Senior Advocacy Officer

Does your understanding of Scotland’s political and public policy scenes include a detailed working knowledge of the Scottish Government and Scottish Parliament processes and how public policy is made and influenced? Then join Shelter Scotland as
- **Senior Advocacy Officer** and you could soon be part of a dedicated, passionate and proactive team whose key responsibility is to effectively advocate for the crucial structural changes required to reduce housing need.**About Shelter Scotland**:

- A home is a fundamental human need, as essential as education or healthcare. Yet over a million people in Scotland struggle on a daily basis with homelessness, bad housing conditions, soaring rents, discrimination and the threat of eviction. So, we are striving for change, with individuals, in communities, across society, and leading the way to a safe home. We need ambitious, best-in-class individuals who are passionate about our cause to join us at this exciting time. This is your chance to play a part in the fundamental change we are striving to achieve.- At Shelter Scotland we are united by our purpose to defend the right to a safe home. Our enemy is the social injustice at the core of the escalating housing emergency. We believe that to win that fight, we must be representative of the people we are here to help and those who support our movement for change. In all our people decisions, we take pride in being inclusive, fair, equitable and transparent.- We have committed to combat racism both within and outside Shelter Scotland and welcome you on our journey to becoming a truly anti-racist organisation.**About the Team**:

- Our Communications and Advocacy department promotes the Shelter Scotland brand and leads our policy advocacy, public campaigning and digital communications to achieve change for people who don’t have a safe, secure or affordable home. Our work targets national and local government, as well as communities and stakeholder groups and we use rigorous research, client insight and human stories to develop advocacy action plans and public campaigns for change to tackle the root causes of Scotland’s housing emergency. This particular role sits within our Advocacy team, which is responsible for developing our policy positions at a national and local level in order to advocate for the structural changes required to tackle the root causes of Scotland’s housing emergency.**About the role**:

- Your challenge will be to lead the advocacy work on our social housing strategic objective that’s supporting the biggest social housing campaign in Shelter Scotland’s history. To date, the campaign has helped achieve commitments to 110,000 affordable homes over the next 10 years. We’ll rely on you to provide robust, clear and concise policy recommendations and research evidence, including lived experience evidence, to ensure we can effectively advocate for the social homes that are required. You’ll also be responsible for communicating these recommendations and evidence to influence key stakeholders in housing and other relevant sectors, local and national government and Scottish Parliament. Commissioning and managing external research projects to add to the evidence base, designing and project managing events and line managing an Advocacy Officer - these are just some aspects of this wide-ranging role.**About you**:

- To succeed, you’ll need a relevant track record that includes proven experience of producing high impact written and verbal communication to influence decision makers and persuade key stakeholders. You’ll also need a demonstrable ability to deliver change and build effective working relationships with senior officials in government and other organisations to advocate for that change. Used to managing externally funded projects, budgeting and taking financial accountability for project deliverables, you also have experience of managing and motivating team members to achieve objectives. Last but not least, you’ll need to bring a proactive mindset in identifying opportunities for influencing and be able to respond both proactively and reactively to external events.**How to apply**:
- We prioritise diversity and have an inclusive and open mindset**Benefits**:

- We offer a wide range of benefits, including 30 days of annual leave, enhanced family friendly policies, pension and interest free travel loans. Our employees also have access to a tenancy deposit loan, payroll giving, cycle to work scheme and an employee assistance programme.- Safeguarding is everyone’s business. Shelter is committed to protecting the health, wellbeing and human rights of those we support, and enabling them to live free from harm, abuse and neglect. All our staff will be expected to observe professional standards of behaviour and conduct their work in line with our Safeguarding Policies.**Shelter does not accept unsolicited CVs from external recruitment agencies nor accept the fees associated with them.