Senior Project Officer

Bring your environmental passion for rivers to life!

The South East Rivers Trust (SERT) has an exciting opportunity for an enthusiastic individual who is keen to gain more experience in river and catchment enhancement work - making a positive, lasting difference to the aquatic environment in the south east of England.

The Role

The Water and Land Stewardship Team (W&LS) lead the identification and delivery of Nature-based Solutions (NbS) to improve rivers and catchments across the South East. Through evidence, stakeholder engagement and on-the-ground experience, this new senior role will lead and develop NbS project opportunities. You will aim for impact, scale and collaboration.

You will be responsible for delivering projects to scale up NbS across the SERT area, and lead the ‘South East demos’ for the Ofwat Innovation Mainstreaming Nature-based Solutions project, a flagship five-year innovation project with water industry partners across the UK. Working with colleagues at SERT to deliver NbS measures on the ground will give you the opportunity to make a real difference, using this to help regulators and policy makers address barriers and build enablers for NbS at scale.

You will lead walkovers, report on project opportunities identified, and develop projects on the ground, including natural flood management, riparian corridor enhancement and land management to increase catchment resilience. You will work closely with land managers to co-design feasible NbS options delivering multiple benefits. Your recommendations will be informed by data and evidence, and part of your role will be contributing to the effective collation of this across the Trust and the region. This will include identifying and reviewing nature market opportunities including through Biodiversity Net Gain, water resource, natural flood management and water quality, and you will look to capitalise on these opportunities and find ways to combine them with public funding (e.g. developing agri-environment schemes) to develop blended funding approaches. Working with our regional water companies, you will use your understanding of their drivers and processes to find ways of delivering more nature-based solutions with them in our catchments, building on existing relationships and projects within the Trust and the wider Rivers Trust movement.

Crucially, you will take a collaborative partnership approach, building close relationships with our regional water companies, farmer clusters and other NGOs as well as regulators and local authorities, and provide a vision for these stakeholder groups to drive improvement of our rivers and catchments. 

This role is varied and allows for an individual to take ownership for their own projects, seeking and developing resolutions whilst working collaboratively with several organisations and individuals, as well as learn new skills and grow within a supported environment. You will be personable and inquisitive, enjoy working with evidence, be able to explain technical concepts in simple terms, engage positively with partners, and be passionate about rivers and the environment.

While the role covers the entire SERT area, we expect to develop a geographic focus towards either the East (Sussex, Kent) or West (Hampshire, Berkshire, Surrey).

Please see the full Senior Project Officer job description for more information.

The closing date for applications is Sunday, 29 September 2024.

Interviews will take place Friday 4 – Tuesday 8 October 2024.

Interested?

Please click the apply button to be taken to our website, where you can download the Job Application form and complete your application.