Looking for a new Chairperson to lead our Board of Trustees

BID Services is a charity. We work in partnership with children, young people, adults, their families and carers. We support people with a sensory loss including those who are deaf, hard of hearing, visually impaired or have a dual sensory loss. Our aim is to make a positive difference to the people we support by offering a range of innovative services that empower people to control their own lives.

We are recruiting a new Chairperson for our Board of Trustees and would like to hear from those who feel they have the commitment, drive and passion to help us shape our future. We seek a dynamic individual who will take a principal role, using their background, experience and influence to lead the trustees and work alongside the senior management team to develop new services, deliver our long term vision and progress our strategies.

We want to strengthen our board of trustees so that we maintain the expertise, knowledge and skills needed to develop our services and commercial products. As such, the brief for the role is broad, with an expectation that our new Chairperson will possess superior skills in a number of the following areas:

• Adept at building relationships, developing new partnerships and networking
• Good links and collaborations within the third sector, healthcare, local authority and corporates
• A solid understanding of the political landscape and the ability to influence policy decisions
• An entrepreneurial flair with a keen eye for growing and developing commercial opportunities
• An understanding of the needs of people with a sensory loss
• Fundraising and business development skills
• A strong financial background
• A knowledge of social enterprises, with a particular focus on conferencing, interpreting and employment
• An ability to champion and raise awareness of issues relating to sensory impairment, influencing change where this is possible
• An understanding of marketing

Our 3 - 5 year Strategic Aims

We have identified a number of strategic aims that we want to achieve:

• Build enduring relationships and high engagement with service users by involving them in the co-production of our services, resulting in high involvement about decisions that affect them and maximising their independence
• Identify new partnerships and relationships, collaborating with other third sector organisations and communities, to allow us to offer more and better services to the client groups we support.
• Continue to support people to live health, active and independent lives.
• Continue to support people to increase confidence, acquire new skills and secure and retain employment.
• Grow our commercial businesses including our social enterprise conference venue and our sign language interpreting service
• Invest in developing our IT strength, so we can collect and analyse a range of data that can be used to improve service delivery, identify gaps in services and support commissioners with future commissioning needs.
• Champion and raise awareness of issues relating to sensory impairment, facilitating and influencing change where we can.
• Invest in the ongoing training and development of our staff teams, trustees and volunteers to support our changing service models and fundraising efforts.

Time Commitment

Trustees will be required to attend an induction session at BID Services prior to their first board meeting. Trustees are expected to attend all board meetings, which are held 6 times per year during the evening in Birmingham. Trustees may also be asked to contribute their expertise by participating in steering groups and acting as subject experts on particular projects as appropriate.

How to apply

We want to make the application process as easy as possible. If you are interested in learning more about this opportunity, or just want an informal chat with our Chief Executive, please send an email to Gail Penberthy, gail.penberthy@bid.org.uk

Ideally, we would like to have the new Chair in post by December, 2018.

About BID Services

We are a well established charity with a long history of supporting children, young people and adults with a sensory loss as well as their families and carers. We support people who use our services from our Head Office in Birmingham, West Midlands and from our regional offices in Cumbria, Durham, Huddersfield, Leeds, Milton Keynes and Northumberland.

Through our innovative service delivery, we strive to achieve the best possible outcomes for the clients we support. We work in partnership with them to maximise independence, improve mobility and ensure they have the right information and advice to help them achieve a better quality of life.

Our specialist services areas focus around hearing and sight loss and include advocacy, employment, specialist information and advice, rehabilitation, British Sign Language interpreting and training, eye and hearing care, specialist equipment support, residential placements, social work, support for tinnitus and housing related services.

Our social enterprise business, the Signing Tree Venue provides a high quality conference, meeting and event spaces, located within the award-winning Deaf Cultural Centre building in Birmingham which also houses the charity's main office and cafe. The Signing Tree Venue and onsite cafe offers employment and training opportunities to people with a sensory loss, as well as supporting a range of community, arts and leisure activities.

Our Mission

"We are here to make a positive difference to the people we support by providing innovative services that empower people to control their own lives".

Posted 18th September 2018