Isobel Thomas Email & Phone Number

Sheffield, Gb

I lead Good Things Foundation's Community Engagement and Experience team.The team’s purpose is to develop and deliver our strategies to grow and strengthen our UK network of community partners and ensure that they - and the people they support - benefit from the resources and support we offer to help fix the digital divide, including our online learning platforms, Learn My Way and Make It Click.We work closely with community organisations throughout the UK to: grow our network (the National Digital Inclusion Network); ensure our network membership offer is the best it can be; inspire and support community organisations to embed digital inclusion in their work; and build their capacity to do this well - through direct provision of training, learning and development and through facilitating peer-support and specialist networks.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

I am a Programmes and Partnerships Manager. In this role I work with a range of funding partners to deliver digital inclusion programmes. Partners are from the private and public sectors.I lead project matrix teams to ensure that we deliver project key performance indicators. This involves the whole project cycle from bid development, project kick-off, project planning and reporting as well as end of project reporting and retrospectives.Recent programmes include:- A place-based digital inclusion programme in partnership with a local authority in the north of England.- Designing and delivering a capacity building programme to build the digital capability of voluntary sector organisations, in partnership with a large UK bank.- A large government funded digital skills programme.

I was seconded part-time from Good Things Foundation for six months to help the West Midlands Combined Authority develop their understanding of and approach to digital inclusion at a regional level.During this time I: - Supported the development of the West Midlands Coalition for Digital Inclusion including developing the Vision, Mission, Values and Action Plan for the Coalition and identifying new stakeholders to join the Coalition, particularly representatives from the voluntary sector. - Helped deepen stakeholders' understanding of the digital exclusion challenge across the region through developing a digital inclusion map of the region showing data relating to need, provision and deprivation. I also commissioned some peer research to understand how people who are digitally excluded in their communities connect and how digital may help them.- Developed a proposal for investment to support people who do not traditionally access more formal skills provision to get online and benefit from digital.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

I worked as an Associate for Healthwatch Sheffield. I designed and delivered the evaluation of two multi stakeholder projects aimed at increasing citizen voice and social action in health and social care. This is what Margaret Kilner, Chief Officer for Healthwatch Sheffield said about my work:"Isobel worked with us to design and deliver the evaluations of two multi stakeholder projects focused on increasing citizen voice and social action in health and social care. Isobel is a pleasure to work with, with an approach that is both supportive and objective. The technical elements of the projects were delivered to a high standard, this involved project planning, evaluation design, liaising with numerous stakeholder, rapid data review, interviews, options appraisal and recommendations.Her ability to build relationships fast, coupled with a systematic approach to project management and data meant that both pieces of work were completed to time and with excellent insight."

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Zest is a social enterprise and charity based in a deprived neighbourhood in Sheffield. I was responsible for: - New Business Development: I developed and wrote contract proposals and grant funding applications. In my final year at Zest I secured £450,000 worth of contracts with Sheffield City Council. - Team leadership: I led the charity's health team of seven staff and was responsible for ensuring the teams services and projects delivered their key performance indicators. I also worked with the team to look at how services may need to be redesigned to fit in with the changing strategic landscape. In my last year in post, I developed the charity's approach to social prescribing and worked with local GP practices to develop a referral pathway. - Financial management: I set and controlled service area budgets. I set annual budgets, completed quarterly monitoring information and produced budget outturns. I regularly reviewed financial management information to ensure that budgets were spending to target. - Monitoring and evaluation: I competed monitoring reports providing data on key performance indicators. I am used RAG rating systems of monitoring performance and risk as part of this process.

Youth Consortium Sheffield (YCS) was a consortium of third sector organisations delivering activities and services for children and young people in the city. As Consortium Manager I was responsible for identifying potential business opportunities such as contracts and funding opportunities; deciding with stakeholders whether particular opportunities were likely to deliver benefit to consortium members and their customers and then developing tenders/funding bids. I developed tenders of significant contract value such as Kids Can Do (which secured a contract value of £384,000) and on funding bids such as the National Citizen Service. I was also responsible for developing distinct ‘products’ that the consortium could sell.I ran a Quality Pilot Project which looked at measuring the quality of service delivery of member organisations. This approach to quality is currently being adopted by Sheffield City Council.In addition I developed a Social Media project which supported member organisations to make use of social media including Facebook and Twitter to market their services.

North West Sheffield Regeneration Partnership aimed to improve the services for residents in NW Sheffield. It was a partnership between the voluntary sector, statutory services and local residents.As Partnership Development Manager I worked on a pilot neighbourhood management scheme which aimed to involve local people in shaping services. I also secured grant funding for the staff team and developed a local Young People's Fund which awarded small grants to small community organisations to deliver activities for children and young people.I managed the small staff team and developed good working relationships with all the partners involved.

London, United Kingdom

My responsibilities included writing press releases; "selling" stories to the national media; briefing senior managers on media interviews and developing trusted relationships with national media outlets and individual journalists.

Bachelor Of Arts (Ba), French And Russian, 2.1

Master Of Science (Msc), Urban Regeneration, Distinction

Gcses And A-Levels