Job description

The King’s community is dedicated to the service of society. King’s Strategic Vision 2029 sets out our vision for the future, shaped around five priority areas: educate to inspire and improve; research to inform and innovate; serve to shape and transform; a civic university at the heart of London; and an international community that services the world. Our ambitious Education Strategy sets out the actions that we must take to transform how we teach, how and where our students learn and how we support them during their time with us.  

Libraries & Collections comprises four departments: Education & Learning, Research & Impact, Service Design & Delivery, along with Business Operations. We are part of the Students & Education Directorate, which manages the student lifecycle from application to graduation and beyond.  

This role is based within Service Design & Delivery, which is responsible for designing and delivering services for Libraries & Collections that enhance the experience for individuals from across the King’s community.     

The purpose of the post is to co-ordinate the delivery of frontline services, in support of an innovative and sustainable Libraries & Collections service. Coordinators work with the Library Frontline Manager to provide welcoming, supportive and accessible services and environments that empower learning and support study and research. The role involves developing knowledge of specific home site(s) requirements and identifying service opportunities to meet these needs, balancing advocacy for site nuance with a need for cross-site consistency. The role will require regular collaboration as part of a team of Frontline Coordinators.  

This is an exciting opportunity for candidates looking to gain experience in supervising operational services, who wish to utilise their skills and expertise in managing and motivating staff, and developing and maintaining networks. This is an opportunity to grow your skills in flexibly adapting frontline resources informed by user feedback, colleague insight, and your own knowledge and experience. 

All Libraries & Collections staff are encouraged to take responsibility for their own performance and development, through agreeing clear objectives, maintaining professional awareness, participating in professional networks and reflecting on own performance. We expect all co-ordinators to role-model a positive, proactive, flexible and committed approach that inspires others.   

You will be required to participate in frontline services as required, including contributing towards a rota for evening and weekend working.   

This post will be offered as a permanent post.

This is a full-time post .

Key responsibilities

• Work independently to resolve a range of sometimes complex problems and provide guidance across Libraries & Collections in relation to Frontline Services  
• Manage people, through project or line management, in order to deliver high quality services  
• Role-model a positive, proactive, flexible and committed approach that inspires others  
• Facilitate an environment of continuous improvement, through open communication and constructive feedback  
• Deliver training to a range of audiences  
• Co-ordinate, interpret and apply the implementation and use of Business Intelligence to steer operational service planning and decision making, identifying gaps and barriers to success and ensuring workflows are effective and efficient   
• Co-ordinate and participate in the delivery of frontline services at your home site(s), working with local teams and colleagues across Libraries & Collections to ensure service points are staffed and shelving is carried out   
• Supervise and monitor the library spaces to ensure the environment, technology, signage and promotional materials are up to date and fit to support frontline services  
• Supervise local customer feedback processes and complaints, acting as a point of escalation or referring as appropriate  
• Undertake administrative duties at your home site to support the delivery of frontline services

The above list of responsibilities may not be exhaustive, and the post holder will be required to undertake such tasks and responsibilities as may reasonably be expected within the scope and grading of the post. 

Skills, knowledge, and experience 

Essential criteria   

1. Relevant work experience and/or education: We think a wide range of different work and educational experiences could support you to be successful in this role. Relevant work experience might include work in Library, or customer-facing service. Relevant educational experiences might include higher education in a related discipline, professional qualifications or other training  
2. Excellent oral and written communication skills, including the ability to present information to a range of different audiences  
3. Experience in positively and proactively resolving a range of problems  
4. Experience of supervising staff  
5. Ability to work independently in a fast-changing environment and to meet challenging deadlines  
6. Ability to work effectively and proactively with own team, other teams and with our stakeholders to provide a high-quality service  
7. Up-to-date knowledge of data protection and copyright legislation  
8. Commitment to equity, equality, diversity and inclusivity in your own learning and ways of working  
9. Experience of delivering excellent customer service in a team environment    
10. Ability to prioritise and organise own workload and those of assigned staff    
11. Ability to influence service design and delivery through effective upwards management and feedback  

Desirable criteria  

1. Educated to first degree level or professionally accredited library/information/archives qualification.  
2. Understanding of the current and future challenges facing academic libraries in research-intensive universities  
3. Experience of co-ordinating projects and/or service improvements  
4. Experience of supporting yourself and others through change