Participation & Learning Director

Summary

We are the public body that looks after England’s historic environment. We champion and protect historic places, helping people understand, value and care for them.

Historic England have a fantastic opportunity for you to join us as our Participation & Learning Director.

You will be responsible for developing and embedding strategies that help people across England to discover and connect with their heritage, increasing engagement with Historic England and the historic environment through our nationally important Archive collections and engagement programmes which include learning (Heritage Schools), community engagement, inclusion, volunteering and cultural programming.

Through the power of storytelling, capacity building and audience led approaches, you will lead your teams to unlock the power of heritage for people and places, embedding inclusive practice and centring social impact.

What you will be doing:

Reporting to the Director of Communications and Public Engagement and working as part of the Public Engagement Leadership Team, you will help shape the direction of Historic England’s engagement and participation activity, ensuring our vision and mission are well-understood and supported in society. You will work together to embed the strategic priorities of Active Participation and Connected Communities across our work and activities.

You will share your expertise and passion, ensuring the organisation’s knowledge, resources and voice are leveraged beyond Historic England and we are actively working together with more people and partners to the benefit of people and places. Working closely with the Content, Marketing & Digital Director and Communications Director, you will ensure that our presence continues to grow and gain positive recognition on a national stage, with new and current audiences, and that we are in an open conversation about how we can all work together to take action for heritage and the historic environment.

Who we are looking for:

• Experience of leading multi-disciplinary teams in a learning, participatory, collections management or engagement discipline
• Experience of successfully creating and delivering integrated engagement and/or learning activity in an arts, education, culture, or heritage setting.
• Experience of project delivery including community led approaches, and co-creation with communities.
• Experience of initiating and leading projects within a strategic framework
• Excellent leadership and management skills, including culture change
• Strategic thinking skills

We offer a wide benefits package including a competitive pension scheme starting at 26% contributions, a generous 28 days holiday, corporate discounts, free entry into English Heritage sites across the country and development opportunities to ensure you achieve your goals.

We are committed to promoting equality of opportunity for everyone. Diversity helps us to perform better and attract more people to aid our work. We welcome and encourage job applications from people of all backgrounds.

We particularly encourage applications from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic candidates and candidates with disabilities as they are underrepresented within Historic England at this level.

Historic England want all of our candidates to shine in the recruitment process. Please tell us what we can do to make sure you can show us your very best self. You can contact us by email at ResourcingTeam@Historicengland.org.uk if you have an queries.

To ensure a fair and inclusive recruitment process for everyone the use of AI or automated tools is not permitted.

Provisional interview dates: First stage interviews will be held w/c 19th February and second stage will be held w/c 26th February.

How to Apply:

Please submit a copy of your CV and include a CV cover letter outlining why you are suitable for the role of Participation & Learning Director (max two pages) via our online Applied application process.

To read full Job Description, please visit the link below:

• https://historicengland.org.uk/content/job-descriptions-hr/participation-manager/