Communications Officer

Job summary

Do you have experience in communications and an interest in how the criminal justice system works? Would you like to use your creativity, judgement and content skills to help the Crown Prosecution Service communicate clearly with colleagues and the public?

As a Communications Officer, you will lead and support internal and external communications projects that contribute to organisational priorities and the CPS 2030 strategy. You will work with colleagues and stakeholders at all levels, from senior leaders to frontline teams, to turn complex information into clear, engaging and accessible communications.

You will create content for a range of channels to help deliver priority communication campaigns and communications for organisational change and transformation programmes, along with supporting events. You will manage in house communications channels and use audience insight to improve our work. This is a varied role in a busy, supportive and forward-thinking communications team, offering opportunities to develop your professional communications skills while making a visible contribution to the delivery of justice.

Please note, there is an expectation of attendance at the London office once a week, alongside attendance at your local office in line with the hybrid working policy.

Job description

Your roles and responsibilities:
• Lead and support internal and external communications projects aligned with organisational priorities.
• Create clear, engaging and accessible content for channels including the intranet, newsletters, blogs, social media and video.
• Manage and improve communications channels, using audience insight and evaluation to inform content and plans.
• Support the planning and delivery of priority campaigns and corporate events, coordinating activity and stakeholders.
• Provide practical communications advice and contribute to team planning, schedules and continuous improvement.

Person specification

To be eligible to apply, you need to:
• Have experience of working across a range of communications channels and producing clear, audience-focused content.
• Demonstrate strong written and oral communication skills and the ability to work effectively with stakeholders.
• Have experience of planning or delivering communications projects, campaigns or events while managing competing priorities.
• Be able to create or edit visual and video content using appropriate design tools, such as Adobe Creative Suite.
• Understand how audience insight and evaluation can be used to improve communications activity.

Behaviours

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Making Effective Decisions
• Delivering at Pace
• Working Together

Technical skills

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

• Government Communications Service’s professional competency framework. This will be assessed against level 2 of the GCS professional competency framework.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £35,935, Crown Prosecution Service contributes £10,410 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

Join the Crown Prosecution Service and find your purpose.

The Crown Prosecution Service is passionate about ensuring that we're a top performing organisation and a great place to work. We're a committed equal opportunities employer, creating a culture where you can bring your whole self to work, and individuality is truly appreciated.

This culture of inclusion is underpinned by our staff networks covering disability, faith and belief, LGBTQI+, race, social mobility alongside our mental health first aiders programme and wellbeing sessions.

The Crown Prosecution Service commits to offer its employees the following experience.

• You can do impactful, purposeful work that’s making a difference to your local communities.
• You are able to learn and grow, with access to the right opportunities and resources.
• We care about your wellbeing.
• We want you to feel valued, trusted and included.

We also offer the following range of benefits:

• Civil Service contributory pension of up to 28.9%
• 25 days’ leave, increasing to 30 days after 5 years
• £350 each year to spend on personal development
• lawyer training programme for all new prosecutors
• an extra privilege day to mark the King's birthday
• competitive maternity, paternity and parental leave
• flexible working including flexitime, and a family friendly approach to work
• Cycle2Work scheme, employee savings.

Diversity at the Crown Prosecution Service is about inclusion, embracing differences and ensuring our workforce truly reflects the communities we serve. We want you to feel that you belong and can thrive, whatever your background, identity or culture. As a Disability Confident employer, we're happy to support requests for reasonable adjustments and improve your recruitment experience. If you'd like any reasonable adjustments made to our recruitment process, let us know within your application or contact [email removed]

The Crown Prosecution Service has fixed rates for its Higher Executive Officer grade – a developing rate (the starting salary) and a spot rate (the maximum salary). Applicants typically join us on the developing rate and, after completing a 18-month development period, move to the spot rate – this is subject to your line manager confirming that you’re performing the role to a satisfactory standard.

We want to ensure our employees can thrive at work and home and offer a range of support to achieve a balance. This includes flexibility of working hours, flexibility to support caring responsibilities and a flexible approach to deployment. We offer a hybrid working policy. You must spend at least 40% of your contracted hours over a four-week period at court, in an office or another official workplace depending on business need and the kind of work you're doing.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Strengths, Ability, Experience and Technical skills.

Recruitment process

The recruitment process consists of an online application, assessment and interview.

Personal statement

We ask you to complete a personal statement of no more than 1,250 words. You need to address the core behaviours for this role, which are:

1. Making effective decisions
2. Delivering at pace

You also need to demonstrate the following experi