The Assistant Director of Communications and Involvement is a critical member of the senior team both within the communications d.....
The Assistant Director of Communications and Involvement is a critical member of the senior team both within the communications directorate and within the North West London ICS. The post holder will: Deputise for the Director of Communications and Involvement Drive the strategy for supporting and ensuring alignment of public and stakeholder involvement across the system Play a significant leadership role in community involvement and engagement activity, including managing the involvement team Lead as the expert; develop and lead implementation of the community engagement strategy supporting NHS and social care improvements across North West London Ensure effective co-production throughout the directorate Engage with key strategic regional and national policy makers to inform development of strategy and policies Develop and champion both internally and externally new initiatives or projects within the Directorate to drive awareness and understanding Provide relevant expertise of best practice, regulatory requirements and learnings from other NHS and public sector communication and engagement programmes Build and maintain good working relationships with a broad range of internal and external stakeholders, including service users and communities Manage the Senior Involvement Managers and be responsible for their annual appraisal and development. Identify examples of national and international best practice in public involvement and communications, to ensure that North West London benefits from relevant innovations. Represent the ICB and ICS in sensitive, contentious and political environments and situations, delivering difficult messages to high-level and public audiences where required. Provide and receive highly complex, sensitive and contentious information, including managing potentially antagonistic interactions with stakeholders, staff and communities. Community and Stakeholder Involvement Lead community involvement and engagement, including line management of the involvement function. Lead on development and publication of regular insight reports, sharing what people and communities are telling us about our services. Manage contracts and relationships with external providers relating to public and community involvement (e.g. the voluntary sector) Oversee responses to ministerial briefings, PQs, MQTs and OSC requests Build and maintain key relationships including residents and community groups, NHS provider trusts, local authorities, Healthwatch, the voluntary sector and other public services services Develop strategic alliances with partner agencies to share best practice and work together to improve communications functions across the health and social care economy and beyond. Ensure a best practice approach to public and stakeholder engagement. Public Communications Develop strategies for proactive, positive community involvement and reputation management around local improvements across integrated care, mental health, primary care, service reconfiguration and other projects as required Establish and communicate the key messages and objectives of NHS NW London in order to promote a consistent message. Communicate highly sensitive, complex and contentious information to a wide variety of individuals and groups, such as the media, local residents and communities, public involvement and third sector representatives, senior managers, Trusts, Local Authorities and ICBs. Plan, develop and implement public education campaigns regarding service changes and behaviour change. Build and maintain relationships with key external stakeholders, e.g. thought leadership bodies, campaign groups, journalists, local residents and communities. Oversee commissioned public engagement initiatives for example, to support our winter campaign including managing procurement/bidding processes and ensuring delivery by commissioned organisations. Commission and deliver relevant, high quality, accessible and timely publications for diverse audiences which effectively support, promote and raise awareness of the improvements in North West London. Oversee responses to media and Freedom of Information requests as required. Internal System Relations Work in partnership with local borough-based teams across NHS NW London. Ensure the development of strong working relationships with all levels of the NHS including developing and maintaining relationships with Department of Health, NHS England, NHS England (London) and the Trust Development Authority. Build and maintain strong working relationships with local government and the community and voluntary sector. Provide high quality, timely specialist advice on corporate, internal and online communications to the executive team, ICS and work stream leads Facilitate and support the development of networks within the geographical locality that span health and social care organisations. Service Change Direct and support involvement staff to enable board assurance and compliance with regards to key statutory requirements, guidance on equalities and on improving patient experience. Manage formal public consultations and resident engagement on proposed changes to services. Build on and lead the ICB involvement strategy while ensuring that the voices of those seldom heard are proactively gathered to influence and drive change towards patient community centred services across the ICS. Develop mechanisms to ensure that the ICB understands the communities it services and that all ICB decisions are informed by insights from local people and communities. Train staff in statutory requirements and best practice around public consultation and resident involvement. Operational Link with managers and members of other workstreams to address inter-dependencies and ensure alignment Represent the organisation in sensitive and political situations, delivering difficult messages where required to high-level audiences and members of the public Accountable for developing and delivering strategy, promoting innovation and supporting operational excellence around communications, engagement and co-production in the organisation Support all workstreams and inputting into wider ICS strategy. Financial & Physical Resources Accountability and sign off for all projects and initiatives Constantly strive for value for money and greater efficiency in the use of budgets Manage the commpublic engagement budget to ensure a planned, managed and balanced budget is maintained. Use personally generated information and software, including the insights database and stakeholder database, to develop reports and commentary on public involvement and communications activity. Use the Actus database as a performance management tool for involvement staff. Staff Management Manage, motivate and develop staff within the team to ensure that they are able to deliver the responsibilities of the team. Recruit as necessary and performance manage a team that delivers a range of tasks within a matrix structure in a challenging environment. Manage involvement team, including Senior Involvement Managers (2 x band 8A) and Insights Manager (band 7). Ensure the provision of regular supervision, objective setting, appraisal and personal development plans to all direct reports and their staff Research & Development Incorporate research in all strategies to ensure continuous learning and improvement within communications, involvement and equalities. Analyse strategy implementation, monitor and evaluate to ensure that communications, engagement, equalities and co-production through public involvement programme leads to positive changes and modernisation within service delivery. Draw from experience and expertise of other NHS and public sector organisations. As appropriate, undertake evaluation of the views of key audiences, including service users and members of the local population, in order to continually improve on our reputation and impact of our work programmes. Planning and Organisation Accountable for further developing and overseeing delivery of the involvement strategy Develop plan for the delivery of the roles responsibilities including identifying interdependencies, managing risks, determining resource requirements and building in contingency where necessary Be a senior leader in the Directorates strategic planning process and delivery of priorities, managing consequential adjustments to activities responsible for as required.