Group Director - Customer & Communications

Group Director, Customer & Communications

Location: Flexible/Hybrid
Contract: Permanent | Full-time (37.5 hours per week)
Salary: £140,000 to £180,000 plus £7,400 cash car allowance
Working pattern: Home-based with regular travel between London and Bradford

Help Shape the Experience of Every Customer and Resident

At Anchor, we're committed to helping people live well in later life. As England's largest not-for-profit provider of housing and care for older people, we support thousands of residents and customers across the country every day.

We're now looking for an exceptional leader to join our Senior Leadership Team in the newly created role of Group Director, Customer & Communications.

This is one of Anchor's most influential leadership positions. Reporting to the Executive Director, Resources, you will lead a broad portfolio spanning customer services, resident engagement, communications and corporate business support, helping to shape how Anchor listens to, understands and responds to the people we serve.

As a member of the Senior Leadership Team, you will play a key role in shaping organisational strategy and performance, ensuring that customer insight and resident voice inform decision-making across the business. Working closely with Executive colleagues, the Board and resident representatives, you will strengthen customer outcomes, drive continuous improvement and enhance Anchor's reputation as a trusted provider of housing and care services.

Leading through the Director of Communications, Brand & Marketing, Director of Resident Engagement & Customer Voice and Director of Customer Services, you will bring together customer experience, engagement and communications to build trust, strengthen our reputation and improve the everyday lives of the people who call an Anchor property home.

About the Role

This is a unique opportunity to shape how Anchor engages with, listens to and delivers for its customers and residents.

You will be responsible for ensuring customer insight, resident voice and organisational learning are embedded within decision-making at every level, helping to shape long-term strategies that improve services, strengthen engagement and deliver better outcomes for customers.

Working closely with Executive colleagues, the Board and resident representatives, you will provide strategic leadership across customer experience, customer services, complaints, communications, marketing, brand and resident engagement. You will use insight, influence and innovation to strengthen customer outcomes, drive service improvement and ensure feedback translates into meaningful action.

Home is at the centre of people's lives. For our residents and customers, the quality of their home, the services they receive and the extent to which they feel heard and valued have a direct impact on their wellbeing, independence and quality of life. This role provides a rare opportunity to influence the experiences of thousands of people across the country, ensuring customers remain at the heart of every decision we make.

About You

You will be an experienced senior leader with a track record of leading customer-focused services, communications, engagement or reputational functions within a large, complex organisation.

You will bring:

• Significant leadership experience, operating at Director level or above, with responsibility for shaping organisational strategy and performance.
• A strong track record of improving customer outcomes and embedding customer insight within decision-making.
• Experience leading large, multidisciplinary teams through senior leaders.
• The ability to influence and build credibility with Executive Teams, Boards and a wide range of internal and external stakeholders.
• Experience driving organisational change, service improvement and cultural transformation.
• Outstanding communication and relationship-building skills, with the ability to translate strategic ambition into tangible outcomes.

Most importantly, you will understand the profound difference that a safe, secure and well-managed home can make to people's lives. You will be passionate about ensuring that customer voice shapes strategy, informs decision-making and leads to better outcomes for residents and customers across Anchor.

Why Join Anchor?

This is an opportunity to shape one of the most important leadership portfolios within our organisation.

You'll play a key role in ensuring residents' voices are heard, customer experiences continually improve and Anchor's reputation remains strong as we deliver our strategic ambitions.

Most importantly, you'll make a meaningful difference to the lives of thousands of people in later life.

Why Join Anchor?

At Anchor, we're united by a shared purpose: helping people create a home where they love living in later life. As England's largest not-for-profit provider of housing and care for older people, every pound we make or save is reinvested into our residents, services, and colleagues.

Our values of being Accountable, Respectful, Courageous and Honest shape everything we do. They guide how we work together, support our residents and customers, and create an environment where everyone can thrive.

We're committed to helping our colleagues succeed both professionally and personally. Through our dedicated Being Well programme, you'll have access to a wide range of wellbeing, financial and lifestyle benefits designed to support you at every stage of your career and life.

What you can expect from us

• Health and wellbeing support, including free eye tests and flu jabs, access to a digital gym, virtual physiotherapy, a clinical advice line, and digital GP services, giving you practical support for your physical, mental and emotional wellbeing.
• Generous pension scheme, where you contribute between 4% and 8% and Anchor matches or exceeds your contribution, with employer contributions of up to 10%, plus a pension transfer service, retirement planning support and free life cover.
• The opportunity to buy or sell up to one week of annual leave each year, giving you greater flexibility to balance work and personal commitments.
• A free Blue Light Card giving you access to Shopping, travel, technology and lifestyle discounts.
• Ongoing learning and development, Leadership Pathways resources and opportunities to progress your career.

Celebrating diversity, celebrating you

Anchor is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We aim to celebrate diversity and inclusion in all that we do, as we know that the more diverse our colleagues are, the better care and support we can give to our residents and each other.  

We are proud to have an inclusion group for our residents, as well as colleague networks for disability, LGBTQ+, race and ethnicity, and unpaid carers. These work to celebrate diversity, address concerns, review policy and practice and empower their members.  We also have an Inclusive Ambassador network to allow all colleagues to be part of promoting diversity and to be an ally to others.

We are a Gold Standard Inclusive Employer, a Stonewall Diversity Champion, signatory to the Care Leaver Covenant, LGBTQ+ Housing Pledge Pioneers and members of the Age Friendly Employer Pledge.