Spatial Agency Project Lead

Terms

Employed by: Makespace Oxfordshire CBS

Salary: £34,925 per annum, pro rata (0.4 FTE)

Starting date: Oct/ Nov 2026

Contract: 3-year fixed term (Ends Oct 2029)

Hours: part time, 0.4 FTE (around 2 days per week), worked flexibly; some evening and weekend work around cohort sessions.

Holiday: 25 days + bank holidays (pro rata)

Pension: Statutory (3%) employer contribution to the NEST pension scheme

Role scope

The Spatial Agency Project Lead develops and leads Makespace’s new Spatial Agency programme: a cohort-based learning journey that supports community leaders to find, secure and manage space of their own. 

Over three years it will work with up to 20 leaders, in two cohorts of ten, prioritising those with lived experience of poverty, disadvantage or discrimination to gain the skills, confidence and support to shape and curate space, build power and play an active role in design, control and ownership of their neighbourhoods. 

Spatial Agency is one half of a National Lottery funded programme: Reclaiming Place. Rebuilding Power. It sits alongside the complimentary Common Room project; a pilot model for a free, open-access citizen-led space, or “public living room”.

This role will design, curate and lead the Spatial Agency training programme, working in close collaboration with the Makespace team and community of consultants and collaborators, utilising the knowledge, skills and learning from Makespace’s work unlocking space across Oxfordshire over the last decade. 

Spatial Agency is rooted in Makespace’s north star vision for spatial justice and built around our emerging DREAMS framework, a step-by-step approach to unlocking and stewarding space: Define, Research, Explore, Approach, Make, Steward.

Is it the right job for you?

This role is for someone who values how people learn as much as what they learn. Spatial Agency is a new peer learning journey, supporting community leaders in identifying, unlocking, retrofitting, and stewarding of land and buildings in their neighbourhoods. You will enable the forming of deep relationships through peer learning, building skills and knowledge through expert input, tools, approaches and the experience of leading Community Asset Developers.

You’ll be someone who can think strategically about a whole programme while also caring about the quality of each session and connection. You’re a confident trainer and project manager, comfortable translating approaches and ideas into accessible and engaging learning resources.

You’ll bring patience for the pace peer learning demands, curiosity about ecological retrofit and spatial justice, and the confidence to set direction without needing to be the expert. Experience in place shaping or community assets is a plus, but not essential. The role offers a flexible working pattern, busier during teaching periods and lighter during assessment and reflection. If this sounds like you, it could be a great fit.

How to apply

We don’t ask for CVs. Please read through our Application Pack for full details about the role and then complete our Application Form. 

If you’d like to work offline before you submit your application, here is a .docx copy of the application questions.

If invited to interview we will give you the questions in advance. We want to have a conversation, rather than giving you a memory test.

The deadline for applications has been extended until Monday 21st Sept 9am.

This role is funded by The National Lottery Reaching Communities Fund.

Communities Development Lead

Terms: 

Employed by: Makespace Oxfordshire CBS

Salary: £34,925 per annum (pro rata)

Starting date: Oct/Nov 2026

Contract: permanent

Hours: 0.8 FTE   Partially funded (0.4) by the National Lottery 

Holiday: 25 days + bank holidays

Pension: Statutory (3%) employer contribution to the NEST pension scheme

Role scope

The Communities Lead holds the strategy, mission and yearly plan for community development across Makespace’s buildings, and leads and manages the Communities Team in line with our organisational strategy and our North Star of spatial justice. The purpose of the role is to widen access to space and build local capacity and agency, creating an environment where Makespace and local residents can transform their neighbourhoods towards social justice and ecological resilience.

The role is also the strategic and project lead for our funded community work: currently the Common Rooms project within a three-year National Lottery programme, Reclaiming Place. Rebuilding Power. Alongside any future funded community projects. This role manages the Community Organisers, who hold the day-to-day support of residents and the running of the Common Rooms, so this role can stay lighter-touch and focused on the bigger picture.

Is it the right job for you?

This role suits someone who is confident and adept at leading a team or a programme, and feels at home being accountable for how something turns out. You hold the wider view naturally, whilst still paying close attention to the details to ensure high quality and timely delivery.

You’ll be someone who can hold several projects at once without losing sight of the bigger picture, you are comfortable setting priorities, working under pressure, and comfortable making a call and being accountable for it. You lead with and through others. You’re a natural collaborator, excellent listener, empowering enabler and able to bring people along the journey with you; whether that’s team members, local residents or partners. You know how to turn a good idea into an action plan with a set of deliverables that makes a real impact.

You can hold a vision for where the work is heading, translating it into clear, steady guidance for the people you’re responsible for day to day. You read relationships well, and you know when to step in and when to let someone find their own way. If that mix of vision, making impact and care for people appeals, this could suit you well.

How to apply

We don’t ask for CVs. Please read through our Application Pack for full details about the role and then complete our Application Form. 

If you’d like to work offline before you submit your application, here is a .docx copy of the application questions.

If invited to interview we will give you the questions in advance. We want to have a conversation, rather than giving you a memory test.

The deadline for applications has been extended until Monday 21st Sept 9am.

This role is funded by The National Lottery Reaching Communities Fund.

We recognise that systemic inequalities exist and have developed an inclusive approach to recruitment that takes positive action. We actively encourage applications from global majority candidates.

If you need any adjustments to apply or to interview, please contact us at info@makespaceoxford.org. You do not need to explain why, and asking will not affect how your application is considered.

We are excited by people that can add new skills, perspectives and experiences to the team. We know this will help us grow as an organisation.

If the below describes you, then we want to hear from you:

• An effective collaborator, good at listening, understanding people’s needs and building capacity within the community
• Good at working with competing demands and comfortable with high levels of autonomy.
• Curious when it comes to new ways of working and keen to help build a strong and connected team.

We want to challenge ourselves not to fall back on “traditional” ways of doing things, but to question how the design of new roles, together with an inclusive recruitment and onboarding approach, could lead us to a range of candidates who can bring something new to our team.

We recognise that systemic inequalities exist and have developed an inclusive approach to recruitment that takes positive action and lives up to being an anti-oppressive organisation in line with our Equity, Equality, Diversity and Inclusion commitments. We actively encourage applications from global majority candidates; we aim to have a staff and board team that fully represent the communities we serve.