Director of Nature and Species Recovery

Closing date:
Sunday 22 November 2026 Salary: up to £80,000 per annum Contract type:
Permanent /

Working hours:

Full time

Location:

Predominantly home-based with regular travel across the UK. There may be an opportunity to on occasion work from the offices at a local Wildlife Trust.

Are you passionate about restoring nature at scale and helping create a future where people and wildlife thrive together? Do you have the vision, ambition and strategic leadership experience to bring together partners, communities, Wildlife Trusts and funders behind a shared ambition to recover nature across land, freshwater, coastal & rural landscapes?
The Wildlife Trusts are looking for an inspiring, collaborative and values-driven leader with expertise in landscape-scale nature recovery, ecological restoration, strategic partnerships and innovation to lead one of the most exciting areas of our work.

This is a unique opportunity to help shape how nature recovers across the UK. You will be a visible advocate for nature recovery and a trusted ambassador for The Wildlife Trusts, the wider federation and the conservation sector. Comfortable operating at senior levels, you will represent the movement externally with credibility and authority, building influential relationships and communicating a compelling vision for nature’s recovery across media, policy, partnership and public platform.

As Director of Nature and Species Recovery, you will provide strategic leadership for The Wildlife Trusts’ ambitions to restore nature at scale through landscape recovery, species recovery, nature recovery networks, ecological restoration, rural landscapes and rewilding. Working across our federation of 46 independent Wildlife Trusts, you will help create the conditions for ambitious, collaborative action that delivers lasting impact for wildlife, climate and people.

Whether through helping Wildlife Trusts develop landscape-scale recovery projects, fostering collaboration across regions and habitats, building partnerships capable of delivering transformative change, or influencing national conversations about the future of nature recovery, you will play a pivotal role in helping deliver our vision for a wilder future.

You will lead work that brings together local action and national ambition, helping individual Wildlife Trusts maximise their contribution to our shared goal of putting nature into recovery. You will champion innovation, evidence‑led practice and learning across the federation, ensuring local success contributes to collective impact.

In addition, you will provide strategic oversight of The Wildlife Trusts’ engagement with International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) programmes, partnerships and standards, ensuring best practice and learning to strengthen our work and influence.

As a member of our Senior Leadership Team, you will help shape organisational strategy, contribute to our culture and values, and strengthen the impact of one of the UK’s largest and most influential nature movements. At a time when nature and climate face unprecedented challenges, this role offers an exceptional opportunity to help create nature-rich landscapes where wildlife and people can flourish for generations to come.

We are looking for a highly strategic, collaborative and values‑driven leader with the vision, credibility and expertise to influence at the highest levels.

You will combine excellent ecological understanding with exceptional relationship‑building skills, enabling you to bring together diverse stakeholders around a shared vision for nature recovery. Comfortable operating within complex environments, you will excel at building partnerships, developing ambitious programmes and…