Press and Communications Officer

Grade - IO

Location: National

Number of roles: 1

Job description

Are you looking for an exciting opportunity to work on issues that really matter and have a big social impact?

We are looking for a highly skilled and passionate press professional to work in our central award-winning Ministry of Justice team. You will be responsible for generating creative, high impact media coverage to help recruit prison officers, probation officers and magistrates.

This role sits in the Retention Communications (RRC) team - part of the Ministry of Justice’s award-winning communications team. We are responsible for delivering high impact recruitment communications that ensure the Ministry of Justice has the people it needs to deliver its priorities of swift access to justice, protecting the public and reducing reoffending. This includes attracting several thousand new prison and probation staff each year and 2,000 magistrates. 

You will join an ambitious, exciting team working to raise public understanding of the vital roles prison and probation officers, magistrates, and others play across the justice system. Your objectives will include placing myth busting creative national and regional press and wider communications to increase awareness and consideration of justice roles through positive media coverage.

Working as part of an established team of central and regional communications experts, you will achieve these objectives by building close relationships with key frontline partners as well as local, national and online media outlets so you can place compelling stories that inform the public about the roles available. This will also include feature articles and broadcast packages in consumer and national media outlets. Previously the team has placed pieces with national media outlets such as the Sun, BBC Newsbeat and the One Show.

Your press coverage will not only be used externally to raise awareness of justice roles but will also be vital to help raise staff pride, showing them their excellent work reflected in the media. This role would be ideal for someone with a background in Press/PR/journalism and media.

You would also work closely with the central Ministry of Justice Press Office and the central recruitment marketing team, who lead on encouraging greater consideration of our roles as well as the identification and targeting of potential candidates.

You will ensure all of your work is executed to brilliant standards, within an existing culture of continuous improvement and innovation, and evaluating performance on an ongoing basis. You will also be expected to develop strong networks.  

Person specification

The role has several key requirements including: 
 

Expertise and experience in delivering innovative creative external press/PR and communications.

You will think creatively to challenge the often-negative narrative about work in the justice sector. We want to do this by telling stories at a regional and local level about the great work staff do. You will be able to think innovatively and are not afraid to try out new approaches.

Good judgement, able to spot and mitigate risks.

You will have good judgement, which will enable you to identify potential reputational risks in the work you propose and seek appropriate sign-off and ensure mitigations are in place. 
 

Using insight and evaluating the impact of your work.

You will use relevant information and audience insight to develop your plans and will use evaluation methods to measure the effectiveness and impact of your work.

Effective teamwork and collaboration.

You are expected to build effective working and collaborative relationships internally and externally. You will be able to use these relationships to unblock issues, manage risks, and deliver more effective communications. You will be working closely alongside internal communications colleagues and other external PR colleagues and are expected to work closely with them to ensure you join up seamlessly and share knowledge.

Proactive, self-motivated and solution focussed.

You will be expected to be proactive and drive forward your own work at pace. You will also find positive and creative solutions to overcome issues that arise when working with real people on the frontline, for example when access to case studies can be limited.

Resilient and flexible

You will be resilient and flexible and able to overcome challenges that crop up in your work and to help to find solutions to unblock and resolve issues.

Public sector prisons are located across England and Wales and the role is likely to involve some travel to key sites to meet regionally located leaders and visit priority prisons, such as Berwyn (Europe's largest prison) and prisons in the Midlands and East of England for example. 

Application process

We will be using success profiles to assess your communication and delivery abilities.

As part of the application process, you will be asked to complete a CV and provide examples of Civil Service behaviours (PDF) and technical behaviours based on the Government Communication Professional Competency Framework (PDF).

Civil Service Behaviours

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

Communicating and Influencing

Communicate purpose and direction with clarity, integrity and enthusiasm. Respect the needs, responses and opinions of others.

Delivering at Pace

Take responsibility for delivering timely and quality results with focus and drive.

Changing and improving

Seek out opportunities to create effective change and suggest innovative ideas for improvement. Review ways of working, including seeking and providing feedback.

Candidates that pass the application sift stage will be invited to have an interview. They will be expected to undertake a short-written task during the interview and will have an opportunity to present on the task. Candidates will be given more information about this ahead of time.

At the interview, we will be assessing you again on the Civil Service behaviours outlined above, and also against the four GCS core technical behaviours outlined in the Government Communication Professional Competency Framework.

These include:

• Insight - Consider any relevant audience research/insight when developing communications plans and campaigns.

• Ideas - Initiate and lead the development of proactive communications. Work constructively with other communications, policy colleagues and partners to gain expert advice and opinions.

• Implementation - Deliver communications plans in an efficient and timely manner to deadlines

• Impact - Analyse and evaluate communications to assess the effectiveness and inform future activity.

If you have any queries about the role, or wish to discuss, please contact Simon.Mundell@justice.gov.uk

Candidates that pass the application sift stage will be invited to have an interview. They will be expected to give a short presentation at the interview and will be given more information about this ahead of time.

Selection process details

As part of the application process you will be asked to complete a CV and 1,000-word personal statement.

Your personal statement should demonstrate your suitability and will highlight the reason you are interested in the role and how your experience makes you the best candidate for the role requirements. In your statement you should also make particular reference to the Civil Service behaviours set out above.

Please note that feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview.

Security clearance and residency

If you are successful at interview, we will work with you to acquire SC security clearance. This is a straightforward process for most people but does, generally, require you to have been resident in the UK for at least the last five years.