Job details

Job title: Policy Partnerships Manager

Directorate: External Relations

Reporting to: Head of Policy, Partnerships and Impact

Responsible for: N/A

Based: British Science Association, 165 Queen's Gate, London SW7 5HD

Terms: Full-time (35 hours per week), permanent. Requests for flexible working will be considered

Salary: £28,600 – £33,000

About the role

The Policy Partnerships Manager will play a key role in making the British Science Association’s mission to transform the diversity and inclusivity of science relevant to key stakeholders, such as leaders in business, science, policy and the media.

Key responsibilities 

The main responsibilities will be to: 

• Manage the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Diversity and Inclusion in STEM, including seeking funding, liaising with members of Parliament and leading inquiries;
• Deliver the Inclusive Science Engagement Network (ISEN);
• Develop partnerships for the Huxley Summit, which will include curating policy roundtables and creating policy reports;
• Undertake stakeholder mapping and help identify new potential partnerships;
• Measure the effectiveness of our policy partnerships and develop an understanding of how current and new partnerships could help take forward the BSA’s mission;
• Collaborate with colleagues from across the organisation to share learnings from different activities with stakeholders.

About you

The Policy Partnerships Manager role would suit someone who is an excellent networker and is driven by convening diverse groups of professionals together to create change. The successful candidate will need to be comfortable working with societal influencers and will have the ability to ensure under-represented groups are included in discussions where their views are traditionally absent.

Person Specification

Below is a summary of essential and desirable criteria needed for this role, as well as how we will assess a candidate’s suitability.

Essential criteria

Criteria	CV	Cover letter	Interview	Task at interview
Experience of developing and maintaining effective policy partnerships in a professional or policy setting	Y	Y	Y	Y
Excellent verbal and written communication skills including the ability to act as an effective ambassador for the organisation	Y	Y	Y	Y
Experience of tracking outputs and outcomes of partnerships – including experience of how different research methods can support projects	Y	Y	Y
Excellent planning and strategic thinking skills including experience of managing projects to deliver successfully, on time and on budget	Y	Y	Y
A passion for equality, diversity and inclusion		Y	Y	Y
Knowledge of the British political landscape and an awareness of big societal debates around science and/or equality, diversity and inclusion.		Y	Y	Y

Desirable criteria

Criteria	CV	Cover letter	Interview	Task at interview
Experience of convening senior stakeholders to discuss policy issues		Y	Y	Y
Knowledge of the key stakeholders in either science policy or science engagement		Y	Y
Ability to work effectively between strategic and operational activities		Y	Y
Experience of fundraising and/or influencing internal or external policy change.		Y	Y

Benefits 

• 27 days holiday per annum plus bank holidays (pro-rata for part-time employees);
• Up to two days paid leave per year for significant voluntary commitments in support of professional and personal development, such as being a trustee of a charity or a school governor;
• Auto-enrolment pension scheme (currently 5% of salary from employee plus 3% from BSA);
• Up to five days’ unpaid leave per year (this is down to the Manager’s decision and ensuring it does not affect work);
• Life insurance from your first day;
• Occupational sick pay: up to six weeks’ full pay per year (pro-rata for part-time employees);
• Interest-free loan for season ticket, bike to work, and assisted study;
• Homeworking Wednesdays, subject to the needs of the BSA.

To apply

Please send a CV and covering letter (each of no more than two A4 pages) that summarises your interest in the role and details your ability to match the criteria.

Applications should be made via this link: recruit.smb.co.uk/vacancy.aspx?id=UXcUps7MUYThpZb

The closing date for applications is 9am on 8 April 2020. 

Interviews are due to take place on 15 April.

You will be informed as soon as possible after the application deadline whether you have been selected for interview.

As part of the British Science Association’s commitment to being a Disability Confident employer, all disabled* applicants who meet the ‘essential criteria’ for this vacancy will be offered an interview under our guaranteed interview scheme.

If you wish to apply under the guaranteed interview scheme, you will be asked to indicate this when you submit your application by selecting ‘yes’ in the relevant box when asked during the application process. Applicants do not need to state any further information or declare their disability at the application stage.

Whether you are applying under the scheme or not, if you are successful in being shortlisted, we will ask candidates with disabilities or long-term health conditions to let us know if they need any adjustments during the recruitment process.

If you have further questions or would like this information in a different format, please contact: [email protected]  

Download the candidate pack for this role as a pdf or view our text-only version of the pack here.

Terms & conditions

From time to time the job entails working extended hours and occasional weekends, for which no overtime payments are made. The BSA operates a time off in lieu policy for weekend working and some other out-of-hours instances.

Only applicants who have a legal right to work within the UK will be considered. You will be asked to bring along proof of nationality and/or proof of ability to work in the UK.

You will also be asked to declare any previous convictions in line with your rights under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) order 1975.

This is a description of the job as it is presently constituted. It is the practice of the Association to examine job descriptions from time to time and to update them to ensure they relate to the job as then being performed, or to incorporate whatever changes are reasonably required, in discussion with the postholder.

It is the policy of the BSA to offer starting salaries at the bottom end of the salary band where appropriate.

A copy of our Privacy Notice is available on the vacancies page of our website.

*The Disability Confident scheme’s definition of disability is in line with the Equalities Act 2010: “a physical or mental condition which has a long-term and substantial effect on your daily life”. Further information about our Disability Confident commitments can be found on the Disability Confident page of our website.