Policy Manager, Higher Education

Expires

21st February 2022

About Public First

Public First is a public policy consultancy. We offer solutions to complex policy problems faced by clients. We are a boutique, high end organisation that works in a few distinct areas of specialism, within which we offer unparalleled expertise – education is one of these areas, alongside energy, technology and infrastructure/levelling up.

We are, in effect, part thinktank, part strategic advisory consultancy, part polling company, and part communications and public affairs agency. For our clients, this means benefitting from our ability to combine different skills and methodologies to tackle their problem. For our staff, it means an almost unique opportunity to learn a wide range of skills from former Special Advisers, think-tankers, civil servants, political campaigners, opinion researchers, journalists and more. Our three main disciplines are:

  • Policy and research – we offer services including research and analysis, economic modelling, writing of publications, thought leadership, and strategic counsel on public policy and public affairs issues.
  • Opinion research – we offer accredited British Polling Council quantitative research including opinion polls, and a wide range of Market Research Society qualitative opinion research methods including focus groups and cognitive interviews.
  • Communications and campaigns – we offer a full service of campaign work including grassroots campaigning execution for clients, as well as more traditional media and communications support including press releases, op-ed drafting and placement, select committee training and media training, and event /launch management.

We are passionate about Education – and it is one of our major areas of specialism. Many of the most senior team at the company – including Founding Partners Rachel Wolf and James Frayne, Partner and Head of Education Practice Jonathan Simons; Director Ed Dorrell and Associate Director Reza Schwitzer – have all worked in and around government in education for the last fifteen years. Between us, we have worked with or advised the last four Prime Ministers, eight Education Secretaries, and numerous junior Ministers.

We work across all phases of education. Our clients include universities and Multi-Academy Trusts, national and local government, charities, foundations, trade associations, and businesses large and small who work in education. Across the practice, we have worked with some of the most well recognised names in the education space in the past three years.

At Public First we are united by a belief in the power of understanding, shaping and using public opinion to influence public policy. Put simply, public opinion is at the heart of everything we do.

We are also proudly inquisitive and argumentative. We care about public policy because we know that it has the power to transform lives. And we are united by the desire to work somewhere where thinking differently or challenging existing policy assumptions is welcomed, not discouraged.

If that sounds like you, we want you to join us.

The role

We are looking for one or two people to come and join our education practice, ideally with a specialism in Higher Education.

Fundamentally, we want people who are passionate about education policy – who can think creatively about different policy problems and solutions, and can work effectively with opinion researchers, media specialists and others to help solve clients’ problems.

We are open to the career people might have had to date. You may be someone who has spent a couple of years professionally in education as a teacher, or in a policy role covering education such as in a university, in government, a think tank, a charity, or in consultancy and private business. Please do not worry overly about fitting yourself to the ‘right’ background. We recruit for skill, and fit within the organisation – and will work with the people we make offers to, to ensure that they are placed and rewarded within the company in a way that suits everyone.

The role will include the following key responsibilities:

  • Supporting individual projects and liaison with the client under the supervision of the Head of Practice or Associate Director, but with significant day to day autonomy and responsibility for execution and delivery of work. This will primarily consist of policy writing (internally and for publication) and data analysis (via Excel).
  • Providing expertise in Higher Education. We are knowledge junkies! We want a culture of expertise within the organisation, and to learn from each other about all elements of policy within education (and other areas, as well)
  • Scoping of and developing future project work and engaging with potential clients. Although this is not a business development role, and there is no ‘sales target’, everyone will have scope to develop new areas of policy which they want to work in and have opportunities to engage with new clients.
  • Maintaining and building strong networks across the education sector in the UK – we encourage all our staff to build networks, write for sector and national publications, and otherwise contribute to the development of public policy.

The roles will require the following skills and experience:

  • Experience within the education field. The single most important thing we will be looking for is someone who understands education policy. We are relaxed about where this expertise may have come from, or how many years’ experience you have. But we will be looking for someone who – for example – reads, and enjoys reading, policy articles and opeds from Wonkhe on a daily basis, or contributes to discussion face to face or online about education policy. We are unashamed about being wonks ourselves and we want someone to help contribute to this mission.
  • Deep familiarity with government, Westminster and policymaking and politics. This could similarly have been gained through direct experience in politics and government or through working alongside them; regardless of the route, successful candidates will need to demonstrate above all that they understand how government and policymaking works.
  • Ability to write clearly, incisively and precisely about policy issues – including the ability to translate complex policy topics into language accessible to educated laypeople.
  • Ability to handle quantitative data – Public First employs economists and data modellers but all staff are required to be able to conduct some data analysis in Excel and to be comfortable working with large datasets and raw numbers and to be able to draw conclusions from them.
  • The ability to be able to present, verbally, conclusions from our work. This could be to clients (including senior individuals), or to prospective clients, or to MPs and policymakers, or to an expert education audience. We are looking for someone who is comfortable and enthusiastic about discussing education policy and what it means.
  • A willingness to work flexibly across a small organisation – including getting involved in different types of role within a project (for example, running focus groups, helping out on polling questions or psychological profiling, helping craft press releases, or managing events in Westminster) as well as policy analysis, and, where needed, contributing to projects running in other subject areas.

The roles are London-based (we have offices in Victoria at the WeWork) but if Covid has taught us anything, it’s that we are flexible! At the moment we are all in the office Mondays and Thursdays, with flexibility for people to be in the office or at home, as is their preference, for the other days. We are also shortly opening a Northern office, based in Manchester. Given the geographic spread of many of our clients, we are also very open to discussions about jobholders being permanently based in another area of the country, if they are willing to travel on occasions to be with the rest of the team.

Salaries will depend on experience and level of seniority but to give a sense of scale, Policy Manager salaries will typically start from £30,000, with considerable upside flexibility for the right candidate. We particularly welcome applications from disabled and Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) candidates.

If you’re interested, please send a copy of a CV, and a short covering letter outlining how you fit the criteria (including ideally links to any writing or external materials about yourself) to Jonathan.simons@publicfirst.co.uk.

The deadline is Monday 21st February 2022 but we encourage early applications as we may interview early.