Outlandish is seeking a talented, pro-active, and socially-engaged individual to project manage a variety of tech-for-good projects and strategically bring in new business.

Location: North London Office (at SPACE4, Finsbury Park).

Hours: 3 days a week at 7.5 hours/day (22.5 hours per week). Our business days are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday with core hours 10:00-15:00.

Remote Working: Some remote working is possible, though we would expect you to be in our London coworking space, SPACE4, twice a week. We expect the candidate to be based in the UK, with full rights to work in the UK.

Rate: £55k per annum pro rata.

Holiday: 25 days paid holiday pro rata + bank holidays. Unpaid leave available.

Start date: Between February and March 2025.

Contract type: Nine months fixed term, with a hope to turn this into a permanent contract if you join the cooperative as a member.

Deadline and Application: To apply for this role, please send a CV and covering letter to jobs@outlandish.com by 9am on Monday 6th January 2025. Interviews will be held the week of the 13th January.

Job Purpose

To deliver a range of client tech projects as a Digital Project Manager
To join our business development team and increase new sales
To carry out account management in our ‘Sponsor’ role in order to increase sales to existing clients and ensure we are delivering high-quality and valuable services and products
To find opportunities to improve our internal processes around project management and sales to make Outlandish more impactful and effective

We are a digital agency working on socially impactful tech projects. We specialise in complex data-led websites, tools and campaigns but we also work on whatever is impactful at the time.

We are looking for a proactive Digital Project Manager to take ownership and responsibility for our spread of existing client support projects, initially. We hope to expand this into chunkier client projects as and when we secure them in 2025.

Part of your role will be to actively participate in sales work. You will be joining our business development team to generate new work from new clients. We’d love for you to attend and speak at external events to put Outlandish on the map. You will also act as a ‘Sponsor’ – account manager – for a range of existing clients to strategically upsell our services. We are seeking someone with significant sales experience who can bring their knowledge to improve our processes and networks for winning work.

Skills are only part of what we look for. You’ll be able to use your interest for social justice, activism, the environment and more by collaborating with clients who are invested in projects that make the world better.

We are a worker-cooperative and you will join our agency as an ‘Outlander’ – our term for a ‘Member in training’ – for the first nine-months on a fixed-term contract. During this period you will learn about cooperatives and the roles and responsibilities of being a full Member. You will be part of our Members meetings and participate in discussions around our business strategy. It is our hope that after this period you will apply to join our cooperative membership permanently and become a co-director of the business. If you decide not to or your application is unsuccessful, we won’t be able to continue working with you.

Your weeks will therefore be a mix of internal and external work. You’ll work closely with our five co-owners (Members) as well as with our larger team of regular freelancers (Collaborators).

We especially encourage applications from groups that are underrepresented throughout the technology industry i.e. women, disabled people and people of colour, since a team that can bring different perspectives, ideas and thoughts together will effectively deliver awesome work.

Key responsibilities:

We expect the balance of the role to change after the first nine months and we will discuss and design this collaboratively with you at the time.

Sales – 55%

Increase Sales: Drive sales of new design and technology projects, supported by the business development team.
Account Management: Act as a ‘Sponsor’ for existing clients, maintaining relationships and identifying opportunities for new projects.
Proposals & Pitches: Write proposals for new projects and lead client pitches to secure work.
Business Growth: Proactively identify and pursue opportunities to expand Outlandish’s client base.
Networking & Representation: Attend industry and tech-for-good events to connect with potential clients, represent Outlandish, and speak in relevant forums.

Project Management & Product Ownership – 35%

Project Leadership: Act as a ‘Producer’ to collaborate with Developers, Designers, and Clients in discovering and defining solutions that achieve project goals.
Agile Methodology: Where budgets and goals allow, use agile practices and help clients understand time-and-materials project management.
Budgeting & Planning: Create and manage project budgets, sprint plans, and timelines to ensure delivery within scope and budget.
Sprint Management: Work with Technical Leads to define sprints, create tasks, and estimate effort.
Product Delivery: Oversee the design and development of various builds, including websites, web apps, data tools, dashboards, and research-focused projects.
User Stories: Translate client needs into well-defined user stories for developers and designers.
User Research: Conduct user research and workshops in collaboration with the UX and design teams.
Quality Assurance: Perform QA testing to ensure high standards in deliverables.
Ongoing Support: Help clients plan and schedule support, updates, and backlog management.
Producer Support: Act as a ‘Sponsor’ for other Producers, providing guidance at key points like project kick-offs or scope changes.

Journey to Cooperative Membership – 10%

Collaborative Working: Develop an understanding of our cooperative ways of working and actively contribute to decision-making processes.
Business Growth: Share ideas and energy to sustain and grow the business, while identifying areas for improvement and proposing optimisations.
Engagement with the Movement: Participate in the wider cooperative movement by attending meetings, conferences, and engaging with networks like CoTech, Workers.coop, and Co-operatives UK.

Candidate Profile

Essential

5+ years of experience working in a digital agency or similar organisation
Proven track record of selling or commissioning digital products and services between £50k and £100k.
Confidence in face-to-face networking and public speaking.
Ability to devise, plan and deliver technical web builds.
Familiarity with iterative development of complex projects.
Good approach to problem solving and decision making around product development.
Able to communicate technical aspects to non-technical people.
Enjoy working with a diverse range of team members and skills, including designers, developers and more.
Experience of developing new systems and processes within an organisation
Interest in becoming a member of a cooperative (and co-director of a small business).
Good interpersonal skills and approach to collaboration.

Desirable

Interest in working in a non-hierarchical business setting.
An existing relevant network of industry experts and potential clients.
Experience of delivering tech-for-good projects.
Ability to work outside of standard office hours sometimes to attend events and client meetings.
Interest in data-led projects.
Familiarity with Agile project management.

About Outlandish

Outlandish is a small, worker-controlled digital agency. We are a worker cooperative. We have existed since 2011. Currently we have 5 members, and we work with about 10 additional collaborators. We work with an exciting range of clients, including trade unions, NGOs, public sector organisations, campaigners, charities and research organisations. And we don’t just talk the talk; we reinvest 100% of our surplus income into socially impactful projects.

Our theory of change is to live and share a transformative approach to tech business that brings about positive social change, balanced with the importance of a positive working environment. We wrote a blog about how we defined it.

About Membership of the Co-operative

This role is offered on a nine-month fixed term contract. After that point, our hope is that, pending the success of the first 9 months, the candidate would be interested in continuing the role on a permanent basis, and becoming a legal member of the cooperative. We expect our members to demonstrate leadership across the whole company, and to take initiative to make it the best possible place to work.

What we offer

Employee Status

You will be an employee of Outlandish, meaning Outlandish will pay your National Insurance Contributions (NICs)

Autonomy

You won’t have a manager or boss. You’ll have the opportunity to bring proposals to members and relevant teams to shape the company and your role.

Pension

3% employer contributions with 5% less tax relief employee contributions. Employees can raise their personal contributions if desired.

Paternity and Maternity Pay

Employees are paid statutory pay only for their maternity and paternity leave

Holiday

25 days pro rata, plus bank holidays. You can also request unpaid leave.

Training

Employees can attend training that is relevant to their role – the fee for the training, and your time will be paid. We don’t have a strict limit per year for this, it’s usually around £500-1000 per year per person for training fees.

As well as training provided by external experts, training includes time to shadow another team member in order to build on existing skills and develop new skills. We expect people to be proactive in identifying training opportunities.

Lunches and Socials

On Tuesdays we pay for lunch for all team members who are in the office. We’re quite a social co-operative, and we try to organise regular opportunities for going out together for food, drinks and other activities. We try to organise a company-wide Away Day once per year where we allocate some time for strategic activities and some time for socialising.

Equipment

Outlandish pays for equipment needed to deliver your work. This includes but it is not exclusive to: mobile phone, laptop, office chair, monitor, microphone.

Please note that benefits and perks increase once you become a member of the cooperative.

We are hiring a Digital Project Manager & Business Development Specialist