Director of Communications and Corporate Affairs

As our Director of Communications and Corporate Affairs, you’ll deliver and drive the PR, corporate communications, and corporate affairs strategy, promoting and protecting the British Heart Foundation (BHF)’s reputation, building brand awareness, and generating support and engagement to ultimately drive income. 

Reporting to the Chief Marketing and Fundraising Officer, you'll deliver the media engagement, press and comms strategy, thought leadership strategy and content generation to build brand awareness, credibility, and influence policy decisions. Accountable for the development and delivery of the corporate communications and reputation management strategy, and stakeholder engagement strategy for alumni and ambassadors, you’ll also own the crisis response process and be responsible for internal change messaging.

In this highly collaborative senior leadership role, you'll also advise the Chief Executive, Executive Group and Trustees on communication strategy and communications and work closely with the Chief People Officer and Director of Policy and Public Affairs to ensure alignment of communications strategies with planning processes and policy and public affairs strategies. Additionally, you’ll collaborate with the Director of Brand, Acquisition and Health Marketing to deliver integrated campaigns across earned, owned and paid media. 

You'll role model our values, provide effective and authentic leadership, and grow colleague engagement. Engaging teams to provide clear direction, motivation, and coaching, you'll enable them to perform at their best and drive the delivery of the Directorate’s strategic plans.

Working arrangements

9–12-month fixed term contract, covering an internal secondment. 

Start date: As soon as possible. Candidates must be available to start by Monday 2 September at the latest.

This is a blended role, where your work will be dual located between your home and our London office.

At BHF we believe in the power of being together, so our colleagues on blended contracts can expect to spend some time in their office, at least two days each week, on average.  The use of our office spaces is driven in part by your role and the activities you need to do. This may vary from time to time, so you will need to work in a flexible way to unlock your best work for our cause.

Need more help balancing your work and home life? Talk to us about what flexibility is available at the application or interview.

About the team

The Communications and Corporate Affairs team comprises of 25+ communications professionals across a variety of specialisms including press, PR, and engagement, covering all four UK nations.

About you

With outstanding leadership skills and experience of leading a communications function within a large organisation, you have experience of implementing PR campaigns, multi-faceted communications solutions and delivering PR account management to exceptional levels.

With an awareness and passion for a wide range of media tools, you bring comprehensive knowledge and understanding of the media landscape across online and offline communications, the marketing planning process, and BHF’s cause and objectives.

A confident and ambitious communications specialist, able to deliver transformation and strategic programmes, you have intellectual flexibility and the ability to develop strong working relationships at Board/Senior leadership level. A highly effective organiser who can prioritise and manage multiple complex projects and stakeholders, you possess excellent problem-solving skills and the ability to inspire excellence in others and build high-performing teams.