External Affairs Senior Officer - ( Ref : 6650 )

Job summary

This position can be based at Crewe , Leeds , Manchester or York

Job description

Join us in shaping a future where nature and people thrive. Whether you're drawn to hands-on conservation or playing a vital part behind the scenes, your work at Natural England will support lasting benefits for the environment and society.

Our Role

Natural England is the Government’s adviser for the natural environment and the Nature regulator with a wide range of statutory duties and powers. We provide the evidence, expertise and advice to recover Nature and shape better places for people to live. We do this working through and with others.

Strategic Outcomes for Nature

Our strategy is framed through four strategic outcomes. Each of these outcomes reinforces and amplifies the others, and together they address environmental, social and economic actions critical to thriving nature.

• Recovering Nature – Increased scale and quality of places where nature thrives.

• Building Better Places – Greener homes and infrastructure create healthier, more investable places, recognising we live better where nature thrives around us.

• Improving Health and Wellbeing – Build nature into everyday life so people can support, access and benefit from nature, wherever they live.

• Delivering Security through Nature – Nature helps us adapt to the threats of a changing climate and improves our national security, supporting more resilient food production, healthy soils, clean and plentiful water and clean air.

Find out more about the work of Natural England at:

Natural England’s Strategy: Recovering Nature for Growth, Health and Security - GOV.UK

Job description

This role offers a unique opportunity to lead and shape external affairs and stakeholder engagement in both the Yorkshire and Northern Lincolnshire and Cheshire to Lancashire Area Teams, supporting Natural England’s ambition to strengthen its external profile and build meaningful partnerships that drive nature recovery. As External Affairs Senior Officer, you will play a key role in shaping how we communicate our work, engage with stakeholders, and align local delivery with national priorities.

You will work at the intersection of local delivery and national strategy, helping to ensure that our communications and engagement are inclusive, impactful, and well-coordinated. The role offers the chance to work closely with senior leaders, national communications colleagues, and external partners, including MPs and Defra, to ensure our work is visible, understood, and strategically positioned.

This is a highly collaborative role that requires strong judgement, political awareness, and the ability to work across teams and functions. You will have the opportunity to contribute to high-profile initiatives and shape how Natural England engages with its audiences at a critical time for environmental leadership. You will be supported by a well-established network of regional and national colleagues with functional management from the Internal Engagement and External Affairs Principal, Operations.

Key Tasks /Principal Accountabilities:

• The role has no functional management responsibilities but are a source of expertise and advice for the area team staff as well as the Deputy Area and Regional Directors and contribute to Area leadership teams by bringing subject leadership to the development and delivery of local plans

• Lead the development and delivery of the Area and Regional Stakeholder Engagement Implementation Plans, ensuring alignment with Natural England’s national strategy, Communications and Engagement Framework and local priorities. Plans should include SMART objectives stakeholder analysis and evaluation metrics.

• Feed into national and regional forward planning and horizon scanning processes, including the NE Forward Look and Defra media grid.

• Support the Regional Director and Deputy Directors to build and maintain strategic relationships with MPs, Metro Mayors, local authorities, and other key partners, ensuring Natural England’s work is visible and well understood. This will include proactive outreach, meeting coordination, and briefing preparation.

• Use the Stakeholder Insights Database to track and share engagement activity across the organisation.

• Collaborate with Defra’s Operational and Local Communications (OLC) teams to manage local media relations, press releases, and social media content for internal and external audiences.

• Identify and promote positive news stories that support Natural England’s priorities, both locally and nationally.

• Support media training and upskilling of spokespeople within the Area team.

• Act as a key liaison between the Area team and national External Affairs, ensuring two-way communication and alignment on reputational issues and strategic messaging.

• Coordinate the handling plans for emerging issues that pose reputational risk.

• Contribute to the Communications and Engagement Strategic Working Group’s reputational horizon scanning.

• Support high-profile events such as NNR launches, stakeholder site visits, and Ministerial engagements.

• Coordinate with portfolio leads and regional colleagues to ensure consistent messaging and strategic alignment.

• Monitor and evaluate communications and engagement activities using insight and feedback to inform continuous improvement and demonstrate impact.

• Champion inclusivity and accessibility in all communications and engagement activities, ensuring diverse voices are represented and barriers to participation are addressed.

Knowledge and skills:

• An understanding of communications and engagement to achieve measurable outcomes (essential)

• An understanding and awareness of the Government Communications Service standards (essential)

• Completion or working towards GCS Advance Practitioner (desirable)

• The ability to use insight and evaluation to improve our delivery and outcomes (essential)

• Knowledge of tools for engagement including social media (essential)

• Excellent written and oral communications skills (essential)

• Excellent planning, prioritisation, and organisational ability to manage complex projects with competing demands (essential)

• The ability to build collaborative relationships with colleagues to help make things happen and deliver outcomes (essential)

• The ability to demonstrate and embody Natural England’s values – of being ambitious, inclusive, and collaborative and of working with integrity (essential)

Benefits

At Natural England, we support a healthy work-life balance by offering full-time, part-time, and flexible working arrangements.

We provide excellent opportunities for career progression, training, and development tailored to your role. This includes ten days annually for personal learning and development, plus three additional days for volunteering.

You’ll receive a generous leave allowance of 25 days per year (pro rata), increasing by one day for each year of service up to 30 days (pro-rata), access to the Civil Service Pension scheme with a 28.97% employer contribution, and a range of benefits such as shopping discounts and a cycle-to-work scheme. Staff can also join the Civil Service Sport club for discounts on sports, leisure activities, and social events.

We are committed to fairness, equality, and inclusivity. Our employee-led diversity networks help foster a welcoming environment where everyone feels valued and supported.

Locations:

Natural England has adopted hybrid working – which means our staff work from a flexible range of locations, encompassing home, offices (ours and our partners) and relevant sites. All new staff will be formally linked to one of our 25 offices across England, and the expectation is that all new staff will be able to access their local office to be part of the community of staff in their geographical area. Staff are expected to attend their associated office for 20% of their contractual hours.

Staff members are required to carry out all their duties working in this way and cannot do so from an overseas location at any time. Travel expenses will be paid if work-related travel is required but does not apply to travel between home and your associated office.

This role is based within the Yorkshire and Northern Lincolnshire and Cheshire to Lancashire Area Teams and the successful candidate will be able to be based out of the offices within those areas listed within this advert. (Manchester, Crewe, York, Leeds).

View a map of our office locations here: online map of Natural England office locations

Pay
It is Natural England policy to employ at the entry point of the salary range.

How to Apply

We welcome and encourage applications from all communities. Natural England is accredited to the Disability Confident Scheme, which denotes organisations which have a positive attitude towards disabled people. Disabled applicants who meet the minimum requirements for the role at the shortlisting stage are guaranteed an invitation to interview.

If you require a reasonable adjustment at interview, or there is anything else you would like the panel to take into consideration, you should notify us of this at application stage where possible, or well in advance of your interview. We now provide primary interview questions in advance for all formal recruitments.

This vacancy uses competency-based assessment. We'll assess you against the competencies below during the selection process. Please be aware that we reserve the right for roles that receive a high volume of applications to initially sift applications for one competence only.

• Technical Skills and Knowledge
• Personal Effectiveness
• Putting People at the Heart of the Environment
• Work Delivery

When completing the application form you should present relevant examples using the STAR format. Give us an example of how you have demonstrated the competency (which can be work related or from another area of your life) and tell us about the Situation, the specific Task you had to undertake, the specific Actions you took, and the Result (both immediate and in a wider context) of your Action.

Please note that STAR format is not required when answering the Technical Skills & Knowledge competency.

Examples should be given in no more than 250 words for each competency.

If you are successful at the shortlisting stage, you will be invited to attend an interview via MS Teams or a suitable alternative, where you will be asked to give examples for all competencies as set out in the Job Description.

As with all roles in NE, these roles require office attendance of a minimum of 20% of the working time – one day per week for those who work full time, subject to any reasonable adjustments and/or existing contractual homeworking.

Competencies

Competence 1

Professional competency

Detail

Technical Skills and Knowledge

Description

Develop and deliver stakeholder engagement plans to analyse and improve stakeholder relationships,
identify gaps and increase the diversity of cross-sector partnerships, using insight and evaluation to measure
outcomes and improve your approach.
Contribution to reputational horizon scanning and create a handling plan,
lines to take and briefings to manage emerging reputational risks in a timely way

Competence 2

Professional competency

Detail

Personal Effectiveness

Description

Make and explain objective decisions which combine your professional judgement and evidence. (Expert)
Act with integrity, addressing challenging issues and managing conflict through being open and objective. (Practitioner)

Competence 3

Professional competency

Detail

Putting People at the Heart of the Environment

Description

Listen to and understand our diverse partners and customers so that you achieve the best outcomes for them and Natural England. (Practitioner)
Nurture trusting partnerships and collaborate to achieve pragmatic outcomes that help deliver Natural England’s vision, mission and aims. (Practitioner)

Competence 4

Professional competency

Detail

Work Delivery

Description

Manage and deliver your work to meet agreed targets and deadlines (Expert)
Handle data responsibly, understand your role in good governance, and comply with delegations, policies and procedures (practitioner).

Person specification

Please refer to Job Description

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £41,550, Natural England contributes £12,037 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).

• 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

Please refer to Job Description

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.

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

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 : Sarah Hare
• Email : Sarah.hare@naturalengland.org.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : defra-recruitment-enquiries@resourcing.soprasteria.co.uk

Further information

https://networkrecruitment.tal.net/vx/appcentre-7/brand-4/spa-1/candidate/so/pm/1/pl/8/opp/6650-6650-External-Affairs-Senior-Officer/en-GB

Attachments

DEF-001h - Candidate Pack Natural England v2.9 Opens in new window (docx, 548kB)