Senior Press Officer

Details
Reference number

432071

Salary

£48,750 - £59,559

A Civil Service Pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%

GBP

Job grade

Senior Executive Officer

Contract type

Permanent

Business area

UKEF - SSIG - Communications

Type of role

Press Relations

Working pattern

Flexible working, Full-time

Number of jobs available

1

Contents

• Location
• About the job
• Benefits
• Things you need to know
• Apply and further information

Location

Westminster, London

About the job
Job summary

UK Export Finance (UKEF) is the UK's export credit agency, supporting UK businesses exporting overseas by providing insurance, guarantees and loans. As a ministerial department, we help UK companies of all sizes compete and win contracts globally while managing risk.

About the Role

The communications team plays a vital role in improving awareness of UKEF and managing its reputation among audiences within and outside of Government, in the UK and overseas. The team is responsible for all corporate communications activities, covering strategic communications (editorial, planning and evaluation), press office and media relations, speechwriting and internal communications.

Reporting into the Head of News and Communications, the Senior Press Officer will apply best practice communications insight, ideas, implementation and impact assessment to deliver UKEF's press office and PR activities, including planning, content creation, handling media enquiries and evaluation. This will involve anticipating and handling issues; creating responses for journalists and gaining sign-off; drafting press materials including press releases, thought leadership, lines to take and interview briefings; and building relationships with key journalists and editors to secure positive coverage of UKEF.

Job description
Main Activities

• Plan, deliver and evaluate media relations activities, including announcements, campaign activities and cross-government initiatives.
• Lead on proactive PR, identifying and developing stories to generate positive coverage in regional, trade and stakeholder outlets to support UKEF's marketing and communications campaigns.
• Respond to reactive media queries, draft responses and manage sign-off. Anticipate issues, working with internal stakeholders to develop handling strategies and lines to take. Providing out of hours support when required.
• Provide editorial, content and PR support to other communications, marketing and business development activities, helping to ensure high-quality and consistently applied messaging across all channels.
• Maintain and disseminate a core messaging hub, including signed-off statistics and case studies, for staff to communicate to stakeholders.
• Qualitative and quantitative evaluation of UKEF coverage on a daily and monthly basis, using insights gained to inform and improve future activities.
• Plan, execute and evaluate announcements and campaigns working with other communications specialists and agencies across channels.
• Collaborate with colleagues in the Department Business and Trade and other government departments to support departmental and cross-government communications initiatives.

This list is not exhaustive; you may be required to carry out additional duties according to business need.

Person specification

UK Export Finance is looking for motivated individuals with a desire to learn about the business. Successful candidates will be provided not only with functional training to enable them to do well in their role, but also with personal development to help them to achieve their career ambitions. Please note that the person specification below outlines at which stage(s) you will be assessed on how you meet the criteria for the role(s) including:-

A= assessed at application stage I = assessed at interview stage

T= assessed by test stage P = assessed at presentation stage

Essential
Knowledge

• A practical understanding of insight, planning, delivery and evaluation of communications activities. (A, I)
• A practical knowledge of best practice in writing for multiple content channels. (A, I, P)

Skills/Ability

• Excellent writing, proofing and editorial skills (A, T)
• Effective interpersonal communication skills, with the ability to express ideas and issues clearly and confidently in both spoken and written communication to a broad range of stakeholders (A, I, T, P)
• A confident and trusted advisor who can liaise with stakeholders at a senior level. (A, I)
• Demonstrable ability to grasp complex technical issues and make them understandable to non-technical audiences. (A, I)

Experience

• Evidence of experience in editorial, PR/press office or a related communications discipline. (A, I)
• Developing, delivering and evaluating communications plans. (A, I, P)
• Experience in a communications role within the public, private or financial services sector. (A, I)
• Experience of managing conflicting priorities and meeting tight deadlines in a communications environment. (A, I)
• Effectively advising senior management and other colleagues on communications matters. (A, I)

Behaviours

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

• Making Effective Decisions
• Leadership
• Seeing the Big Picture
• Changing and Improving
• Communicating and Influencing

Technical skills

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

• Presentation

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £48,750, UK Export Finance contributes £14,122 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%

Things you need to know
Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles , and will assess your Behaviours, Experience and Technical skills.

We are assessing candidates using Success Profiles (see Appendix 1) and across the whole process we will assess your Experience, Technical, and Behaviours as highlighted below.

The application must be completed by 23.55 on the day of the closing date for it to be accepted.

Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Artificial Intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

All applications will be sifted against our essential criteria outlined in the personal specification.

• Statement of suitability - you should fully articulate in 750 words how you meet the essential criteria outlined in the person specification within the Information Pack.

For the initial sift your application will be evaluated against:

• Experience - Application and Statement of Suitability

In the event of a high volume of applications, there will be a pre-sift on the following essential criteria's:

• Excellent writing, proofing and editorial skills (A, T)
• Evidence of experience in editorial, PR/press office or a related communications discipline. (A, I)

If you are successful following the sift stage, you will be invited to complete a technical written exercise:

• Technical - A written exercise which must be completed in 60 minutes where you will be assessed the following essential criteria's:
• Excellent writing, proofing and editorial skills (A, T)
• Effective interpersonal communication skills, with the ability to express ideas and issues clearly and confidently in both spoken and written communication to a broad range of stakeholders (A, I, T, P)

If you are successful following the technical written exercise stage, you will be invited to an initial interview; this will include the following assessment:

• Behaviours - a formal panel interview where you will be interviewed across all five behaviours
• Behaviour - Making Effective Decisions (Lead Behaviour)
• Behaviour - Leadership
• Behaviour - Seeing the big picture
• Behaviour - Changing and improving
• Behaviour - Communicating and influencing
• Technical - Presentation
• This will be a 5 minute presentation candidates will receive the topic with their invite to book a interview slot and will be assessed on the following essential criteria's;
  • A practical knowledge of best practice in writing for multiple content channels. (A, I, P)
  • Effective interpersonal communication skills, with the ability to express ideas and issues clearly and confidently in both spoken and written communication to a broad range of stakeholders (A, I, T, P)
  • Developing, delivering and evaluating communications plans. (A, I, P)

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check .

See our vetting charter .

People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements

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 equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy .

Apply and further information

This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans initiative.

Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants
Job contact :

• Name : UKEF Recruitment
• Email :

Recruitment team

• Email :

Further information

Should you have a complaint or wish to raise any concerns regarding the recruitment process, please e-mail your complaint to the Head of Pay and Resourcing (UKEF) at and include "Complaint" in the subject heading. Should you remain dissatisfied following UKEF's investigation then you can refer your complaint to the Commission -

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