Head of Educator Development

WSET's purpose is to empower people through inspiring learning experiences all over the world. We offer a comprehensive suite of globally recognised qualifications covering wines, spirits and sake.

We are the world’s leading provider of qualifications in wines, spirits and sake, delivering over 140,000 exams each year to candidates in over 70 countries via our network of Approved Programme Providers (APPs).

The successful applicant will contribute to a culture of integrity, empowerment, dynamism, and inclusivity within WSET.

The Head of Educator Development is a key role at the forefront of improving the quality of education for students through inspiring and empowering all WSET educators. The role will lead development of a strategic plan to establish and strengthen direct relationships with educators globally with the aim of enhancing their professional growth, strengthening advocacy, and creating better insight to improve the educational experience of students.
The role ensures we have aligned plans to meet our strategic aims, is responsible for developing new and existing programmes for educators and for operational delivery of global educator training programmes.

Strategic vision and planning

- Develop a plan to establish and strengthen direct relationships with educators globally with the aim of enhancing their professional growth, strengthening advocacy, and creating better insight to improve the educational experience of students.

- Collaborate with key stakeholders to understand and align with WSET's strategic aims.

- Inspire and empower all WSET educators, ensuring they feel supported, valued, and equipped to deliver high-quality education.

- Develop and enhance existing educator training programmes, ensuring they are scalable to meet global growth.

Developing existing and new programmes

- Oversee the alignment of all educator programmes and resources with current and future WSET offerings in all categories and languages.

- Innovate and create new programmes for educators that align with WSET's mission and cater to diverse educational needs globally.

- Manage content development for training modules across all WSET qualifications, adhering to best educational practices.

- Conduct testing to ensure content meets student needs and WSET standards.

- Collaborate with other teams in Product to ensure consistency of content across student and educator resources.

Operational delivery of existing programmes

- Manage the Educator Development team to schedule programmes in multiple locations to meet business demands.

- Organize ad-hoc training to meet development requirements.

- Proactively manage the resource pool of trainers and assessors ensuring volume and location meets global needs for delivery.

- Oversee administration, including applications, allocations, bookings, preparation, results, certificates, and record management.

- Monitor and report on global delivery and assessment to uphold high standards of consistency and validity.

Skills and Competencies

Leadership and Vision:

- Ability to inspire, motivate, and lead a team towards a common vision.

- Strategic mindset to develop and communicate a compelling vision for educator development aligned with WSET's mission.

Educational Expertise and creativity:

- Creativity to innovate and develop educational programmes that align with global educational needs.

- Understanding of best educational practices and the ability to apply them in programme development.

WSET Product knowledge:

- Holds highest WSET qualifications in at least one of the categories wine, spirits or sake and certified WSET educator.

Relationship Building and communication:

- Strong collaboration skills to work with internal and external stakeholders.

- Clear and concise communication skills to articulate strategies, expectations, and updates.

Operational and budget management:

- Ability to proactively manage trainer and assessor resources globally to meet delivery needs.

- Strong organizational skills to oversee programme administration, ensuring smooth operations.

- Proficiency in developing and managing budgets.

Definitions:

Fully remote - Can be performed entirely remotely from any location.

Hybrid remote - Performed as a mixture of in-office and remote work.

Temporarily remote - Performed in a single location, such as an office or at a job site, but which is temporarily remote during special circumstances).

UK Benefits

Annual Leave - 27 days pa + public holidays, increases with service; ability to buy/sell 5 days

Pension (options available after three months):

5% Employee (EE) 3% Employer (ER) contributions.

Option 1: 3% EE 5% ER

Option 2: 5% EE 8% ER

Option 3: 7.5% EE 12.5% ER

Option 4: 9% EE 15% ER

Health insurance (after three months):

Vitality scheme - post probation - Access to virtual GP appointments, Rewards include Caffe Nero drinks, Cinema Tickets, Apple Watch, Cash Back on Waitrose shopping, Amazon Prime membership, 75% off at Champneys, 6 month subscription with HeadSpace, Discounted Weight Watchers membership and gyms, Smoking Cessation day worth £300 and half price health screens

Eye voucher scheme

Food and drink in the office

Nespresso coffee makers and a range of other drinks, fruit, cereals, soups

Season ticket & gym membership loan scheme

Group income protection scheme

EAP

24/7 confidential help and support from trained counsellors and advisors

Death in service

4x annual salary paid to nominees with associated bereavement support for family

Enhanced family friendly leave and pay

Celebration vouchers

Cycle2Work scheme

Discretionary bonus

Development - WSET's in-house training and qualifications in Wines, Spirits, Sake and Beer as well as other professional development opportunities

USA benefits

US benefit options will be discussed during further stages of communication.

US Applicants Only:

Physical Demands:
The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodation may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

ESSENTIAL
While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit and talk or hear. The employee frequently is required to stand; walk; use hands to finger, handle, or feel; and reach with hands and arms. The employee is occasionally required to climb or balance; stoop; kneel, crouch, and taste or smell. The employee must regularly lift and/or move up to 50 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, depth perception, peripheral vision, and ability to adjust and focus.

DISCLAIMER: This is not necessarily an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, duties, skills, efforts, requirements or working conditions associated with the job. While this is intended to be an accurate reflection of the current job, management reserves the right to revise the job or to require that other or different tasks be performed as assigned, at any time.