Campaigns Manager: Office of the Public Guardian

Grade: HEO

Location: National with regular travel to our offices in Nottingham, Birmingham and London

Overview

We’re on the lookout for an enthusiastic and creative communicator to join our team on a fixed term basis and help design and deliver important, innovative campaigns.

As a Campaigns Manager, you’ll lead external communications that help people understand, access and use our vital services, and play a key role in delivering our transformation priorities.

You’ll be confident using data and insight to improve our campaigns and will have experience of using online and offline channels to engage different audiences. You will play a key role in bringing stories and our customer information to life, while embedding diversity and accessibility throughout.

We’re looking for someone who has excellent project management skills, can quickly build relationships with stakeholders and who can make sure we’re evaluating our progress, so our work is making a positive impact.

The role is varied and challenging, so you’ll be a strong collaborator with a flexible approach and can-do attitude. An eye for detail is vital as is being able to make sense of complex information and the ability to craft messages on sensitive topics with care and compassion.

You will join an energetic and ambitious team and a supportive working environment with the opportunity to continuously develop your skills and expertise to further your professional growth. 

About the role

The role forms part of a multi-disciplinary communications team supporting the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG) to achieve its business objectives during an exciting time of change for the agency. 

We’re looking for someone to help deliver our priority campaigns and external communications activity and ensure we are connecting with our audiences in the most effective way possible. 

You will:

• Work closely with communications colleagues to support strategic campaigns delivery

• Create excellent written content for external communication channels including blogs and news articles

• Monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of our external communication activity, reporting on the impact and iterating plans in response

• Identify opportunities to work with external stakeholders to deliver our plans, using earned channels to engage with target audiences and amplify reach of our content

• Identify and recommend how our channels can be used most effectively to engage audiences through external communications, PR and direct engagement

• Work with press office colleagues to develop press lines, deliver proactive PR and manage announcements about OPG's work

• Work with internal stakeholders to develop a strong understanding of customer/audience insights and how these can drive behaviour change

• Maintain an awareness of the news agenda and emerging news events affecting both the Ministry of Justice and OPG

• Build effective, collaborative relationships with key stakeholders and colleagues in the Ministry of Justice strategic communications team and across the wider department

About you

• Experience of planning, delivering, and evaluating effective communication plans and activity

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills and strong interpersonal skills

• You have ability to see the bigger picture, will be able to draw conclusions from complex data and can work as part of an effective team to deliver results

• You are a self-motivated individual who can operate collaboratively and independently

• You have experience in advising, influencing and briefing senior internal stakeholders and are confident to debate different views on communications approaches

• You have demonstrable understanding of how print, broadcast and digital media work

• You’ll enjoy collaboration and be curious about different perspectives with an awareness of the value diversity brings to communications.

• You’ll be a strong communicator who is able to work with people across the organisation, wider Ministry of Justice teams and external organisations.

About our organisation

The Ministry of Justice is one of the largest government organisations with more than 65,000 staff in offices, courts and prisons across the country.

The department is delivering ambitious plans to make sure prisons are safe, secure and provide genuine rehabilitation, to provide a modern courts and justice system and to support our world-leading legal sector.

Within the MoJ, this role is delivering campaigns and external communication activity for the Office of the Public Guardian, an executive agency of MoJ. 

OPG’s role is to support people who may lack the mental capacity to make certain decisions for themselves, such as about their health and wellbeing or financial affairs. It enables people to plan ahead so that someone they trust can support them, or make certain decisions for them, if they lose capacity in the future. OPG also supervises people appointed by the court to help manage someone’s affairs where they’ve lost mental capacity. This could be due to age-related conditions such as dementia, mental illness, ill health or an accident.  

Across MoJ we are guided by our shared values - purpose, humanity, openness and togetherness. We believe in our purpose, providing justice for our society; we care about each other and those we work with, we show them humanity; we are open to learning and innovating, both in ourselves and the things we do; and we want to work together, collaborating with colleagues throughout MoJ and far beyond.

We provide a truly flexible culture including working from home, job-sharing and part-time work to support our people in being the best they can be.

In this role you will become part of the Government Communication Service (GCS), the professional body for government communicators - https://gcs.civilservice.gov.uk/ 

Please note - we will routinely recruit individuals at the bottom of our salary scale for all our communications roles.

Assessment

You will be asked to provide a CV and a supporting statement of suitability of no more than 750 words. This statement should explain your relevant experience and why you believe you are a suitable candidate for this role, focusing on how you meet the key skills above. We strongly encourage you to use examples from your previous experience to help demonstrate this.  

We will use success profiles as part of this recruitment exercise. Details of the Success Profiles competencies can be found online: Success Profiles: Civil Service behaviours - GOV.UK

If you’re invited to attend an interview, we will ask you about your competencies in the following areas: 

 
Behaviours 

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process: 

Leadership:

• ensure colleagues and stakeholders have a clear understanding of objectives, activities and timeframes

• take into account different individual needs, views, and ideas, championing inclusion and equality of opportunity for all

• consider the impacts of own and team’s activities on stakeholders and end users

• role-model commitment and satisfaction with role

• recognise and praise the achievements of others to drive positivity within the team

• effectively manage conflict, misconduct and non-inclusive behaviour, raising with senior managers where appropriate

Working together:

• encourage joined up teamwork within your own team and across other groups

• establish professional relationships with a range of stakeholders

• collaborate with these to share information, resources and support

• invest time to develop a common focus and genuine positive team spirit where colleagues feel valued and respect one another

• put in place support for the wellbeing of individuals within the team, including consideration of your own needs

• make it clear to all team members that bullying, harassment and discrimination are unacceptable

• actively seek and consider input of people from diverse backgrounds and perspectives

Technical skills 

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:  

• Communications - Implementation: Campaigns and Marketing

• Communications - Impact: Campaigns and Marketing 

Details of these competencies can be found online: https://gcs.civilservice.gov.uk/professional-development/competency-framework/ 

Additional Information  

Flexible working hours
The Ministry of Justice offers a flexible working system in many offices.

Benefits
The MoJ offers a range of benefits:

Annual Leave
Generous allowances for paid holiday starting at 25 days per year, rising as your service increases. There is also a scheme to allow qualifying staff to buy or sell up to three days leave each year. Additional paid time off for public holidays and 1 privilege day. Leave for part-time and job share posts will be calculated on a pro-rata basis.

Pension
The Civil Service offers a choice of pension schemes, giving you the flexibility to choose the pension that suits you best.

Training
The Ministry of Justice is committed to staff development and offers an extensive range of training and development opportunities.

Support

• A range of ‘Family Friendly’ policies such as opportunities to work reduced hours or job share.

• Access to flexible benefits such as salary sacrifice arrangements for childcare vouchers, and voluntary benefits such as retail vouchers and discounts on a range of goods and services.

• Paid paternity, adoption and maternity leave.

• Free annual sight tests for employees who use computer screens.

Networks
The opportunity to join employee-run networks that have been established to provide advice and support and to enable the views of employees from minority groups to be expressed direct to senior management. There are currently networks for employees of minority ethnic origin, employees with disabilities, employees with caring responsibilities, women employees, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender employees.

Working for the Civil Service
The Civil Service Code sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles.

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equality of opportunity.

There is a guaranteed interview scheme (GIS) for candidates