Policy Assistant

Job Scope:

The Royal Society is seeking an enthusiastic person to join the People and Planet team as a Policy Assistant on a full time basis. This position is likely to suit someone who is looking to make the move into a policy and influencing role.

The People and the Planet policy team currently comprises about 15 members of staff working on issues such as human health, biodiversity, climate, energy and the environment. Situated in the Science Policy section, we work to develop and promote independent, expert and timely science advice to UK, European and international decision makers.

The successful applicant will have an interest in, and awareness of, the political and policy landscape across the UK. The role requires clear communication skills, both written and verbal, as the post holder will be expected to participate in communicating the team’s work to parliamentarians, civil servants, and the wider scientific and decision-making community across the UK. The post holder will also require strong administrative skills, as they will be responsible for providing logistical, event management, and administrative support across the wider team.

Primarily focussed within the People and Planet Team, many of the issues we deal with have clear overlap with work led by the Society’s other major policy themes – data, education, and policy for science. The post holder will be expected to support work in other programmes as the need arises, and whilst the Society’s policy work is led by the science policy team, we also work closely with colleagues in Communications, Public Affairs, Public Engagement, International Affairs, Industry Engagement, and Diversity and Inclusion teams to deliver outcomes.

About the Royal Society

The Royal Society is the independent scientific academy of the UK. The Society’s mission is to recognise, promote, and support excellence in science and to encourage the development and use of science for the benefit of humanity. Science is vital to many areas of policy making and the Society seeks to ensure the government and the public have access to impartial and independent expert advice to inform debate and guide good decision-making. The Royal Society provides independent, timely and authoritative scientific advice to UK and international decision makers. We champion the contribution that science can make to economic prosperity, quality of life and environmental sustainability, and are a hub for debate about science, society and public policy.

The Science Policy section comprises approximately 50 staff working across a range of themes and policy areas, according to scientific and policy priorities. It works in partnership with businesses, national academies, learned societies, charities and government, and deploys a wide range of channels and approaches – from the delivery of major reports to rapid shorter statements, the creation of influential networks, skilful use of the Society’s digital and media channels, and well-founded programmes of events. The Society continues to develop and look for innovative approaches that will increase its influence in national and international policy debates.

We undertake the following activities, on topics that reflect the Society’s priorities:

• Project: Analysing the scientific evidence relating to major policy issues in collaboration with other experts.
• Reports & publications Producing reports, statements, consultation responses and other publications on a regular basis.
• Events: Bringing together policymakers and scientists to discuss current topics in science policy.

Please note that we are unable to offer sponsorship for this role.

Reports to: Programme Coordinator

Pay band: B

Salary: £31,650

Contract type: Permanent

Hours: 35 hours a week

Location: Carlton House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AG plus the option for some hybrid remote working
Closing date for applications: Monday 13 January 2025 at 23.59 

Interviews will be held: Wednesday 29 January 2025

• Produce written materials to support and/or promote the People and Planet team’s work i.e. preparing summaries, briefings, letters and consultation responses.
• Work closely with the Public Affairs team to promote the work of the People and Planet team amongst parliamentarians, civil servants, and the wider scientific and decision-making community across the UK.
• Provide support for policy projects which may include sourcing background information for events and other activities, drafting briefings or invitations, analysing data, providing information to team members to support link-up between different projects, contract management, helping to support relationships across our networks of experts, and other elements of policy delivery work.
• Organise the logistics for in-person, virtual and hybrid internal and external policy-related events. This will include liaising with the Society’s internal conferencing and events section, seeking out suitable external venues, organising audio-visual support, arranging catering, sending out invitations, managing the delegate list, attendee registration, preparing relevant material for the event, and expenses.
• Administrative and logistical support for the People and Planet team, including travel bookings, coordination of meetings, drafting and distributing agendas and papers and minute-taking for a range of informal and formal governance boards, meetings and visits.
• Management of day-to-day financial activities such as raising purchase orders, receiving goods, processing expenses claims, logging spending accurately and keeping spend within budget for the projects.
• Liaise with the design, social media, communications and website teams to promote the team’s work, coordinating with all relevant stakeholders and working to deadlines.
• Develop and maintain a stakeholder network to facilitate delivery.
• Other reasonable activities as required.

Pay Band B – Role Descriptor and Competencies

Decision-making – your work is varied and you have a range of administrative or technical tasks. You take decisions in line with specific routines, guidelines or procedures.  You plan your own work and coordinate with others on how your work fits into a broader plan of activities.  Supervision is available for issues that fall outside of existing operating guidelines or your realm of knowledge

Thinking challenges - solutions to issues or problems are not always obvious and the investigation is needed before you choose a way forward. Your initiative is required to help find ways to improve working practices and procedures in your area of work, in sorting out problems that occur in day-to-day work or improvements to work processes.

Communicating – you maintain relationships which involve liaison or coordinating with a range of internal and/or external contacts on mainly transactional issues.  

Developing people – you may be responsible for allocating work to, or checking the work of, less experienced colleagues.

Managing Resources – you might perform activities such as reconciling information/data or analyses of expenditure or income, adhering to agreed procedures.   

Applying knowledge & expertise - you are proficient in, and keep up to date with the skills required for your area of administrative work or technical skills acquired through relevant work experience and/or vocational qualification.

The competency levels for a pay Band B role are described below.