The Royal College of General Practitioners is the largest membership organisation solely for GPs in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1952, it has over 55,000 members, including 5000 in Scotland, who are committed to improving patient care, developing their own skills and promoting general practice as a discipline. General practice is the largest branch of the medical profession. It provides some 1 million consultations for patients in the UK every working day and deals with 86% of the health problems experienced by the UK population.

We are currently recruiting a Policy and Public Relations Officer to support our communications, policy and public affairs activity in Scotland, and we are looking for someone who has demonstrable experience in a communications, policy or public affairs role.

You will work closely with the Policy & Public Affairs Manager to ensure that the priorities of RCGP and issues impacting general practice are recognised by policy makers, the press and the public. You will support RCGP work to influencing decision making at the highest level which will have a direct impact on general practice and its patients by drafting RCGP policy consultation responses, representing RCGP policy at high-level external stakeholder meetings and providing comprehensive briefings to our GP representatives ahead of these meetings.

You will also help to deliver our internal and external communications across Scotland, ensuring that our key messages reach the intended audiences to maximise impact. This will require you to develop and maintain links with media contacts across Scotland, draft key internal communications to our members and produce proactive and reactive media statements. You will take a lead role in maintaining our social media presence.

Our small, friendly team plays a key role in supporting general practice in Scotland. You’ll be helping communicate to stakeholders the views of the RCGP, and to do that effectively, knowledge and experience of the health agenda, patient issues and political context of Scotland would be highly advantageous.

You’ll have degree level education or have requisite experience, be an excellent team player and be able to work across a varied organisation and take a corporate viewpoint.

The successful candidate will share our corporate values. In return, the College offers excellent terms and conditions and great working environment. This role will be hybrid with two days a week in our office in Edinburgh city centre. We offer flexible working hours Monday to Friday.

Key and our partner organisation Community Lifestyles are recruiting a new Team Manager to complete our Staff Development, Policy and Practice Team. You will be joining us at an exciting time to help influence and lead practice and systems changes within our well established and dedicated learning and training function.

You will be at the heart of the organisation, empowering and supporting our Staff Development Team and operational managers in embedding robust systems and processes that enable us to build on our commitment to workforce learning and development.

You will work with some amazing people, especially the people we support who are co-trainers, in the development and delivery of a high quality and proactive learning and development service that supports our entire workforce.

In addition to supporting and leading our committed, experienced trainers you will co-ordinate, agree, and monitor objectives and work plans, ensuring the delivery of an effective, efficient, responsive high-quality service.

You’ll be thinking carefully about relationships, wellbeing, and collaboration, as well as best practice in the use of systems and processes. You should be able to demonstrate experience in fostering positive employee relations and solution-focused strategies.

You will understand the knowledge, skills and values needed by our workforce to deliver truly person-centred human rights-based support, so having previous service management experience would be ideal.

You will have significant experience in delivering learning and development activities in a social care setting, having designed, delivered, and evaluated learning resources for social care workers and managers.

You will have a relevant qualification in health and social care, and a learning and development qualification would be advantageous.

Excellent people, organisational, communication and influencing skills are essential as are good working knowledge of Microsoft packages and systems.

If you’re ready for an amazing challenge, then we would love to hear from you!

If you would like to discuss the role further, please contact Sheila Hanney, Head of Staff Development, Policy and Practice by emailing Sheila.hanney@key.org.uk

Key and our subsidiary, Community Lifestyles, we provide person-centred support to over 2,000 disabled people, across 17 Scottish local authorities, to enable them to lead full, active lives in their own homes and communities.

The people we support have a wide range of life experiences and needs, from young people still at school through to people in their 90s. Our approach, therefore, is about working in partnership with the person, and the important people in their life, to build flexible, responsive support which is focused on them achieving what they want from life.

We are committed to the Scottish Government’s Coming Home agenda, having a track record in supporting people with complex support needs, people moving out of institution care including those living in out of areas placement, far from their families, friends, and original communities. Individual services range from a few hours per week to 24/7 support in people’s own homes and communities, reflecting each person’s agreed outcomes and personal plan.

Working closely with our Learning and Development Team, operational managers, housing colleagues and team of specialist behaviour support instructors, you will:

• Promote the highest standard of person-centred, outcomes-based support.
• Lead on the delivery of our Positive Behaviour Support and Trauma-focused strategies.
• Provide supervisory guidance and development support to our team of behaviour support instructors and together oversee a Community of Practice for our Practice Leaders.

We are looking for someone who has::

• Managed and led a team delivering social care support.
• Successfully supported individuals with very complex support needs to live good lives in the community.
• Led practice development and training in relation to positive behaviour support within a human-rights and person-centred approach.
• Knowledge and understanding of current social care policy and practice environment including the Scottish Government Coming Home agenda.
• Well-developed leadership, interpersonal and written skills.
• A recognised social care or relevant professional qualification and while a recognised PBS/BILD qualification would be advantageous, this is not essential as we will offer support to attain this.

Based in Glasgow, the role is across all our operational areas, and will involve travel across Scotland working closely with managers, complex support need instructors, staff and the people we support.

If you think you’re the person we are looking for, and you’d like to discuss the role further, please contact Sheila Hanney, Head of Staff Development, Policy and Practice by email sheila.hanney@key.org.uk

Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP) is seeking to appoint an experienced Policy and Public Affairs Officer who is educated to degree level, ideally with a relevant postgraduate qualification, with a keen interest in reducing harms from alcohol.

The Role

The Policy and Public Affairs Officer will help guide SHAAP advocacy activities through identifying and analysing relevant policy, providing advice and developing evidence-based positions, carrying out research, monitoring media and policy activity, dealing with the media, responding to consultations, organising events and providing administrative support.

SHAAP is a partnership of the Medical Royal Colleges and the Faculty of Public Health in Scotland and is based at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE).

Using the best available evidence, SHAAP provides the authoritative clinical voice on how policy makers and clinicians can reduce alcohol-related harms in Scotland. We work in close collaboration with key organisations in the alcohol field in Scotland, the rest of the UK and worldwide.

The Person

The Policy and Public Affairs Officer will be an excellent communicator with internal and external stakeholders at all levels of seniority, with the ability to self-manage and prioritise in a dynamic context and within a small team. They must have the ability to advise on and communicate SHAAP policy positions, with experience of researching and drafting briefings, and/or policy papers and/or consultation responses. They must also be able to represent SHAAP at internal and external meetings, seminars and conferences.

Please refer to the Job Description for the role and person full details.

Remuneration Package

The salary for this role will be £34,711 per annum plus benefits. Additional benefits include:

• Pension: with employer contributions of 9%.
• Holidays: 23 days annual leave (with incremental increase over five years to 28 days) and 11 days public holiday/College close downs.
• Life assurance scheme.
• Long-term income protection scheme for those unable to work due to illness.
• Cycle to Work scheme.
• Discounted rates for use of the venue for personal events.

*Based at the College in Queen Street, Edinburgh, with flexibility for a form of hybrid working to be agreed.