Programme Manager

Peterborough City Council is recruiting two Programme Managers to lead delivery of Pride in Place, our flagship neighbourhood-based, community-led regeneration programme.

This is a rare opportunity to play a visible, influential leadership role in shaping tangible improvements to everyday life for residents - while also operating at senior programme level, managing complexity, public funding and high-profile governance.

About Pride in Place

Pride in Place is a new government funding programme aimed at putting power into the hands of local people in some of the most in-need neighbourhoods across the UK, so that they can decide how to regenerate their local area. In Peterborough, Pride in Place Neighbourhood Boards will cover Paston, Gunthorpe and Welland, and Orton Malborne and Orton Goldhay, with up to £20 million of funding for each neighbourhood.

Each neighbourhood has an independent Board and Chair, supported by the Council as accountable body. The programme focuses on strengthening local pride, opportunity and resilience through community-defined priorities.

As Programme Manager, your role is to enable - not replace - community leadership, turning ambition into deliverable, well-governed programmes that achieve real-world outcomes.

About the role

You will provide named programme leadership for a designated Pride in Place neighbourhood, acting as the single point of accountability for delivery, progress and assurance.

Working closely with an independent Neighbourhood Board, you will:

Translate community priorities into structured, costed programmes and projects
Maintain delivery momentum across a complex, multi-year programme
Ensure robust governance, financial control and compliance as required of a local authority accountable body
Build confidence, capability and readiness within the Board for increasing community autonomy over time

This post is offered on an initial fixed-term basis for two years. Pride in Place is a long-term, place-based programme with the ambition to transition over time to a more autonomous, community-led delivery vehicle. Subject to programme phase, funding and governance arrangements, there is potential for this role to extend beyond the initial contract period, including opportunities to support or transition into future community-led delivery models.

What you'll be responsible for

Programme leadership & delivery - Lead the place-based programme end-to-end, keeping plans on track, managing risk and dependencies, and overseeing commissioning, grants and contracts to deliver measurable neighbourhood outcomes.

Community led governance - Enable Neighbourhood Boards to make informed, inclusive decisions by providing clear papers and evidence, facilitating planning and decision-making sessions, and embedding lived experience and accessibility throughout.

Accountable body & assurance - Manage circa £2m p.a. public funding, ensuring compliance, audit-ready controls, and clear programme, performance and financial reporting.

Partnership & stakeholder management - Act as the link between communities, the Council and partners, influencing across boundaries to unblock delivery and representing the programme confidently in public, political and community settings.

We're looking for experienced programme leaders who can combine delivery discipline with empathy, influence and community awareness., Significant experience leading complex programmes or portfolios, ideally in public sector, partnership or place-based settings
Strong programme management skills (planning, governance, benefits, RAID, assurance)
Experience working with diverse stakeholders, including Boards, elected Members and communities
Confidence managing budgets, public funding and accountability
An enabling leadership style that supports others to lead and grow
Excellent communication skills - able to translate complexity into clarity

Experience of community-led regeneration, neighbourhood governance, grant funding or VCSE partnership working is an advantage, but we value transferable programme leadership skills and mindset above sector-specific experience.