The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association
Regional Academy Manager
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Travel Requirements
Your region covers a large area and includes Scotland, Northern Ireland and northern England. The role will therefore require extensive travel and overnight stays. You will also be required to travel to various meetings and development days across the UK several times a year. When not travelling your work can be undertaken from home or from your local Guide Dogs office.
Guide Dogs Academy is looking for a Regional Academy Manager
Guide Dogs Academy is looking for a Regional Academy Manager to lead and support our Academy teams across our northern region, helping to create an outstanding learning experience for trainees while ensuring the needs of the people we support remain at the heart of everything we do.
Online information session
We're holding an online information session on Thursday 6th August from 6pm – 7pm for you to learn more about the role. Please do join us! Register here
What is Guide Dogs Academy?
The Academy is how we recruit, train and develop our technical staff (the people training the dogs, our clients, and then the partnership together). It’s not a physical building – instead, our learners are based in local teams all around the country with their own Academy tutor (called a Technical Learning Specialist), who teaches one small cohort of learners at a time. Find out more about Guide Dogs Academy on our website: https://www.guidedogs.org.uk/about-us/careers/guide-dogs-academy/
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About the role
You'll be managing a team of Technical Learning Specialists who work day to day on site with their cohort of up to three learners who are training to become our Guide Dog Trainers and Guide Dog Mobility Specialists of the future.
Working closely with operational colleagues from across Guide Dogs and the Academy Core Team you'll focus on supporting learners through their learning journey, ensuring high-quality training, consistent standards and positive outcomes for both our learners and service users.
This is a leadership role where you'll bring people together, build strong partnerships, use data and insight to drive improvements, and help create an environment where people can learn, develop and thrive.
Key Responsibilities
- Lead and develop your team of Technical Learning Specialists
- Ensure a high-quality, inclusive learner experience.
- Monitor learner progress and support development.
- Partner with operational teams and stakeholders to drive learner success.
- Use data and feedback to improve quality and performance.
- Promote compliance, safeguarding, health & safety, and best practice.
- Take ownership of learner outcomes and the impact on service delivery.
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About You
You'll be an experienced people manager who enjoys developing others and helping teams achieve their full potential. You'll be comfortable influencing a range of stakeholders, making decisions using data and insight, and leading change in a collaborative way.
You'll also bring:
- Experience of implementing, managing and ensuring continuous improvement for learners on a large-scale learning programme (e.g. an apprenticeship)
- A strong understanding of learning, development and capability building.
- Experience working collaboratively across different teams and functions.
- The ability to analyse information and use it to improve performance and outcomes.
- Strong organisational, planning and communication skills.
- A commitment to continuous improvement and delivering high-quality outcomes.
Assessment Dates
We'll be holding a series of short telephone interviews on Monday 24th and Tuesday 25th August for shortlisted candidates.
If successful following the telephone screening you'll be invited to an in person assessment day on Thursday 3rd or Friday 4th September in Newcastle.
If you have any questions about the role or the recruitment process please contact Helen Crowther, Academy Recruiting Manager, on 0161 6191338 or helen.crowther@guidedogs.org.uk
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