiting for three Heads of Collaboration Partnership. These roles will be based in three separate Mayoral Combined Authorities across the country. The locations are not yet confirmed, so we are accepting applications from candidates nationwide. The final locations will be based on MCAs who are selected as Collaboration Partners with the FEA. These will be announced on 8 December at the Fair Education Summit.

Each post holder will be required to work three days a week in the location of a specific Mayoral Combined Authority (at their offices and in the community). You can select the areas you are available to work in as part of the application process.

This role also requires regular travel to the FEA office in central London.

After passing probation, up to four weeks ‘super remote’ working per year, where you can work anywhere in the world as long as you’re online for four hours of the UK workday.

Holidays: 38 days per year, including our 3-day winter shutdown and eight flexible bank holidays

Start Date: Early 2026 (or as soon as possible - to be agreed with the successful candidate)

Closing: 5:30pm on 12th Nov 2025

Overall Purpose

These are three new roles at the Fair Education Alliance, leading the partnerships with Mayoral Combined Authorities (MCAs) who are selected as Collaboration Partners, and working with all MCAs through the Combined Authority Network. These are the two new areas of work for the FEA, which are fundamental to our place-based collaboration under the Neighbourhood to National strategy.

Each Head of Collaboration Partnership will work closely with the Combined Authority to develop and implement ambitious ideas in each MCA to close the education, skills and employment gaps for children and young people in the area. You will work from the MCA’s office about two days a week, and you’ll likely spend another day a week in the community, with FEA members and other local stakeholders. You will make sure that systems change, FEA approaches and learning from across all of our work are embedded into the Collaboration Partnership. And crucially, you will ensure that the Partnership leans on the superpower that is the FEA membership network across the region, alongside schools, young people and businesses.

This is a new and emergent area of work, and the exact day-to-day will be dependent on the strengths of each MCA and region, and the idea being tested through the partnership. You will play a key role in ensuring that learning and evaluation are embedded into the approaches, that youth engagement is a key factor driving the work, and that what is being uncovered in MCAs is feeding into policy change.

You will need to be highly collaborative, committed to systems change, comfortable with working through ambiguity, see the incredible potential for MCAs, and be passionate about long-lasting change for children and young people. Now, and into the future.