• Location: Perth preferred, flexible for the right candidate
  

Do you have a track record in community engagement and co-design that has delivered impactful outcomes for communities? Are you known as a listener and learner who can authentically relate to and engage with real people?

We are looking for an authentic, committed and creative individual who can build partnerships and facilitate knowledge exchange to help create extraordinary impact for Australian children, families and communities.

If being part of a start-up with ambitions to work at speed and scale sounds motivating and exciting, we’d love to hear from you.

How you will help us

Participation in high quality early learning supports young children to thrive and families to flourish.

Yet many families across Australia live in communities with limited or no access to early learning and care.

Coaxial Foundation is committed to changing that. Over the next decade, we will work at scale and speed to establish early years services in underserved communities – supporting children to flourish, families to thrive and contributing evidence and stories to support systems change.

Why we need you

More than just a director of community engagement, we seek a deliverer who can elevate community voices to ensure early years services meet the needs of local children, families and communities – to help realise the potential of more Australians.

What we need in you

We are looking for an experienced community engagement specialist with a track record in community engagement and co-design which has resulted in positive impact for disadvantaged and/or regional and rural communities.

Experience in community engagement that has successfully delivered infrastructure projects, or experience establishing early years services would be considered a plus.

You will take the reins leading our strategic and people-first approach to partnering, as well as on-the-ground efforts. This role will play a pivotal role in ensuring people in local communities walk alongside us in co-designing work to establish early years services and solutions that genuinely meet the needs of children and families.

Working directly with communities you are someone who naturally earns trust and builds rapport. You are a welcomed presence - a person who lives and breathes community life; is motivated by a genuine desire for social change; thrives in collaborative environments; and approaches challenges with creativity, optimism and pragmatism. You also have experience nurturing and developing a diverse, outcomes focussed team.

You are a keen listener, humble learner and take a hands-on approach to building robust collaborative relationships that deliver. You enjoy using your skills and expertise to help a nimble team and partners execute priority projects and work that aims to make a lasting difference in the lives of Australians.

If you’re ready to roll up your sleeves and help lead this transformative work, we’d love to hear from you.

What you’ll do

• Be a human hub for knowledge exchange – Actively connect and share valuable information between expert collaborators and local knowledge holders, you capture the needs and capabilities of the communities we are invited to work with.
• Strategic design – Refine and formalise Coaxial Foundation’s community engagement framework, ensuring it balances opportunities for deep community relationships with our ambition to work at scale.
• Support establishment of early childhood education and care infrastructure & services – Collaborate with our team, partners and communities to design and deliver infrastructure, workforce and integrated offerings that meet local child, family and community needs.
• Engage & listen– Build relationships with communities and conduct listening sessions to ensure their voices guide our work.
• Co-design solutions – Work alongside partners and communities to co-create services and offerings to meet local needs.
• Facilitate participation – Design and lead workshops, roundtables, and engagement activities that bring people together and foster meaningful dialogue and learning opportunities.
• Support partnerships – Work with local organisations, service providers, grassroots partners and third-party agencies to achieve mutual goals.
• Drive implementation – Translate community engagement strategies into action, ensuring plans are delivered effectively and with community input.

• Track & report impact – Measure and report on the success of our efforts to ensure accountability and continuous improvement.
• Embed community voice in strategy – Ensure our initiatives stay connected to the lived experiences of those we seek to support.
• Address challenges – Develop strategies to address barriers to participation and to increase quality of early education and care services.
• Support systems change – Provide data and insights from local community experiences to back advocacy for broader systems change. Surface on the ground successes and challenges to support system change advocacy efforts.

Key skills & capabilities

• Strategic design – Ability to implement effective community engagement strategies that can be delivered at scale - drawing on experience, best practices and creative solutions.
• Infrastructure readiness – Experience supporting communities to become ‘shovel ready’ – supporting infrastructure projects from concept to doors opening would be considered a plus.
• Community-led approach – Skilled at co-designing initiatives with communities and partners, ensuring solutions are locally relevant.
• Relationship building – Ability to form strong, lasting partnerships with community members, organisations, and stakeholders.
• Cultural competency – Experience working with diverse communities, including First Nations and those in disadvantaged, regional, rural, and remote settings.
• Facilitation & communication – Strong facilitation and communication skills, able to lead discussions and communicate complex ideas in simple accessible ways.
• Systems thinking – Able to see the broader picture, surfacing local successes and challenges to support advocacy for systems change.
• Adaptability & problem-solving – Comfortable navigating ambiguity and finding practical solutions.
• Project delivery – Hands-on experience implementing and managing community and partner projects to achieve tangible outcomes.
• Data & impact measurement – Ability to support efforts to track, analyse, and report on community engagement impact using both qualitative and quantitative data.
• Collaboration & cross-sector engagement – Works well across teams and stakeholders to align community needs with broader initiatives.

How you’ll work

• You’ll balance strategic planning with hands-on work, ensuring that community engagement leads to tangible results.
• You’ll be in the field, traveling to regional and rural areas, meeting with community members and partners - facilitating discussions which ensure local needs shape our work.
• You will work collaboratively, sharing insights and surfacing community needs to influence program thinking and delivery.
• You will think creatively, finding new ways to engage communities, build trust, work at scale and achieve lasting impact.
• You will embrace learning, continuously improving our approach based on community feedback and real-world results.
• You’ll be flexible, offering your skills and expertise to support a small agile team in delivering priority projects.