Responsibilities

• External Communications and External Affairs Strategy and Planning - responsible for the broad communications approach across Acas. This includes: identifying priority audiences; developing objectives and desired outcomes, aligning with Government priorities where appropriate.
• Deliver an Annual Communications and External Affairs Strategic Plan, launch and campaign plans, quarterly forward look and fortnightly Grid. You will collaborate with senior leaders to align these strategies and each team’s channel/functional plans.
• Strategic comms evaluation– Lead formal annual evaluation and informal lessons learnt to drive impact, oversee occasional communications evaluative research.
• Insight and messaging - Lead research to understand our target audiences’ attitudes, habits and preferences to ensure Acas communications have impact, using data, personas and segmentations to target messages. Create compelling messages and manage occasional message research.
• Governance – responsible for communications governance, managing a Comms Steering Group, overseeing performance reports, analysing campaign performance and progress against KPIs and ensuring good decision-making and change control. Coordinate external assurance, such as Council or Audit, and overseereporting and data to the CEO and Board as required.
• Equality, diversity and inclusion – provide oversight to ensure Acas communications and external affairs represents the society served, is accessible and fulfils PSED obligations. Oversee team equality impact assessments.
• Effectively manage resources and budget for the team, which will have a small research and evaluation budget.
• More broadly as a communications professional you will:
• Uphold good engagement and communications principles and best practice to improve the quality of external communications and stakeholder engagement across the organisation within GCS best practice.
• Ensure all activities are clear, simple and consistent with other Government organisations, managing duplication and minimising complexity.

Requirements

• Experience:
• Communications Strategy - experience managing external communications/affairs/public affairs planning and influencing activity – particularly media, marketing, external affairs, Government Affairs and influencing systems. (Lead criterion)
• Governance – experience of programme/project management, working with Boards, co-ordinating reporting and decision-making.
• Relationships - Strong communication and negotiation skills having worked with senior leaders to understand businesses requirements and an ability to develop trusted and authoritative two-way relationships. Experience of working with external stakeholders on joint communications activity.
• Insight – experience of using audience insight to develop communications plans. Experience using communications, audience, insight, channel or message research. Experience creating, using audience personas and segmentations. Experience commissioning or managing communications, audience, insight, channel or message research.
• Messaging – excellent skills writing key messages and developing capability in others. Excellent written and verbal briefing skills with effective personal impact and confidence in verbal and written briefings to senior leaders.

Preferred

• Desirable Criteria - (the following will be assessed only in the event of tie-breaker scenarios):
• Experience: Sector knowledge - Experience in strategic External Communications/Affairs in any of the following: government departments; Parliament; think tanks; non-profit; business and industry; and/or trade associations on issues relating to workplace policy, employment rights and challenges facing employers and employees in the GB market.
• Qualification:
• Third level qualification in business strategy, Degree or Masters relevant to public policy, business management, communications or external affairs or equivalent experience at a senior level.
• Professional Communications Qualification.

Benefits

• Learning and Development;
• Health and wellbeing;
• Pension scheme;
• Cycle to work scheme;
• Interest free season ticket loans;
• Volunteering opportunities.
• Could you ask for any more?
• You’ll have access to a Lifestyle website, where you’ll be able to grab savings over a wide range of products from holidays to your weekly shop.