Chair, Islington Housing Improvement Board (Interims)
London Borough of Islington
n/a - n/a
£54 per hour
222 Upper Street, London, N1 1XR
Temporary
Fixed-Term
Role
Islington Council
If you're looking for an Independent Chair role where you can use your housing, governance, and leadership expertise to support meaningful improvement for residents, we're delighted you've joined this talent pool.
About the Opportunity
Islington Council is seeking expressions of interest from experienced and respected housing leaders for the role of Independent Chair of the Housing Improvement Board.
This is a significant leadership opportunity to provide impartial oversight, constructive challenge, and strategic direction to the Council's Housing Improvement Programme. The successful Chair will play a key role in ensuring improvement activity delivers better outcomes for tenants and leaseholders, strengthens governance and accountability, and supports the Council in achieving sustainable service excellence.
The Chair will bring extensive knowledge of the housing sector, including current legislation, regulation, and best practice, helping the Council learn from sector insights while maintaining a clear focus on resident experience, service performance, and regulatory compliance.
Key Responsibilities
Strategic Leadership
- Chair Housing Improvement Board meetings, ensuring discussions remain focused, evidence-based, and outcome-oriented.
- Provide independent support and challenge to officers and stakeholders responsible for housing improvement activities.
- Maintain a clear strategic focus on improvement priorities and resident outcomes.
- Promote continuous improvement, transparency, and accountability across housing services.
Assurance and Scrutiny
- Provide independent assurance and scrutiny of the Housing Improvement Programme.
- Ensure the Board receives robust performance, risk, and delivery information.
- Escalate concerns relating to delivery, resources, governance, or risk where appropriate.
- Challenge underperformance and seek evidence that corrective actions are being implemented effectively.
Resident Focus
- Champion the interests of tenants and leaseholders.
- Ensure resident insight, feedback, and lived experience inform decision-making and improvement activity.
- Promote meaningful resident engagement that influences service delivery and outcomes.
Stakeholder Engagement
- Act as an independent ambassador for the Housing Improvement Programme.
- Engage with elected Members, senior leaders, residents, partner organisations, and other stakeholders as required.
- Facilitate constructive discussion where there are competing priorities, delivery challenges, or areas of concern.
Continuous Improvement and Learning
- Draw on good practice from across social housing, local government, and regulatory sectors.
- Support the Council in identifying opportunities for innovation and service improvement.
- Share learning and insights that help strengthen governance, performance, and resident outcomes.
Compliance
- Support adherence to relevant legal, regulatory, and policy requirements, including housing regulation, GDPR, health and safety, and wider governance requirements.
Who We're Looking For
We are interested in hearing from individuals who can demonstrate:
Essential Experience and Expertise
- Significant senior leadership experience within the housing sector.
- Experience chairing boards, commissions, or governance forums, with strong meeting discipline and follow-through.
- Deep and up-to-date knowledge of housing law, regulation, social housing management, landlord responsibilities, and the relationship between service performance, resident trust, and regulatory compliance.
- Experience leading large-scale organisational improvement programmes.
- Strong experience of performance scrutiny, assurance, benefits realisation, and risk management.
- The ability to interpret performance, financial, and assurance information to identify emerging risks, issues, and opportunities.
- Excellent relationship-building skills and the ability to facilitate constructive challenge and difficult conversations in complex organisational and political environments.
- Strong written, verbal, chairing, and facilitation skills, with the ability to communicate complex information clearly and objectively.
- Sound evidence-based judgement and decision-making capability, including knowing when to support, challenge, or escalate concerns.
- A demonstrable commitment to equality, diversity, inclusion, and improving outcomes for residents experiencing inequality or disadvantage.
Desirable Experience
- Experience working with elected Members, senior executives, regulators, residents, and partner organisations.