Private & Confidential

JOB DESCRIPTION

Job Title:Head of Communications

Hours:37.5 hours per week

Term:Permanent

Reports to:Director of Fundraising

Line management responsibility:Two members of staff

Salary:On enquiry

  1. Summary

You will be an influential and successful communications expert with the vision to grow our brand. This fantastic role will require a candidate with extensive experience of strategic direction and hands-on marketing experience.

We are looking for someone who is creative, strategic, entrepreneurial, ideas-driven, diplomatic and empathetic. You must have outstanding leadership and influencing skills, and find it easy to develop personal relationships.

You will lead and implement ACT’s communications strategy. You will re-brand the charity and its approach to communications.You will be dedicated to building a strategic coherent approach to marketing and communications across the charity, which builds and deepens engagement with hospital staff and patients. Your ambitious strategy will raise our profile and secure income to ensure the long term sustainability of the charity. The result will be a charity that effectively engages important audiences, and is positioned at the heart of the hospital and the community as insightful thought-leader that thoroughly understands and effectively supports the needs of the hospital and its patients.

You will deliver a new innovative, ambitious and exciting Communications strategy and Business Plan to support ACT’s five-year growth plan. Develop, lead and manage the Communications Team (two reports). You will champion an integrated insight-driven, audience-focused approach, while living and breathingAddenbrooke’s and the charity

  1. Role

Your responsibilities broadly fall into the following areas:

Brand development

Collaborate closely with the hospital’s Director of Communications to agree how ACT and Addenbrooke’s can align more closely to achieve message synchronicity, how we might support the hospital in proactively generating positive messaging, understand how we can leverage the hospital’s USPs, how we can share events to achieve both of our objectives, how we can make fundraising messaging a more natural integration with the hospital’s media relations programme, how we can co-host events to “celebrate” key events where fundraising has historically or could help to make a huge difference. You will develop a strategy to capitalise on the Addenbrooke’s brand more effectively.

Internal communications (Hospital engagement)

You will be responsible for developing an internal communications strategy; increasing visibility and awareness of ACT in Addenbrooke’s Hospital, amongst patients, visitors and staff. To support our five year growth plan, you will need to build strong relationships with clinicians and hospital leadership to effect change within the hospital. The internal comms plan will be an integrated, planned-out strategy, taking advantage of existing communication channels and building new ones where appropriate. This role will be vital in amplifying 9,000 hospital staff to inspire each other and their patients in ensuring effective execution of communications activities and facilitating engagement across the organisation. You will establish benchmark figures for staff and patient awareness and track growth in awareness.

External communications

You will proactively develop a new communications strategy for external audiences to increase brand recognition, coverage and awareness through above and below-the line communications. You will implement a digital strategy, implement a new website, devise a reputation management programme and crisis management strategy. Vital to this role is being able to track our impact in numbers; audiences, media reach, brand consideration and awareness.

Impact measurement

Working with other Heads, will embed effective impact measurement within ACT; understanding what is the direct impact of our funding e.g. how many lives have we helped to save, how many savings have we achieved for the NHS in Cambridge and beyond, what is the value of our “value-added” spending. What is our impact in numbers, outcomes etc. You will introduce thinking about impact as part of campaign planning. You will also explore how user involvement in planning campaigns can increase their impact.

Marketing support

You will establish a service-driven “internal agency” for the fundraising and corporate teams, delivering commsprojects in a speedy, efficient, donor-focused and impactful way. You will have strategic oversight of a streamlined, integrated donor stewardship programme for all donors to ensure that they feel appreciated and inspired to give again.You will embed a culture of story-telling and celebration within the ACT team. You will explore new income generation comms-led activities.

Critical to the role will be analysing and evaluating effectiveness of current channels, bringing them up to date and introducing new tactics. Equally vital will be your ability to prioritise and project manage.

You will need to work closely with project owners across the organisation and apply excellent communication and interpersonal skills to quickly build trusted relationships. You will develop and project manage carefully prepared activity plans, with specific objectives budgets and timeframes.

  1. General corporate requirements
  1. To adhere at all times to ACT’s policies and procedures as varied from time to time
  2. Undertake not to reveal to any person or entity any confidential information relating to donors, patients and employees, policies, processes and dealings and not to make public statements relating to the affairs of ACT without prior authority of the Director of Fundraising or CEO
  3. To ensure the effective and efficient use of ACT’s resources
  4. To ensure that all duties are carried out to the highest possible standard.
  5. To be aware of individual responsibilities under the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974).
  6. To respect the confidentiality of all matters learned in the course of employment and respect the requirements of the Data Protection Act (1998).
  7. To work in line with the Institute of Fundraising Code of Practice and other relevant legislation and guidance
  8. To ensure due regard is given to customs, values and spiritual beliefs of supporters, patients, carers and their relatives.
  9. To perform any other duties that may be required from time to time.
  10. To participate in team meetings, planning and any corporate development activities and initiatives as may be identified from time to time.
  11. To undertake any other reasonable task as may be identified as necessary by the senior management team from time to time.

The job description outlines the duties required of this post to indicate the level of responsibility. It is not a comprehensive or exclusive list and duties may be varied from time to time which do not change the general character of the job or the level of responsibility outlined.

ACT Head of CommsJanuary 2018