Assistant Species Recovery Officer - Beaver

Job summary

What you’ll do…

Forestry England’s Biodiversity Plan sets out a bold ambition of nature recovery in the Nation’s Forests. Working across five principal focus areas, Forestry England aims to restore resilient biodiversity in the nation’s forests, delivering our vision to ensure that these forests provide the most valuable places for wildlife to thrive and expand in England.

What could be better than working outdoors and making a tangible difference to the restoration of beavers in our landscape? Beavers are a national priority species for Forestry England, engineering complex wetland ecosystems that are hubs of biodiversity and that store water in the landscape, mitigating the impacts of flooding and drought. Our Assistant Species Recovery Officer - Beaver will use their broad range of skills and ongoing training to directly support wild beavers in Gloucestershire through the Severn Vale Beaver Project with Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust and other partners.

The post-holder will assist the Senior Specialist – Severn vale Beaver Project (based at Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust) in all areas of their work to support the successful restoration of wild beavers in Gloucestershire. Key parts of this role will be supporting the Senior Specialist in stakeholder and community engagement, as well as delivering on the reintroduction and monitoring of beaver populations.

Please see the job description below for more information and details about what we need from you.

Where you’ll work…

This role will be based in Gloucestershire and the Severn Vale, working both within Forestry England land in the Forest of Dean and in the wider county in the Frome catchment, with the primary office being our Coleford office.

Job description

Key responsibilities & accountabilities

Stakeholder and community engagement

• Support the Senior Specialist – Severn Vale Beaver Project in engaging with diverse stakeholders and with local communities to ensure the success of the project.

This will require a successful candidate to adapt their communication style to suit their audience and deliver information at different levels of understanding.

Beaver reintroduction

• Support the Senior Specialist – Severn Vale Beaver Project in the process of applying for and delivering the terms of a wild beaver release licence. This will include practical tasks and ecological surveys associated with reintroducing beavers and site selection.

• Undertake and coordinate monitoring of reintroduced beavers with volunteers to document their dispersal and impacts.

And any other tasks, reasonably requested by your line manager.

Person specification

Skills, knowledge & experience

Essential professional and technical experience

• Experience with stakeholder and community engagement

• A good understanding of beaver ecology, ideally with on the ground practical experience or knowledge of monitoring beaver.

• Excellent communication skills in a range of media to a variety of audiences, and an ability to bring people together and gain consensus.

• Experience working on development and/or delivery of a nature conservation project, with a sound understanding of ecology and the barriers and opportunities to species recovery.

• Experience working with stakeholders and/or community groups.

• Strong organisational skills and ability to plan own time efficiently.

• Knowledge and understanding of industry standards and best practice associated with species reintroductions and human-wildlife coexistence in the UK.

• Ability to work independently and in a team while maintaining good relationships and knowledge exchange with wider teams.

• Competent in IT including core Microsoft Office applications.

• A good understanding of Health & Safety in the workplace.

Desirable professional and technical experience

• Direct experience working in species reintroductions, or in the management of captive or wild beaver.

• Experience of managing contractors and volunteers

• Experience in wider ecological assessment and land management.

• Experience dealing with wildlife conflict and complaints.

Qualifications

Essential

• Qualification in ecology or similar discipline and/or experience in conservation and/or land management

• A full driving licence

Desirable

• CL50/CL51/CL52 Natural England licence holder

Licences

A full driving licence

Qualifications

Qualification in ecology or similar discipline and/or experience in conservation and/or land management

Behaviours

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

• Communicating and Influencing
• Working Together
• Delivering at Pace

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £30,105, Forestry Commission contributes £8,721 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%

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 and Experience.

How to apply…

You will be asked to write a 200 word statement on your relevant experience and career history, along with a personal statement of no more than 500 words. You will be assessed on both during sifting. More details about how to apply are listed on the application form.

You will be assessed on behaviour and strength based questions during your interview.

The Behaviours being assessed at interview are –

• Communicating and Influencing
• Working Together
• Delivering At Pace

If candidates pass the interview but are not the leading candidate they can be placed on a reserve list. We may offer candidates on the reserve list for this role the opportunity to be considered for other roles at the same or lower pay bands.

Successful candidates will undergo a criminal record check and the government baseline personnel security standard check.

If you require any reasonable adjustments, please email fcrecruitmentteam@forestryengland.uk.

If you're planning to use AI to support your application, please ensure you've read our guidelines here first.

Read more about our application process and working with us on the Forestry England website.

Nationality requirements…

Read more about nationality requirements here.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see theCivil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

Apply and further information

This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans (opens in a new window) initiative.The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name : FC Recruitment Team
• Email : fcrecruitmentteam@forestryengland.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : fcrecruitmentteam@forestryengland.uk

Further information

Our recruitment process is underpinned by the principle of appointment on the basis of fair and open competition and appointment on merit, as outlined in the Civil Service Commissioners’ Recruitment Principles.If you feel your application has not been treated in accordance with these principles and you wish to make a complaint, you should in the first instance contact FCE by email: englandhr.services@forestryengland.uk. If you are not satisfied with the response you receive, you can contact the Civil Service Commission, which regulates all Civil Service recruitment.

Attachments

Assistant Species Recovery Officer - Beaver (PB6a) (1) Opens in new window (pdf, 113kB)