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Working at FDF

Our organisation

Our benefits

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Current job vacancies

Current job vacancies

• Senior Corporate Affairs Executive
• Sector Technical and Regulatory Executive

Senior Corporate Affairs Executive

Job Type: Full time, Permanent
Location: Central London (Bloomsbury)
Salary: Competitive

The role

This role is crucial in liaising between FDF's expert policy teams, member companies, the media and political stakeholders to help communicate our priorities for Brexit, diet and health, industrial strategy, sustainability and food science. Supporting the Head of Corporate Affairs and Media Manager, you will:

Media relations

• Handle media queries, seeking advice from specific FDF colleagues as appropriate or external organisations, alerting and involving the Media Manager/Head of Corporate Affairs as necessary.
• Provide extra mentoring support to the other Corporate Affairs Executives, where necessary, assisting them to anticipate proactive opportunities and plan for contentious issues.
• With the other members of the Media & Campaigns team, provide a 24-hour on call media service for FDF, to ensure we are able to communicate FDF's position to the media/public at all times. In the absence of the Media Manager, the Senior Corporate Affairs will need to support colleagues and the Head of Corporate Affairs in handling out-of-hours enquiries at times other than their own allocated duty week.
• Develop FDF press notices, position statements and media responses, and with the Media Manger, and where necessary, oversee those produced by Corporate Affairs Executives within the team, in consultation with appropriate FDF colleagues.
• Write articles and letters to the editor for publication on request.
• Prepare and execute proactive media plans for FDF campaigns and interests to ensure maximum publicity for FDF.
• Provide specialist advice for member associations, and FDF committees / groups on media issues of concern to FDF and on specific issues relating to their sectors.
• Help Media Manager to oversee the team to ensure that databases, licenses, contacts lists and monitoring processes are kept up to date and meet the organisation's need.

Campaigns/events

• Work with the Media Manager to scope out forward plans for FDF's core campaigns. This will include setting objectives, deliverables, and planning timescales and resource requirements.
• Contribute to the tactical delivery of the campaigns/events as well as working closely with FDF policy colleagues to keep abreast of Government activity and the national and European agenda related to each campaign.
• Progress the forward plans for each identified campaign/event including developing communication solutions, planning events, creating web and hard copy and sourcing case studies.

Management responsibilities

• Effectively deputise for the Media Manager in their absence.
• Run weekly team meetings (in the absence of the Media Manager) and update the weekly work list Media Team plan (following all meetings).
• Assess the need for media training for colleagues within FDF.
• Take a team wide view of workload and pressure points in order to promote wellbeing within the Corporate Affairs function.

General

• Assist with any other reasonable duties that may be required by the Head of Corporate Affairs and Media Manager.
• Deliver specialist advice to members and other stakeholders in order to ensure they are up- to-date on pertinent issues and opportunities, while seeking to collaborate and encourage contributions in order to build a consensus and influence outcomes.
• Work with colleagues to promote FDF's policy agenda and achievements to wider stakeholders and members
• With the Media Manager, supervise the production of copy for newsletters (FDF and FDF Scotland).
• Support/coach senior staff ahead of/following media appearances.

The team

FDF's Corporate Affairs team are the link between our members and government. We aim to put member issues at the forefront of the government agenda, and work with government in helping our members to meet government set targets for food and drink.

Requirements

• Excellent knowledge of the workings of the FDF media team including experience of working in a front-line media role (Corporate Affairs Executive)
• Experience of managing challenging portfolio areas and contentious issues
• Experience of campaigns work preferably related to a specific policy area
• Able to apply in-depth technical knowledge to own work and that of the wider Corporate Affairs team
• Able to manage own workload and complex/self-defined projects
• Ability to build trust and devise practices, working effectively with colleagues including Corporate Affairs team, the Media Manager and Head of Corporate Affairs
• A persuasive communicator with experience of giving presentations and leading meetings
• Ability to plan resources and timescales
• Strong administrative and IT skills

Main Challenges

Whilst this position is not a managerial role, it holds a high level of responsibility because of regular, direct contact with the media. The Senior Corporate Affairs Executive speaks on behalf of FDF's members / the industry, so must at all times be eloquent, accurate and on-message.

How to apply

We'd love to hear from you, if you think your experience and skillset are suited to the role. Please send us your CV, covering letter and salary expectations, illustrating why you'd be a great candidate to recruitment@fdf.org.uk.

Closing Date

Friday 27 September 2019, 5:30pm

Sector Technical and Regulatory Executive

Job Type: Part time (2.5 days/ week), Fixed-term one year Contract
Location: Central London (Bloomsbury)
Salary: Competitive

The role

This role will support the UK Tea and Infusions Association (UKTIA), working closely with the Chief Executive of the Association and the Associations and Groups Manager.

This role will involve organising, attending and drafting minutes of relevant internal and external meetings, whilst providing updates and representing the interest of the sector. You will also ensure the Associations' website is kept up-to-date and do some general admin. You will track changes to Regulations relevant to the sector and communicate these to members in an timely and appropriate manner. The role will also involve collecting, analysing and presenting data in response to Government Consultations and internal UKTIA projects.

You will act as the first point of contact for members, media and the public, liaise with FDF committees, government departments, European Associations and other stakeholders, assist in the management of incidents and take on ad-hoc projects.

The team

FDF's Regulation, Science and Sustainability team provide a timely and expert service to members, on technical and regulatory developments of interest to the UK food and drink industry. The team covers a wide range of issues including Allergens, Food Contact Materials, Food Law and Labelling, Residues and Contaminants and support a number of serviced Sector Associations on specific category areas of interest.

Must Have (Essentials):

• Knowledge of regulatory and technical issues affecting the food and drink industry
• Responsible self-starter
• Strong ability to manage a diverse workload and a wide range of issues
• Good ability to sustain a range of working relationships
• Willingness to learn & take responsibility for projects
• Good communications skills, both verbal and written
• Very good administrative ability–including accounting competence
• Good ability to prioritise work, work under pressure and meet deadlines
• IT literate
• Good ability to analyse legislative documents

View full job description

How to apply

We'd love to hear from you, if you think your experience and skillset are suited to the role. Please send us your CV, covering letter and salary expectations, illustrating why you'd be a great candidate to recruitment@fdf.org.uk.

Closing Date

Friday 27 September 2019

More about working for FDF

Our organisation

Our benefits

Our workplace

View our recruitment privacy notice

Our organisation

We're the Food and Drink Federation (FDF) - the voice of the UK food and drink industry: the largest manufacturing sector in the country. We help our members operate in a highly regulated marketplace to maximise their competitiveness and profitability. Our job is to communicate our industry's values and concerns to Government, regulators, consumers and the media. We also work in partnership with key players in the food supply chain to ensure our food is safe, affordable and nutritious.

Our benefits

FDF is a great place to work where we take wellbeing seriously and have a great benefits package to match, offering a pension scheme, life insurance, 25 days holiday, private healthcare, leisure travel insurance, gym subsidy, interest-free season ticket loan and cycle-to-work scheme.

View our staff benefits »

Our workplace

We're based in the heart of central London in a modern, bright open-plan office. We have a friendly work culture with great break-out spaces, quiet booths and opportunities for flexible-working. Our 'Feel Good for Life' team regularly organises events and activities to promote positive health and wellbeing.

View our recruitment privacy notice »

FDF operates as an equal opportunities employer and we welcome all applications regardless of gender, marital status, sexual orientation, pregnancy, race, colour, ethnic origin, nationality, religion/beliefs, disability and age.