External Affairs Manager

External Affairs Manager - Northern Ireland
Contract type: Permanent 
Full time: 34.5 hours, we are open to a conversation about how you work these hours
Location: Mobile worker in Northern Ireland - regular travel to external meetings and events required but not in-office attendance.
Salary Range: £53,000 - £59,000

About us

At Macmillan you'll find talented people working together to do whatever it takes to support people living with cancer. We're going all out to find even better ways to help even more people who need our support. Our values are at the heart of who we are and everything we do, inspiring our thinking and guiding our actions. 

About the role 

Are you a senior, experienced external affairs professional, keen to make a difference to the lives of people with cancer? Then this challenging but highly rewarding role could be your opportunity to lead Macmillan’s external affairs and influencing work in Northern Ireland. 

Working as part of the External Affairs UK leadership team, you will lead activity to deliver national system change for people living with cancer in Northern Ireland, with a particular focus on the development and implementation of the Neighbourhood Model and wider health and care reform. 

You will act as a senior external representative for Macmillan in Northern Ireland, ensuring the organisation is a trusted and influential partner with NI Assembly, Health and Social Care leaders, elected representatives, charities, clinicians and wider stakeholders. 

In conjunction with key stakeholders, you will lead matrix teams across influencing, services, partnerships, communications and engagement to develop and deliver strategies that improve outcomes and experiences for people living with cancer. You will play a key role in shaping proactive and reactive external affairs activity, identifying opportunities to influence policy, public debate and system leadership conversations. 

The role will require strong strategic leadership, the ability to navigate complex devolved political and health systems, and a collaborative approach to delivering impact through partnership and influence. 

About you 

The successful candidate will demonstrate the following skills and experience: 

• Significant experience in a senior external affairs, public affairs, policy or influencing role. 
• Demonstrable experience of leading proactive and reactive external affairs activity. 
• Experience in developing and delivering successful influencing strategies that have contributed to system change. 
• Strong understanding of the Northern Ireland political, policy and health landscape, including devolution and health and social care structures. 
• Outstanding relationship management and stakeholder engagement skills. 
• Skilled communicator with experience representing an organisation effectively with senior external stakeholders and influential audiences. 
• Experience of working collaboratively across matrix teams and with internal and external partners. 
• Ability to motivate, support and develop people and teams. 
• Strong strategic thinking, judgement and organisational awareness. 
• Experience acting as a media spokesperson is desirable. 
• A strong commitment to improving the lives of people living with cancer and reducing inequity in access, experience and outcomes. 

Recruitment Process 

Application deadline: 23:59 on Wednesday 17th June
First interview dates: TBC

To ensure fairness and consistency to select the best candidate for this role, all our applications are anonymised up until an interview has been confirmed. 

We are an organisation that is committed to setting candidates up for success, so we can support you to be at your best during the application or selection process, please contact Macmillan TA Team TATeam@macmillan.org.uk for advice, or a conversation on reasonable adjustments.  

We welcome applications from everyone who meet the criteria and strongly encourage individuals to apply who have a disability, impairment or health condition or individuals who identify as Black, Asian or from another minority ethnic background, as these groups are currently under-represented at Macmillan. Our Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy here along with our internal employee representation body, ‘Our Voice’ and 8 Employee Network groups help us promote fairness and belonging, becoming an engaged and inclusive organisation for all our people.