At Capita Public Service, we are dedicated to transforming public services and improving outcomes for citizens.
We are seeking a seasoned professional with extensive experience in employee engagement, corporate communications, external communications, and reputation management to join our divisional team.
This role offers a fantastic opportunity to lead the divisional comms function of around 25 around the UK, and shape communication strategies within a dynamic and supportive environment. The successful candidate will be part of the division's Senior Leadership Team, reporting to the Divisional People Director, and act as a trusted advisor to the Divisional CEO, focusing on communication, reputation, and engagement.
You will be a communications professional with extensive in-house experience. You will probably have significant experience of working in, or with, high profile government or other public sector organisations.
This is home based role with some travel as required.
Your Key Responsibilities:
• Alignment and Integration: Ensure alignment across Corporate Communications, PR, Public Affairs, and Marketing teams. Be instrumental in the development and delivery of the 2025 anchor campaign to increase external engagement, build reputation, and grow effectively.
• Strategic Counsel: Serve as a trusted advisor to the Divisional CEO, Divisional People Director and divisional Senior Leadership team on matters of communication, reputation, and engagement.
• Narrative Development: Build and distribute the Capita Public Service narrative, in line with broader Group Corporate Communications direction, ensuring it resonates with all stakeholders.
• Leadership Engagement: Connect the Divisional CEO with the leadership community to foster engagement, buy-in, and advocacy for the division's vision, priorities, and progress.
• Support Leadership Communication: Assist the CPS leadership community in communicating priorities, progress against strategy & business plan, and successes.
• Client Communications: Ensure core client communications (results, restructures, new strategy, and key messages) are robust, well-considered, and effectively delivered to clients.
• Employee Engagement and Culture Development: Drive initiatives to improve employee engagement, support talent retention and development, and foster an inclusive culture. Communicate Capita's revised values and desired behaviours widely and appropriately throughout the division to re-energize teams. Ensure core messages and benefits are understood and relevant to local teams.
• Reputation Management: Mitigate and manage reputational risks through expert communication strategies.
• Team Leadership: Lead a team of over 20 communications professionals, ensuring high standards and effective delivery of our contractual commitments.
As part of this role, you will work closely with relevant individuals from CPS, including the Leadership Team and Marketing counterparts. You will also collaborate with the Group Corporate Affairs team, which includes the Corporate Affairs Director, Head of Group Internal Communications, Head of Public Affairs, and Head of External Communications. Additionally, you will be responsible for coordinating with the Group team on managing external corporate channels such as the website, media relations, and social media.
What we're looking for :
• You will be a seasoned communications professional with extensive in-house experience across the public and/or private sector.
• You will probably have significant experience of working in, or with, high profile government or other public sector organisations. You will have experience of operating within a large, matrixed organisation, and leading a virtual team of comms professionals.
• Excellent l eadership Skills : We are seeing an individual who can drive a winning mindset, build trusted relationships, promote learning and curiosity and role model accountability
• Excellent Communication Skills: Proficiency in both written and verbal communication, with the ability to convey complex information clearly and concisely.
• Strategic Thinking: Capability to develop and implement comprehensive communication strategies with a forward-thinking and proactive approach.
• Crisis Management: Expertise in handling communication during crises and managing reputational risks.
• Innovative and Creative Thinking: Ability to develop engaging and impactful communication campaigns, with creativity in problem-solving and strategy development.
We're truly committed to building a diverse and representative workforce and as part of our strategic plans we are aiming to accelerate gender and ethnic representation in leadership. As such we would particularly welcome applications from people who are female and/or are from Black, Asian and other ethnic minority backgrounds.
Why Join Us?
• A competitive basic salary and benefits package
• 23 days' holiday (rising to 27) with the opportunity to buy extra leave
• The opportunity to take a paid day out of the office, volunteering for our charity partners or a cause of your choice
• Auto-enrolment to our company pension, life assurance, a cycle2work scheme, 15 weeks' fully paid maternity, adoption and shared parental leave, paternity pay of two weeks...and plenty more
• Voluntary benefits designed to suit your lifestyle - from discounts on retail and socialising, to health & wellbeing, travel and technology
• Access to our Employee Network Groups, which represent every strand of diversity and allow colleagues to connect and learn from each other on an open, inclusive platform
You'll get the chance to follow your chosen career path anywhere in Capita. You'll be joining a network of experienced, innovative and dedicated individuals across multiple disciplines and sectors. There are countless opportunities to learn new skills and develop in your career, and we'll provide the support you need to do just that. Our purpose is to create a better outcome for you.
About Capita Public Service
Capita Public Service is an essential partner to the Public Sector. With over 40 years' experience, we partner with over 500 government and public bodies to tackle society's biggest challenges across Central Government, Local Public Service and Defence & National Preparedness. To support our stated ambition to be the Public Sector's go-to partner, the business has recently announced the creation of a new specialist internal function that brings together critical sales and sales enablement under a single leadership: a Win Centre of specialist integrated pursuit capability, delivered alongside Growth Strategy, Marketing, Products, Propositions & Solutions, Transactional Sales and Sales Operation
What we hope you'll do next:
Choose 'Apply now' to fill out our short application, so that we can find out more about you.
Equal Opportunities
At Capita, we're committed to providing an inclusive, barrier-free recruitment process and working environment for everyone. We want everyone to have the best chance of succeeding as they move through their application and start their career with us. We are an equal opportunity and Disability Confident employer, we want to hear from you if you'd like to discuss any adjustments you might need during your recruitment process. Please email reasonableadjustments@capita.com or call 07784 237318 and we'll get back to you to discuss. For more information about equal opportunities and the types of adjustments we can offer, please visit the Capita Careers website.
If you have a question that does not relate to adjustments during your recruitment process, please email our Talent Acquisition team - CPScareers@capita.com
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Disability Confident
About Disability Confident
A Disability Confident employer will generally offer an interview to any applicant that declares they have a disability and meets the minimum criteria for the job as defined by the employer. It is important to note that in certain recruitment situations such as high-volume, seasonal and high-peak times, the employer may wish to limit the overall numbers of interviews offered to both disabled people and non-disabled people. For more details please go to Disability Confident .