War Child UK
Director of Advocacy and
Communications
Recruitment pack
19 January 2015
Contents
1. About War Child and background to the role:..........................................................................................2
2. Job Description:.........................................................................................................................................3
3. Person Specification:.................................................................................................................................3
4. Terms & Conditions: .................................................................................................................................4
5. Application Procedure:..............................................................................................................................4
6. Equal Opportunities Monitoring................................................................................................................5
War Child UK Director of Advocacy and Communications
18th January 2015
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Are children in conflict reflected in current global development priorities?
Conflict is a priority identified by all the major UK political parties. Globally, conflict is also an issue
placed at centre stage through the UN Security Council. However, despite children being over 50%
of those affected and living in conflict, there is little focus and response to their needs.
Global donor behaviours in relation to children in conflict do not reflect the reality on the ground or
the rhetoric of a thematic focus on conflict. Child protection and education (the only child-specific
aspects of the emergency system) are woefully underfunded as part of humanitarian response and
are not considered as the life-saving interventions that those operating on the ground know them to
be.
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In the years 2007-2012 the UN appeals system spent $24 billion on emergency response of
which only $149 million went to Child Protection.
There were 28.5 million children out of primary school living in conflict affected countries in
2013. More than half of the total of 58 million children out of school globally.
Yet only 1.4 per cent of global humanitarian funding was allocated to education in 2012, a
decrease from 2.4 per cent the previous year.
In 2010 the UK was the third lowest contributor (with less than one million dollars) to Child
Protection in Emergencies (CPiE) and Sexual and Gender Based Violence (SGBV) and the
fourth lowest in 2011 (with under two million dollars).
As one of the world’s largest humanitarian donors, the UK government (from Financial
Tracking Data only) did not fund any protection projects within any appeals process in 2008
and the improvement was negligible in 2009.
Children in conflict are a low priority for the International aid system. Their rights are neglected
and their needs for protection and education are unmet. This has to change.
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Position:
Responsible to:
Direct Reports:
Applications deadline:
Start Date
Director of Advocacy and Communications
Chief Executive Officer,
Head of Advocacy, PR and Artist Liaison Manager, Digital Manager
15thth April 2015
August 2015
1. Background to the Role
War Child was established in 1993 as a response to the brutal effects of conflict on children during the
Balkans war. We now work in Iraq, Afghanistan, Jordan, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo and
Central African Republic.
War Child’s vision is of a world in which the lives of children are no longer torn apart by war, and our
contribution to achieving this vision is articulated in our mission:
to support and improve the protection and care of children and young people who live with a
combination of insecurity, poverty and exclusion in some of the worst conflict-affected countries in
the world
.
We deliver this mission through three strategies:
 Service delivery (directly and through local partner organisations)
 Investment in local protection structures and systems
 Advocacy
We focus on issues which particularly affect children in conflict areas, and have three main programmes:
 Education
 Livelihoods
 Child protection
We aim to respond to conflict emergencies early, bringing life-saving child protection and psycho-social
support to children in acutely vulnerable situations as soon as we can. However, our mission extends
through post conflict to recovery phases, meaning that we will stay with affected populations until the
impact of conflict is no longer the primary driver of issues that need to be addressed. This is a relatively
wide intervention range which reflects our concern for individual children and their long term recovery
from conflict shock.
War Child has grown rapidly over the past few years. Income has increased from approximately £1m pa
in 2007 to £6.3 million in 2014. We have seen an even more dramatic increase in the numbers of
children we reach directly and indirectly. From 5,000 in 2008 to over 90,000 in 2014. Our programming
has become more efficient, more professionally managed, and more consistent across the countries we
work in.
We are now a trusted partner of UN and national donors, receiving significant support from UNHCR and
UNCEF in emergency response programmes, and with several programmes funded by the EU and Comic
Relief. We have a Programme Partnership Agreement with DFID as part of a consortium with Restless
Development and Youth Business International.
War Child UK is one of three independent operational agencies – War Child UK, War Child Holland and
War Child Canada. Coordination and relationships are strong with our sister organisations, which
includes joint working both in the field and on advocacy and fundraising. We will continue to deepen
these relationships and co-operative ways of working to maximise our delivery and impact, in all areas
including Advocacy & Communications.
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Advocacy
Advocacy is one of our three programme approaches (the other two being service delivery and support
to partner organisations). The London head office leads on advocacy in the UK, and on the international
stage. Country teams lead on advocacy with their local and national authorities. London has a role in
supporting teams to do this effectively and in working with country teams to ensure that children’s
voices form the core of our international advocacy messages.
We have had significant successes with advocacy over the past three years, including playing a leading
role in the Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative culminating in the 2014 London summit during which we
secured major commitments to preventing sexual violence against boys and girls and providing support
to survivors. We are members of Watchlist, the New York based consortium of agencies which lobbies
the United Nations on issues affecting children and armed conflict. We a consulting agency to the World
Humanitarian Summit. We lead a consortium of NGOs, corporates and foundations in the UK which
works with DfID to improve their response to education in emergencies. We currently provide
secretariat functions to an All Party Parliamentary Group which is conducting an inquiry into children and
armed conflict.
Our advocacy function in the UK also runs a schools programmes, which provides curriculum materials to
schools who want to learn more about the severe impact of conflict on children and also offers visits to
school in the London area. The Advocacy and Comms directorate is also responsible for supporting the
work of the Youth Engagement Panel – a group of young people with conflict backgrounds who
contribute to our governance and awareness raising.
Communications
In March 2012 (the last time we looked) 18% of people said yes to the question ‘have you heard of War
Child?’. Awareness was highest in the 25 to 34 age group (34%). We are clearly not the best known
international charity but our awareness is higher than might be expected for an agency our size.
Our social media profile is growing and compares well to other much larger organisations in our sector.
Facebook and twitter followers are increasing fast Unique visits to the War Child website will be
approaching 1 million this year. We are keen to grow our online audience and to use this presence to
develop campaigning and to use these channels to contribute to the recruitment of individual regular
donors.
The War Child brand gives us a strong internal and external identity, although we are believe that this
brand is capable of achieving a lot more if managed strategically. The Director of Advocacy and
Communication will take a lead on leveraging our brand strength to mobilise support from individual
donors and campaigners in the UK. Our five year plan includes significant budget for donor acquisition,
which will be led by the Fundraising team but will draw heavily on the work of the Communications
team.
Our profile benefits from the significant support we have received from well known musicians and other
creative artists – a relationship which dates back to the award winning HELP album in 1995. Carey
Mulligan has proved to be a committed and effective Ambassador since joining us in 2014. The Advocacy
and Communications Directorate includes responsibility for stewardship of our high profile supporters
and the development of a wider network of support at this level. The role also includes a push to raise
the volume and quality of stories and case studies coming from our country programmes, to use the
inspiration and learning from our innovative field programmes in our wider communications and
advocacy work. We have an ambitious plan to develop a means of communicating not just the number
of children we help but the impact we are having on reducing their vulnerability to the dangers of
conflict. Our new Vulnerability Scale is undergoing field trials this year and has the potential to quantify
exactly how much safer children are once they enter a War Child field programme.
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Next Steps
We have an ambitious five year strategy and we believe that providing a strong structure and leadership
in advocacy and communications is going to be a major factor in whether or not we realise these
ambitions. At the heart of the ambition is the goal of putting the voices of children at the centre of our
internal and external communications. In support of children’s voices we want to mobilise people and
evidence to support huge increases in the priority given to children in conflict by the international aid
system. This means becoming a campaigning force in the UK, engaging at least 10,000 members of the
UK public in active campaigning for the rights of children on conflict countries, and having a big impact
on how DFID and other donors respond to their needs. In 2014 we brought together the work streams
of advocacy, schools, Press, PR, and digital media into a combined team reporting to the Chief Executive.
The team also includes responsibility for coordinating our relationships with celebrities and other high
profile supporters and for developing internal communications channels including a new intranet. We
now need to establish a new level of strategic leadership of this team by creating the new post of
Director of Advocacy and Communications who will be a key part of our Senior Management Team as we
continue to build a uniquely capable child protection agency.
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Job description
This role reports directly to the CEO
Key responsibilities are:
Strategic leadership
 Lead and manage the Advocacy and Communications Directorate, to deliver our strategic
priorities and objectives, by taking an integrated approach to policy change, campaigning and
communications
 Providing high quality line management and development for talented staff, building a strong
team and embedding robust planning, implementation reporting and evaluation processes into
our advocacy and communications work
 Play a full part in Senior Management Team Processes, leading on a range of cross-organisational
priorities and strategies, driving WCUK through a period of exceptional growth and strong
ambition
 Engaging the advocacy and communications benefits which will flow from closer cooperation
with our colleagues in War Child Holland and War Child Canada
 Creating relationships, systems and pathways to ensure that the advocacy and comms team is
fully integrated into the organisation at all levels so that we can fully realise our potential for
campaigning, income generation, quality and learning and impact reporting
 Ensure that War Child’s Child Protection Policy is understood and adhered to for all
communications work across the organisation
 Lead and support developments in internal communications
Advocacy and policy
 Strategic leadership in the development and implementation of an advocacy programme
ensuring WCUK represents and promotes a powerful and expert voice to children in conflict
 Strategically plan and implement stakeholder engagement, and develop relationships to increase
the WCUK’s profile amongst target and influential audiences such as DFID, FCO, UN agencies,
Ministers and politicians
 Lead the development of War Child UK as a campaigning force with the UK public
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Communications and Brand
 Maximising the profile and impact of the Chief Executive and Chair as spokespeople for War
Child, but also acting as a spokesperson yourself
 Lead and support the team to realise our potential to use PR, media, our website and social
communication channels to engage at scale with UK public, policy makers, and international
organisations
 Developing a strategy to promote the WCUK brand in a way which enhances our fundraising, our
advocacy and our programme effectiveness in the UK, in-country and internationally
 Developing our work with high-profile supporters to enable us to maximise their contribution to
income generation, campaigning and awareness raising
 Work closely with the Director of Programmes and Director of Fundraising to deliver robust
impact reporting communications for internal and external use
 Support the communications team to develop compelling storytelling assets for advocacy,
fundraising, and in-country programme use
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Person Specification
The ideal candidate will be a highly motivated person with a significant background of achievement in
advocacy and communications. Knowledge of advocacy approaches based on evidence and on the
voices of people seldom given opportunities to speak to those in power will be essential. Candidates will
need to show that they have a strategic understanding of how excellent communications can enhance
the power of our advocacy, our fundraising and our programmes. They will have experience of
campaigning for change by mobilising the voices of thousands of supporters in the UK in support of a
strong argument. We are looking for a good knowledge of the digital landscape and a keen awareness of
how this can drive support and build brand profile. They will have demonstrable good media sense and a
track record of attracted press and media attention to particular issues which may otherwise go
unnoticed. We need someone with the relationship skills to develop internal pathways for information
and stories about our beneficiaries to inform every part of the organisation, and the emotional
intelligence to sustain enthusiasm for this work at all levels of the organisation. A thorough knowledge
of the humanitarian and international development structures will be vital to this role. The candidate
should be able to demonstrate a strong business sense and the ability to prioritise between a number of
valid options. Most importantly they will need to show a genuine and deep seated commitment to
helping children in dire circumstances in conflict areas.
Experience:
 Demonstrable experience of developing realistic but ambitious advocacy goals with a successful
track record of achieving change in official policy and practice through the use of advocacy and
campaigning techniques
 Demonstrable experience of developing strategies and providing high level leadership of social
media marketing
 Demonstrable experience of developing strategies and providing high level leadership of well as
traditional print and broadcast media
 Delivering public facing campaigns which mobilise large numbers of campaigners around specific
policy change goals.
 Experience developing and managing relationships with senior level political decision makers and
policy opinion formers
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Experience building relationships, and managing delivery with, senior journalists and editors
across media channels
Experience of achieving advocacy impact at an international level
Experience of working with beneficiaries and service users to influence those in power
Leading teams of highly motivated individuals and ensuring that planning and structured ways of
working translate skills and motivation into highly successful outcomes
In addition, we are looking for experience of, proven abilities in, and a track record of:
 Brand management
 Harnessing the power of high profile supporters
 Recruitment and retention of capable key staff
 Using digital platforms for campaigning and donor recruitment
 Integrated fundraising and communications planning and delivery
 Financial management
 Working in consortia, preferably across international boundaries
With this in mind, we will be looking for the following key attributes:
 A genuine and deep seated commitment to helping children in dire circumstances
 A thorough knowledge of the humanitarian and international development structures
 A strong business sense and the ability to prioritise between a number of attractive options
 Excellent people management and team building skills
 Good financial, budgeting and reporting skills
 Ability to think through the future and set an inspiring course
 Good written communication
 Good verbal communication and the ability to Represent War Child UK to a wide range of
stakeholders through different channels
 High levels of energy and personal resilience
 Negotiation skills
 Ability to involve others whilst also making decisions in a timely manner
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Terms and conditions
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Salary in the region of £55,000 pa
28 days paid annual leave, pro-rata (in addition to statutory Bank Holidays) plus an additional
day for every year served up to a maximum of five additional days
Flexible working arrangements, including the opportunity to work from home for one day a week
5% matching pension contribution
Application Procedure
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War Child UK Application to be submitted by 5.00pm on April 15th
First interviews on 24th April
Second interview 30th April
All applications should be sent to [email protected]
For more information on War Child please see our website: www.warchild.org.uk
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Equal Opportunities Monitoring
War Child is committed to continuing to develop its Equal Opportunities policy to ensure that all
job applicants and employees are treated fairly, irrespective of gender, age, sexual orientation,
religious belief or creed, disability, and racial or ethnic origin. The following section of the
application form will help us to monitor the effects of our policy and will be used for no other
purposes, except to monitor how well we are reaching diverse groups. We would be grateful if
you would complete it. It would be helpful if you could indicate your age, gender, religious belief
or creed, sexual orientation, and ethnic origin by either ticking, or specifying, in one of the boxes
or spaces, below, and return this slip with your application:
Which age group do you belong to?
18-29 
30-39 
40-49 
50-59 
60-65 
Which gender group do you belong to?
Male 
Female 
Other 
What is your ethnic origin?
White:
British 
Irish 
Mixed:
White & Black 
Caribbean
White & Black 
African
Asian and Asian British:
Indian 
Pakistani 
Other  _____________________
White & Asian 
Bangladeshi 
Other  ____________
British Asian 
Other Asian  ___________________________
Black or Black British:
Caribbean 
African 
Black British 
Other Black  _________
Chinese or Other Ethnic Group:
Chinese 
Other Ethnic Group  ________________________
Please indicate your religious belief or creed in the space provided.
What is your sexual orientation?
Bisexual 
Gay Man  Gay Woman/Lesbian 
Disability:
Do you consider yourself to have a disability?
If yes, please provide details:
Yes 
Heterosexual/Straight 
Other 
No 
Resources Monitoring: So that we can continue to use the resources that work best, please tell us
where you saw the advertisement for this position.
Newspaper  Magazine 
Website (War Child)  Website (Other) 
Please specify ___________________________