Community Development Coordinator

Are you ready to make a real difference in the community for people affected by dementia and their families?

Do you possess the skills to engage people with lived experience of dementia in shaping more inclusive communities and services?

Can you adapt your communication style to connect with any audience?

Yes? We'd love to tell you more...

We have an incredibly rewarding and meaningful opportunity to join us as a Community Development Coordinator with a focus on lived experience and involvement covering the whole of the Essex area. This role plays an instrumental part in making strong trusted relationships with people affected by dementia, families and carers within communities and diverse groups to support them to attend workshops and focus groups or community networks, Alzheimer's Society have a commitment to working with people with lived experience. This ensures that we create and adapt our services to be meaningful and reflect the needs of our service users. This role helps to embed this value and a improve dementia awareness and inclusivity in our communities, businesses and with stakeholders. The successful individual will be working with the support of the team to ensure that individuals, local communities and health services have access to vital information about dementia support, ensuring that lived experience remains a real focus in local communities.

This is a highly rewarding and outward-facing role, focused on building strong relationships across diverse communities. You will engage and network with people at all levels—from senior healthcare professionals to people affected by dementia, their families and carers. Through community-specific workshops, awareness sessions and partnership working, you will help reduce health inequalities and improve access to dementia support across Essex.

You will be joining an established, knowledgeable and well-respected team, sharing learning, insight and best practice. Our work is rooted in communities, and we have built trusted relationships with local partners, professionals and people affected by dementia.

The service is recognised for its commitment to working collaboratively to ensure dementia support reaches those who need it most, including underrepresented and seldom-heard communities. This role involves significant time spent working directly in communities. You will identify opportunities to promote services, build trust, facilitate workshops and strengthen local networks to improve dementia awareness and support.

You will focus on:

• Actively engage with communities across Essex, facilitating and attending community events, local forums and networking opportunities to raise awareness of dementia services.
• Build and maintain relationships with a wide range of stakeholders, from senior healthcare professionals (delivering presentations and briefings) to community leaders, charities and grassroots organisations.
• Deliver community-specific workshops and awareness sessions, working collaboratively with both internal colleagues and external partners.
• Develop strong links with organisations delivering similar or complementary services, helping to create a robust and collaborative local network.
• Influence and motivate individuals and organisations to take action, often encouraging people to work beyond their usual roles to create meaningful, long-term change.
• Gathering knowledge from communities—understanding what works, what doesn’t, and why—and using this learning to continuously improve engagement and reduce health inequalities, including those affecting smaller or less visible groups.
• Support and enable community members and volunteers who wish to run groups, events or activities, working alongside and empowering them to take action.
• Work flexibly, including some evening and weekend work, to meet community needs and attend events.

You will possess:

• Confidence and ability to approach and build trusting relationships with a diverse range of organisations and individuals including unrepresented or seldom-heard groups
• Skills and ability to coordinate and facilitate groups and workshops
• Understanding of equity, diversity and health.
• Have an understanding of dementia or be keen to develop knowledge of its impact on people diagnosed and those who care for them.
• Take a proactive approach and be motivated to achieve positive, meaningful outcomes.

Dementia is the UK’s biggest killer. One in three people born in the UK today will develop dementia in their lifetime.

At Alzheimer’s Society, we’re the UK’s leading dementia charity and the only one to tackle all aspects of dementia by giving help and hope to people living with dementia today and in the future. We give vital support to people facing the most frightening times of their lives, while also funding groundbreaking research and campaigning to make dementia the priority it should be.

Together with our supporters, we’re working towards a world where dementia no longer devastates lives.

Our values make sure that our focus is clear for the challenges and opportunities ahead and remind us of what we all stand for.

Our commitment to Equity, Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging

We need to ensure the voices around our table better reflect and understand the communities we exist to serve. We strongly encourage individuals to apply who have a disability, impairment or health condition or individuals who identify as Black, Asian or from another minority ethnic background, as these groups are currently under-represented at Alzheimer's Society.  

We want everyone we work with, as a colleague, volunteer, supporter, or someone we support, to feel included and that they belong at Alzheimer's Society. 

Our Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy here along with our internal employee forum and Employee Lived Experience network groups help us promote inclusion and belonging, becoming an engaged and inclusive organisation for all our people. 

Our hiring process

During your recruitment process we want to make sure that you bring your whole self and can be at your best. We are working hard to ensure our recruitment process is as inclusive as possible, so please do inform us of your experience and anything you think we could do better by completing our candidate survey when you apply.  Please also contact Alzheimer’s Society Talent Acquisition Team via [email protected] for application support or any adjustments you might need.

To ensure fairness and consistency to select the best candidate for this role, all our applications are anonymised up until an interview has been confirmed. We recognise the benefits of AI, but if you're considering using it to submit your application, we encourage you to reflect on the value it truly adds. AI tools often lack the personal touch and authenticity that set candidates apart. We want to hear your unique perspective, experiences, and skills, so we encourage you to showcase them in your own voice.

We try to avoid closing roles early where possible, however if we receive a high volume of applications, we may close earlier than the advertised closing date. Should this occur, we will aim to provide you with at least 48 hours' notice.

We are committed to safer recruitment and ensuring the welfare of those we work with, due to the nature of some of our roles, we might need to carry out a DBS check at the relevant level.

Giving back to you

Our employees work hard every day to make a true difference in people's lives. We are proud to support them with a range of benefits, recognition and many options for working agilely, all contributing to a strong work life balance. We also have various learning programmes to support you in your development and help you grow to realise your potential and shape a career with Alzheimer's Society. 

You can also visit our Working for Us pages, which give you more information about what it’s like to be an employee at the Society.