Senior Communications Manager – Special Projects

Senior Communications Manager – Special Projects

Contract: 12 Months Fixed Term Contract, Full Time, 35 hour per week

Salary: £50,000 - £57,000 per annum with excellent benefits

Location: London, UK
Hybrid Working: A minimum of 40% of working time is spent face to face, either in London office, or as a result of external engagement or travel for WaterAid. WaterAid is located at Canary Wharf, London and this will be your location and contract base.

About WaterAid:
Want to use your skills in Communications and Project Management to play a vital role in making clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene normal for everyone everywhere? We need passionate, creative and dedicated people. In return, you will be encouraged and empowered to be yourself at your very best. Together, we will make a bigger difference.

Join WaterAid as Senior Communications Manager – Special Projects to change normal for millions of people so they can unlock their potential, break free from poverty and change their lives for good. 

About the Team:
The Communications Manager is positioned within the Brand and Strategic Communications Team in WaterAid UK, which is part of the wider Communications Department – which in turn sits within the Communications and Fundraising Directorate. 

The team consists of three functions; Brand, Strategic Communications – Partnerships and Strategic Communications – Advocacy. The Brand and Strategic Communications team leads the development of brand and communications strategy which aligns to wider organisational objectives and works collaboratively with stakeholders across internal and external networks to execute it. We're focused on driving forward WaterAid's brand, advocacy and fundraising objectives.

About the Role:
WaterAid is seeking a talented Senior Communications Manager to lead the planning and delivery of a special project, on a 12-month fixed-term contract.

As the Senior Communications Manager, you will oversee the delivery of an exciting one-off project, leading a dynamic team of colleagues from across media, celebrity, digital, fundraising and content functions. Reporting to Brand & Strategic Communications Lead, your focus will be ensuring all are aligned to deliver on time to a high standard, through planning and integration. You will set campaign KPIs and monitor performance against them and you will regularly report on budget, progress and risk to senior stakeholders in our UK and US offices

In this role you will develop communications strategies to help WaterAid maximise brand-reach and income-raising potential and lead a cross-functional working group to deliver on these strategies. You will be collaborating closely with our teams in communications and fundraising in both UK and US, so occasionally the post holder will join meetings in US time (East and West Coast). 
Alongside this campaign the post holder will also support the brand and strategic comms functions in the planning and delivery of a brand awareness campaign for March 2026. 

You’ll also: 

• Lead the development of campaign specific communications across key target audiences, including potential and existing supporters, high value donors, partners and campaigners. 
• Oversee messaging and creative which resonates with target audiences. 
• Map out, with our media and celebrity team, PR opportunities to engage the public. 
• Lead a delivery group team of cross functional specialists to ensure all the strands of the campaign are in alignment and on schedule.  
• Regularly report on progress and risk to the project steering group. 
• Brief-in and sign-off campaign creative with external agencies and in-house teams. 
• Own and be responsible for the development, through consultative process, of WaterAid’s Strategic Communications Framework, which enable multi-disciplinary teams to work cohesively and effectively. 
• Develop effective working relationships with colleagues across all directorates, fostering an environment of collaboration and when appropriate, challenging to deliver the highest quality work. 
• Commission and/or utilise insight to inform communications plans. 
• Monitor and evaluate the impact of communications activity, fostering a proactive and positive approach to learning and improvement within delivery teams. 
• Oversight of budgets and timelines for specific communications activities, ensuring compliance with WaterAid. 
• Work as an integral player within UK Communications team to establish effective and efficient processes and ways of working 
• At periods of high workload, exercise flexibility to support colleagues across communications department in the delivery of key campaigns 

About You:

• Demonstrable experience in developing, leading and executing large scale effective communications projects that deliver on Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s). 
• Excellent collaboration and influencing skills with the ability to drive integration and alignment across both internal and external stakeholders. 
• Project management skills, specifically in the delivery of marketing campaigns or activities 
• Excellent organisational skills with the ability to drive clarity and direction in a complex and busy environment 
• Ability to work in a flexible and agile way to identify opportunities and address challenges 
• Experience of developing and leading brand awareness activity 
• Experience of working on fundraising campaigns 
• Good understanding of a range of communications functions including media, digital, content and storytelling 
• An excellent understanding of emerging trends in social media and YouTube for young people and a strong understanding of storytelling in social media 
• Experienced at briefing in and analysing content for online audiences – story, film and photography. 
• Excellent time management skills, able to prioritise work across multiple projects to meet deadline. 
• Ability to generate and develop creative and innovative ideas, with a good eye for brand, design, film and photography. 
• Excellent communication, listening and relationship building skills: proven ability to work effectively across different cultures  
• Experience of setting targets and KPI’s, measuring and reporting against them 

Although not essential, we also prefer you to have:

• Experience of partnering with other teams to develop partnerships, grow reach or other opportunities to grow income and reach 
• Experience of brokering pro-bono opportunities through media and partners 
• Ability to flex working hours occasionally 
• Experience working on global marketing activities 

Closing date: Applications will close 23:59 on 19th January 2025. 

How to Apply: To see the full job pack, please click ‘Apply’. Please apply by submitting the following 3 items into one document in either Word Document or PDF format:

1. Using short summaries provide specific details of up to two initiatives or projects that you have been involved in that are relevant to this role. For each please describe your role (eg team leader or team member), the purpose of the activity (i.e. it’s aims) and the major contributions you personally made and what the activity achieved.
2. Please describe your approach to project management, including how you bring cross-functional teams together to deliver on a shared objective under tight timescales? Can you share how you have done this and your key learnings?
3. Please briefly describe why you are interested in working for WaterAid

Pre-employment screening: In order to apply for this post, you must be able to demonstrate your eligibility to work in the UK. All our vacancies require a basic Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check to comply with our Safer Recruitment policy.

Our Benefits:

• 36 days' holiday (including 8 Bank Holidays)
• Option to buy an extra 5 days annual leave
• We offer a generous pension plan with employer contribution of up to 10%
• Wide range of flexible and agile-working arrangement
• Season Ticket Loan
• Free annual eye tests
• Pay as You Give charitable giving scheme
• Enhanced Maternity and Adoption/Surrogacy pay, Shared Parental Leave and Paternity Leave
• Sabbaticals
• Volunteer Day

Our Commitment

Our People Promise:
We will work with passion and focus to ensure safe and sustainable water, toilets and hygiene are available to everyone, everywhere. WaterAid is a place of purpose – where people have a real commitment and shared responsibility for the impact we have.  We are a global community with diverse backgrounds and perspectives, motivated by inspiring, stimulating work. We are determined to put the wellbeing of our people first, to be a place where people feel safe and able to contribute their voice and truly live our values.     

Equal opportunities:
We are an equal opportunity, disability-confident employer and are dedicated to achieving the highest standards of diversity, equity and inclusion. We welcome applications from people of all backgrounds, beliefs, customs, traditions and ways of life. This includes, but is not limited to, race, gender, disability, age, sexual orientation, religion, national or social origin, health status, and economic or social situation.

Safeguarding:
We are also committed to protecting everyone we come into contact with. We have a zero-tolerance approach to abuse of power, privilege or trust across our global work, and any form of inappropriate behaviour, discrimination, abuse, bullying, harassment, or exploitation. Safeguarding the people and communities we work with, our staff, volunteers and anyone working on our behalf is our top priority, and we take our responsibilities extremely seriously.