King's College London

About us

The Faculty of Arts & Humanities plays a key role in delivering King’s College London’s commitment to addressing society’s grand challenges; making this happen through a wide range of intellectual exploration and innovative, interdisciplinary cultural understanding. As a University deeply rooted in both long-standing tradition and radical innovation, Arts & Humanities exemplifies our ambition to blend our long history of academic excellence with groundbreaking approaches to contemporary issues.   

About the role

This role is an excellent opportunity for an experienced higher education manager to contribute to the ongoing and future success of Arts & Humanities at King’s.

The Head of Cluster Operations leads up the professional services team within one of the three ‘Clusters’ within the Faculty. Reporting directly to the Director of Operations, they will work in close partnership with the academic Head of Cluster and Heads of Department to ensure that the academic endeavour is strengthened and supported by excellent professional services provision. Utilising their substantial experience in operational management, they will ensure the effective implementation and delivery of administration to the departments in their cluster, providing oversight and leadership, and work in close liaison with heads of functional areas in the Faculty and beyond to ensure that processes are fit for purpose, and service standards to key stakeholders (students and staff) are met and exceeded.

The Head of Cluster Operations is an integral member of the Faculty Executive and Leadership teams, and the Professional Services Leadership Team. Through this wide committee membership, they contribute to planning, strategy and policy development, and its operational implementation.

This is a full time post (35 Hours per week), and you will be offered an indefinite contract. 

About you

To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience: 

Essential criteria

1. Substantial experience within the Higher Education sector, and a detailed knowledge of the regulatory, policy and procedural context along with the challenges and opportunities within the current UK HEI context.
2. Demonstrable experience of strategic planning and implementation, including preparing budgets, business cases and plans, and monitoring key performance indicators, budgets and risks. High degree of numeracy and the proven ability to analyse statistical data to underpin financial strategic decisions and procedure
3. Proven skills in ensuring excellent service delivery and business continuity planning / implementation
4. Ability to adapt to a changing workload, work under pressure and meet tight deadlines while maintaining enthusiasm and a “can-do” attitude.
5. Excellent staff management and leadership skills, backed by experience of leading and managing large multi-skilled teams; proven commitment to ongoing skills development in self and others
6. Excellent communication, negotiation and influencing skills at all levels
7. Proven ability to manage change, and lead colleagues through challenging times
8. A commitment to inclusive management and team leadership practice, actively addressing areas of potential bias and creating an inclusive culture in which all team members can thrive. Demonstrable alignment to King’s Principles in Action.

Desirable criteria

1. Educated to degree level or equivalent and/or holding a relevant postgraduate or professional qualification

Downloading a copy of our Job Description 

Full details of the role and the skills, knowledge and experience required can be found in the Job Description document, provided at the bottom of the next page after you click “Apply Now”. This document will provide information of what criteria will be assessed at each stage of the recruitment process.

Further information

We pride ourselves on being inclusive and welcoming. We embrace diversity and want everyone to feel that they belong and are connected to others in our community.

We are committed to working with our staff and unions on these and other issues, to continue to support our people and to develop a diverse and inclusive culture at King's.

We ask all candidates to submit a copy of their CV, and a supporting statement, detailing how they meet the essential criteria listed in the advert. If we receive a strong field of candidates, we may use the desirable criteria to choose our final shortlist, so please include your evidence against these where possible.

To find out how our managers will review your application, please take a look at our ‘How we Recruit’ pages.

Interviews are due to be held in week commencing 07 or 14 April 2025 - TBC.

We are able to offer sponsorship for candidates who do not currently possess the right to work in the UK