Health and Safety Advisor

Department/Team: Theatre Operations

Responsible to: Head of Estates & Services

Contract: Fixed Term – 12 months

Location: Flexible mix of home working and from The Old Vic, 103 The Cut, London, SE1 8NB

Hours: Full-Time

The Old Vic offers the ability to work these flexibly under the guidelines in our Ways of Working policy. Additional hours may be necessary in order to fulfil the requirements of the post

Salary: £38,000-£40,000 dependent on experience

Benefits

• Hybrid working for eligible teams and a company culture that promotes good work/life balance
• Enhanced annual leave, starting at 25 days per year, increasing by one day per year up to 30 days (plus bank holidays). Opportunity to switch statutory bank holidays to mark a religious event or festival
• Complimentary tickets for you and a guest to Old Vic preview productions
• Discretionary invite to Press Night performances and parties
• Free therapy from our therapy partner SelfSpace
• Mental health support via our in-house Mental Health Champions
• Salary sacrifice scheme with The People's Pension and enhanced employer pension contributions
• Festive day – one discretionary additional paid day off around the festive period for a collective pause
• Time to volunteer – one day per year to support a charity or project of your choosing
• Commitment to learning, education and development
• Enhanced sick pay
• Access to interest free travel schemes including Cycle 2 work and Season Ticket loans after your probation period
• Family friendly policies and enhanced maternity/paternity/adoption/shared parental pay
• All staff social events
• Staff discount in Penny and The Old Vic bars as well as discounts in local bars and restaurants
• Opportunities to get involved with staff clubs and working groups such as the Inclusion Working Group
• Buddy schemes including New Starter and Parental buddies to support your induction and return to work after parental leave
• Death in Service Benefit

Role Summary

The Health & Safety Advisor sits within the Theatre Operations Team. In their role they will provide guidance and advice, conduct inspections, identify hazards and document management improvements, as well as ensure that we have good contractor management processes and good record keeping in place. They will help to ensure there is a holistic approach to Health & Safety across the Old Vic.

Areas of responsibility

The Health & Safety Advisor is responsible for:

Health & Safety

• Providing support to the Head of Estates & Services in the management of health, safety, and compliance across The Old Vic.
• Ensuring that H&S policies, practices, and procedures are adhered to (and documented) across all areas.
• Ensuring thorough and appropriate safety records are maintained and anything of concern is promptly reported to the Head of Estates & Services.
• Developing strong relationships and influencing behaviours across all areas of the Old Vic to facilitate the promotion of health and safety awareness and drive best practice.
• Leading on management of Blue Lemon [the Old Vic's H&S management system], including ensuring accuracy of data and facilitating training across the organisation.
• Maintaining an overview of the training regime and record keeping for essential life, safety and security critical systems, from a H&S & Compliance perspective.
• Working with The Old Vic's external advisors to arrange and facilitate regular Health and Safety Audits and Fire Risk Assessments of all sites, ensuring that any key changes are reviewed and re-assessed between audits.
• Carrying out health and safety workplace inspections and audits within all areas of the organisation and prioritising action to be taken to resolve any outstanding issues.
• Support managers in implementing action plans in response to external audits.
• Undertaking Old Vic wide projects as appropriate to enhance our systems and procedures e.g. accident report systems, risk assessment software etc.
• Challenging accepted views of health and safety within the business in regards to working practice, processes and methodologies.
• Seeking to apply a consistent approach to health, safety, and fire across all areas of the business whilst still remaining mindful of the creative process - a flexible approach is important.
• Carrying out training as required, including new starter H&S inductions.
• Supporting teams in writing up and reviewing risk assessments, prioritising remedial actions and monitoring their implementation to minimise risk to employees, visitors and assets.
• Investigating and documenting accidents, incidents and dangerous occurrences and providing meaningful statistics and advice to management.
• Providing advice, guidance, and assistance to all managers in the implementation of policies and systems in order to ensure the achievement of required standards and working practices. Where possible introduce initiatives that will enhance health and safety standards and awareness.
• Attending the Health & Safety Committee meetings.
• Coordinating & minuting the Health & Safety Steering Group meetings.
• Ensuring that minutes and actions arising from Health & Safety Steering Group meetings are circulated to members and risks escalated to the Head of Estates & Services1 or Operations Director as required.
• Attend Technical H&S Meetings.
• Developing and promoting a positive culture across the organisation in relation to Health and Safety.

Compliance

• Working with colleagues across the organisation to ensure that all life safety systems are maintained and inspected regularly in line with relevant guidance to minimise the risk of any business interruption, and ensuring any changes in legislation are met.
• Having ownership of the onboarding and record-keeping process for contractors, ensuring that these are kept up to date and that all staff are aware of their responsibilities when engaging contractors to work on site.
• Alongside colleagues in the Technical department, managing the Theatre's permit to work procedures.

Building Security

• Working with the Operations Administration Team to ensure that there are good records for all keys, alarm fobs and security passes issued to staff – and overseeing the upkeep of the Key Safe Log.
• Prioritising the safety and security everyone in the building.

Capital Building Projects

• Support the Head of Estates & Services and the Operations Director, overseeing the planning, development and implementation of all fire, safety, security and compliance elements of capital building projects, ensuring that changes made during works do not compromise the plans and interfaces with the current building and strategies.
• Inputting on the site-wide strategies for fire, safety, security, and compliance, liaising with relevant contractors and consultants to review cause and effect and establish a hierarchy of control between the relevant strategies.
• Assisting the Head of Estates & Services with operational planning in relation to health, safety & compliance, in preparation for completion of capital building projects.

This is not an exhaustive list of duties and the Theatre's management may, at any time, allocate other tasks which are of a similar nature or level.

Person Specification

Essential:

• Hold an IOSH (or Tech IOSH) qualification.
• Demonstrable experience in a similar role with strong awareness of health and safety procedures and practices and a strong understanding of compliance.
• Experience of dealing with a range of stakeholders, including senior leaders, colleagues, and contractors.
• Ability to work with a diverse range of people in a confident and professional manner.
• A flexible attitude with the ability to adapt accordingly to the role.
• Demonstratable ability to use initiative to provide options and solutions for a fast-paced, changing, often reactive, service.
• Action oriented, with the ability to take the initiative and deliver results.
• Sensitivity in dealing with confidential information.
• Excellent IT skills.

How to Apply

We understand that everyone is different and we want you to apply in whichever way you feel best shows your skills and experience. There are a range of ways that you can apply with us:

• 1. Sending a short video file of yourself (no longer than two minutes in length), detailing your experience, why you are applying for the role and what about working at The Old Vic interests you (have a look at the person specification in the job description).
• 2. Sending a short audio file of yourself (no longer than two minutes in length), detailing your experience, why you are applying for the role and what about working at The Old Vic interests you.
• 3. Completing our application form.
• 4. Uploading your CV and covering letter, explaining why you are interested in the role and working at the Old Vic.

As a Disability Confident employer, The Old Vic has made a commitment that all applicants with disabilities who meet the essential criteria for this job will be invited to interview. However in the event that we have a high volume of applications all of whom meet the criteria and identify as disabled, meaning it is not practicable to interview everyone, we may apply a weighting to the shortlisting criteria, or add an additional shortlisting stage before any interviews take place. In all cases we will take care to ensure that any criteria or weightings do not disadvantage disabled applicants.

All appointments are made subject to satisfactory references and proof of eligibility to work in the UK. 

The Process

The recruitment process for this role will be two stages:

• 1st stage virtual conversation
• 2nd stage in person conversation
• You may be asked to complete a work based skills assessment or challenge.

The closing date for this role is 7 December 2025. First Conversations are likely to take place 11 December 2025.

Equal Opportunities

We actively support and encourage people from a variety of backgrounds, experiences and skill sets to join us and help shape what we do. We are particularly keen to receive applications from people of the global majority, LGBTQ+, neurodiverse and disabled candidates.

We may take positive action, in cases where candidates are equally qualified, to increase the employment of under-represented groups at The Old Vic.

In the event that we ask you to attend the theatre for a conversation and you are struggling financially, we may be able to reimburse you for any reasonable travel costs.

We partner with a range of inclusive organisations, to find out more please read our FAQs. 

FAQs

Read our recruitment and selection and equal opportunities FAQs here.