Head of Public Affairs

What would you do with the perspective of senior executives and experts inside some of the industries that most shape society and the environment?

Who needs to hear it? What might make them act? And when is a private conversation more powerful than a public campaign?

We’re supporting a high-profile social entrepreneur with a strong track record of building organisations and initiatives for social change, who is behind an ambitious and rapidly growing non-profit.

The organisation has developed a distinctive model.

It works confidentially with experienced executives and industry experts, including some very senior figures, to understand where established norms, incentives and structures are getting in the way of better social and environmental outcomes.

That insight is then turned into focused engagement with the people and institutions best placed to act.

The model is already operating across several influential industries, with its work generating national media attention and engagement from senior figures across business, investment, government and civil society.

This is industry-level work. It is not about attacking individual companies or asking people to share sensitive company information. The people involved know their sectors deeply, care about their future and want to help them change.

The organisation is now well funded, scaling rapidly and building the team and capability to take the model much further.

They are appointing a Head of Public Affairs to play a central role in what comes next.

This is not a conventional public affairs role.

At its heart is a simple question: who needs to hear what, when, and in what form?

Sometimes that will mean government, Parliament or regulators. Sometimes investors, journalists or civil society. Sometimes the most effective route will be public. Often it will not.

The role is about understanding where power really sits, building trusted relationships with the people who matter, and using strong political and strategic judgement to turn credible industry insight into influence.

It is also a genuine building role.

You will work closely with the founder, help shape the organisation’s approach to public affairs and take real ownership of a visible external remit as the organisation grows.

The organisation is a non-profit, but the environment has much more of the pace, ambition and ownership of a start-up. It is building quickly around a model that is already gaining traction, with serious ambitions for the scale of its impact.

You may have worked as a special adviser, in Parliament or government, or built your career in public affairs, policy, campaigning, journalism or strategic communications. We are deliberately open-minded about background.

What matters is that you:

• understand how political and institutional decisions really get made
• bring strong judgement on people, power, timing and context
• can build credibility and trusted relationships with senior stakeholders
• are intellectually curious and able to make sense of complex issues quickly
• can move comfortably between strategic thinking and practical delivery
• have the discretion and maturity to operate around sensitive work

You do not need to have followed a conventional public affairs career.

You do need to be excited by the prospect of taking what you have learnt about politics, policy, institutions or influence and applying it somewhere different.

For the right person, this is a chance to join something at a particularly interesting moment: established enough to have demonstrated that the model works, but early enough to have a real hand in shaping what it becomes.

It offers direct access to an accomplished founder, substantial ownership, exposure across influential sectors and institutions, and the opportunity to become a visible senior part of an organisation with ambitions well beyond its current scale.

Working pattern: 2 days per week initially, with possible scope to increase

Location: UK-based and largely remote, with regular time in London