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Head of Campaigns and Engagement

Employer
ERA Foundation
Location
London (Greater) or Homeworking
Salary
£40,000 pro rata
Closing date
28 Jan 2019
Reference
IET1

Job Details

The opportunity: The ERA Foundation is an independent grant giving foundation with a highly experienced and commercially minded board, able to move quickly to help catalyse new and innovative areas of activity. One such example is our “Born to Engineer” campaign to create a small but very high-quality cohort of leading engineering sixth formers and undergraduates to be the face of a national campaign to encourage more young people, particularly girls, into engineering. The Foundation is seeking a Head of Campaign and Engagement to manage a significant expansion of the current scheme and to work closely with key partners to ensure the maximum alignment with other high-quality skills initiatives. The role will be for 18-months initially with the opportunity to become permanent subject to the candidate’s ability to establish a long term sustainable business plan.

The Head of Campaign and Engagement will coordinate a total budget of circa £70k (Wider partner activity is approximately £250k). New activities will include: 

  • Sponsorship of student ambassador cohort via mix of prizes and bursaries
  • Running networking events for student ambassadors
  • Creation and promotion of student led blogs and videos
  • Creation and promotion of competitions aimed at students

Location: Office accommodation will be provided at the Leadenhall Building in central London, with the opportunity to also work from home. The postholder will need flexibility to travel to coordinate with key partners in various parts of the UK and will be comfortable dealing at a high executive level.

Please apply by e-mail including a CV and covering letter highlighting your suitability for the role to:

Russell Marriott - Russell.Marriott@erafoundation.org

Closing date for applications: 26thJanuary 2019 with interviews planned mid-February 2019.

No agencies please.

Reporting:The post holder will report to the Executive Secretary of the ERA Foundation and will work closely to develop strategy in close collaboration with the Born to Engineer steering group comprised of the Exec Secretary and three key individuals working on ERA’s current organisational and web and media activities.

The ERA Foundation Ltd is a not for profit institution, but one which is deeply rooted in its electrical research and commercial origins in 1920, growing to be the UK’s first “privatised” research association. In 2003 the entire issued share capital of ERA Technology was sold and the proceeds used as the basis for the ERA Foundation’s funds.  Since that date, we have supported UK engineering skills development with a focus on electro-technologies. Major partners include the Royal Society, The Royal Academy of Engineering, The Royal Commission of 1851 and the IET along with other specialist skills organisations.

Annex 1 – Person Specification

E- Essential

D- Desirable

Qualifications: 

E. Must be educated to degree level or above

Experience

E. Must be able to demonstrate management of previously successful campaign and the capability to put the Born to Engineer programme on a self-sufficient basis after the initial 18-month period.

E. Working with a range of partners including corporate and charitable to deliver programmes.

D. Experience in the not for profit and/or educations/skills sector

D. Previous exposure/experience in the engineering/tech sector.

The person

Must:

E. Be a self-starter and able demonstrate energetic and innovative approaches to campaigns

E. Relate with young people and fulfil necessary CRB and DBS checks criteria

E. Be able to communicate and influence strongly at senior level, up to Board level if required.

E. Be a team player who will enjoy working with a small but highly experienced, multi-tasking group of colleagues.

E. Be prepared to travel to meet partners in various locations in the UK with an office base in London but working flexibly from home if required.

Ideally:

D. Be credible when dealing with representatives from the engineering/science sector

D. Be interested to work with the ERAF Executive Secretary to establish a business plan to place the Born to Engineer campaign on a sustainable long-term footing, including drawing in funding from other sources.

Annex 2 - Terms of reference for updated strategy 2019 onwards

Background

Born to Engineer is a national programme established by the ERA Foundation to inspire more young people in the UK to take a career in engineering.

https://www.borntoengineer.com

The Born to Engineer brand has developed an excellent reputation and has produced a range of very engaging video material which has been disseminated successfully through various channels. However, the challenge for the future is to greatly increase the reach and impact of the programme across the UK whilst maintaining the emphasis on ERA’s USPs. These USPs include ERA’s focus on quality, its strong relationships with high quality partners and its flexibility as an independent organisation to work in innovative ways with organisations and individuals deemed to be able to contribute toward ERA core objectives.  

A key differentiation compared to other programmes aimed at attracting more young people into engineering will be the quality being targeted. For example, bringing just 100 very high calibre, leading engineers into the profession could have a disproportionally positive impact for the UK. Such individuals will also provide the inspirational role models needed to attract more like-minded young people. ERA’s strategy will therefore to target schools and universities across the UK with the very best potential, albeit from the widest social range possible.  By doing this ERA will be taking a different approach to many other established programmes which tend to employ a “broadcast approach”.

ERA also wishes to increase the focus on women in science and engineering. For example, many competent young women mathematicians may not have even considered or understood the creative opportunities that an engineering career may provide. If ERA is able to develop suitable programmes to attract such individuals then they may represent a ready-made cohort that could have a relatively fast impact. Therefore, specialist maths schools may be sensible early targets in this regard.

Campaign

To achieve the above objects ERA will need to implement a carefully coordinated campaign.

This will be managed by an experienced campaign manager, who will be responsible for driving the programme, alongside co-option of suitable cadres of young, charismatic engineers to provide the high calibre face of the campaign. The campaign manager will be recruited by ERA on an eighteen-month contract in addition to an appropriate campaign budget.

The campaign will be run on a national basis with partners selected purely on their quality and ability to create real impact.

The campaign manager will work under the direction of the Executive Secretary to implement the campaign strategy in line with the strategy set by the Chairman with on-going advice from members of the ERA Board. Key stages of the campaign will be:

1)Develop coordinated plan with identified key partners selected on the basis of quality and ability to maximise reach and impact of through campaign through their existing networks.

2)     Mount a drive to recruit a cohort of young engineers to deliver the campaign via a series of events, competitions and awards closely aligned with ERA’s existing programmes. Potential sources for recruitment include:

  • STEM Ambassadors
  • WISE
  • University student ambassadors
  • Young Woman Engineer of the Year

3) Maximise exposure of the programme, considering the following points:

●     The mix of content, both video and written/photography.  
Weigh benefit of production of new videos against benefit of wider dissemination of existing material.

●     Current channel strategy.It may be that ERA needs to change the web sites, which includes substantial online and offline components and seek to bring the partners and online content together in one effort.  

●     Partnership Leverage. How can the content ERA has (film, photography, written) be combined with the efforts that the ERA is already funding through the partners?  
Can the use of ERA funded content become part of the package of being an ERA funded organisation or individual?  

  • New Partnerships. What other organisations or individuals might be approached to use the material, both off and online

4) Develop early metrics totrack the impact of the Born to Engineer programme. This is a vital part of the programme requirement. Partners may be able to assist with this. For example, Smallpeice/Arkwright have very good mechanisms for tracking impact of such programmes and given they are intended partner ERA can benefit from their expertise.

5) Develop other sources of funding with partners to augment ERA contributions initially and to look toward longer-term expansion and sustainability.
For example, such finance may include University Widening Participation funds. 

Outputs

The aim is to place the Born to Engineer Campaign on a footing where activities with Partners could eventually be maintained without drawing on Foundation funds for core activity. (The Board would want its own funds to be used in future to foster more new and innovative growth activities). The principal output of this campaign is to achieve measurable success in converting exceptional students who might not have considered a career in engineering into roles the engineering workplace. 

Additional outputs will be:

·      Expanding the ‘Born to Engineer’ brand also include the ERAF’s wider partnered-outreach activity. This would entail giving B2E a much higher profile on the main ERAF Web site

·      The creation of select, activenetworks with existing and new partners to drive engagement. 

·      Creation of new metrics to track “conversions” of students to engineering. 

·      Progress reports on the above at 6 months with a f report at 12 months which will lay out the longer term, sustainable vision for the ERA Board to review. 

B2E2 - Shape of Campaign

The revised Born to Engineer campaign is all about quality. Our aim is to create a highly energetic and influential cohort of young student engineering “converts”. People who may typically either not chosen STEM options or who may have focused instead on physics, maths or medicine rather than engineering. 100 really impressive young engineers will have more benefit for the UK than ten times that number of less motivated and less skilled individuals. Specific strands of the campaign will include attracting non-engineers, promoting the role of women in STEM, connecting people and manufacturing

We will aim to forge links with a small number of top-class engineering Universities giving good geographic coverage of the UK. 

The current Born to Engineer material should not be neglected in the process and may benefit from ongoing refactoring, e.g. promoting teacher packs, refreshing resources to signpost up-to date steps into engineering, source additional ‘how to’ resources from partners (write an Engineering CV/UCAS statement/etc). 

New Born to Engineer films will be released in November and January to maintain momentum behind existing Born to Engineer activity pending the recruitment of the new Head of Campaign and Engagement. Another film will be commissioned for launch in April to ensure Born to Engineer profile is maintained prior to the new campaign taking off.

Outputs

The ERA Board are considering initial funding over an 18-month period but with a 12-month review to establish whether a long-term sustainable plan can be put in place.  The aim would be to eventually place the Born to Engineer Campaign on a footing where activities with Partners could be maintained without drawing on Foundation funds for core activity. (The ERAF Board would want its own funds to be used in future to foster more new and innovative growth activities).  A Head of Campaign and Engagement (HoC&E) will be recruited. Their role is to leverage existing resources to manage existing passive channels and to coordinate with ERA promotional video producer and to manage Twitter, Facebook and other social media channels

The principal output of this campaign is to achieve measurable success in converting exceptional students who might not have previously considered a career in engineering into the world of the engineering workplace. 

Additional outputs will be:

1.The creation of select, active networks with existing and new partners to drive engagement. 

2.Expanding the ‘Born to Engineer’ brand also include the ERAF’s wider partnered-outreach activity.

Creation of new metrics to track “conversions” of students to engineering. 
Metrics will be used to evolve the campaign toward successful outcomes, promote continuous improvement, and enable future strategic decision making.
Examples would include recording a positive response to calls for action. e.g.downloading specific guidance material, active engagement in a relevant competitions or time spent engaging with online channel

3.Continued organic growth in existing metrics being monitored within the current Born to Engineer operation

4.A report detailing progress on the above will be expected at 6 months with a further report at 12 months which will lay out the longer term, sustainable vision for the ERA Board to review. 

New resources to be developed

Promote Born to Engineer video channel through other YouTube Engineering Channels (Relatively inexpensive compared to pay-per-click advertising; plus creates long term links to back to the brand. For example, a popular sponsored video would contain our ‘ad’ forever rather than the duration of the campaign. 

Produce useful (PDF) doc pack for pre-GCSE students, detailing:

  • Best school courses to take 
  • Universities to contact
  • Partners Schemes
  • Resources should be developed in partnership with suitable contacts in the ERAFs network (e.g. people with direct knowledge of admissions could be asked to help produce content on applying for University etc) 

One of the key new metrics is likely to be active access of these packs.

Developing high impact, cost effective prizes most likely to appeal to the young cohort we are targeting. For example:
 

  • Cameras for producing films (e.g. competition‘produce a short video on YouTube explaining a key engineering concept’. Incentive ‘win a top video-blogging camera’).
  • Work experience packages (e.g. co-ordinate with contacts in the ERAFs network to create work experience opportunities)

New films and content will take into account that most material to date has been largely preaching to the converted. This is a problem we have identified with not just our own, but partners resources. 

Our future media needs to be more focussed on pre-GCSE student who might not realise what engineering is or what it could lead to in terms of exciting opportunities in

  • Saving the environment through green technologies
  • Improving health and social care
  • Creating exciting new digital services

In other words, concentrating the message on the end impact and benefit that can be achieved rather than framing as engineering centric from the outset. 

Resources to target Teachers, Parents and Students and young women in particular, developing regional clusters of activities centred around particular hot spots and driven by student cohort which in turn can start to develop more tailored resources for their specific locale.

Summary of Campaign

In summary we would see the Born to Engineer Campaign playing a role throughout a young person's journey into Engineering

STEP 1. Our primary media output (films, whether produced by Duckrabbit, other producers or sponsored on other YouTube channels) would be aimed at GCSE level students. They would highlight the roles Engineers can play. They are the first ‘hook’ into Engineering

STEP 2. Our online resources (website) would provide the information required at making informed decisions as to how to best become an engineer. These would be aimed at Parents, Teachers and Students. (for example; how to choose A-Levels for Engineering; how to get work experience; how to select a degree level course).

STEP 3.Our ‘active’ role would be helping those on this journey network and feel supported. This would be done through networking opportunities; making use of the ERAF contact network to allow students to find mentors or working experience; and handing off students to other partners (scholarships; awards etc).  

 

Company

The ERA Foundation is a non-profit organisation which contributes to the economic vitality of the UK by supporting engineering skills development and by helping bridge the gap between engineering research and its commercialisation.

Our history means we have a particular interest in electrotechnologies, but we maintain a broad interest in all of engineering especially in our work supporting young people.

Much of our activity is in partnership with other organisations or individuals. All our partners have a significant stake in what we do and how we do it.

Our work involves: informing and promoting a supportive UK policy environment for industry; developing future UK engineers; and supporting excellence in enterprise and entrepreneurshipthrough awards and investments in fledgeling Electro-Technology-related companies

Company info
Website
Telephone
07703233952
Location
The IET
Savoy Place
London
London
WC2R 0BL
GB

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