Location: Flexible within England & Wales

Interview date: w/c 14 December 2020

Contract Duration: 12 months

Citizens Advice offers confidential advice online, over the phone, and in person, for free. Through our national network of charities, we give people the knowledge and the confidence they need to find their way forward – whoever they are, and whatever their problem.

We are a diverse and inclusive organisation and we particularly welcome applications from black, asian and ethnic minority people. We are a flexible employer, so this role would suit working parents or people returning to work after raising children. We are a member of the race equality campaign at Business in the Community, the Prince’s responsible business network and are committed to improving employment opportunities for ethnic minorities across the UK. We also welcome applications from, LGB and Trans and non binary candidates. We have made a positive commitment to employing disabled people and guarantee to interview all disabled candidates who meet the minimum essential criteria for the role.

Citizens Advice is hiring Programme Director to oversee a 12 month fixed-term programme of work related to the organisation’s online advice content.

This is a vital role for the organisation, overseeing work that helps millions of people each year. The role will help us focus on meeting user needs through the creation of clear and accurate content, while also remodelling the organisation’s content as we move to a new modular content architecture enabled by our migration to a new content platform, Contentful.

This role will oversee a focused portfolio of work in five areas:

1. Meeting user needs through the creation of clear and accurate content, in particular in relationship to Covid-19 and Brexit
2. Remodelling the organisation’s content to support the migration to a new content platform, with a view to making the content more sustainable
3. An accelerated programme of archiving and maintenance work to rapidly reduce a backlog of legacy content and tackle content at risk of inaccuracy
4. Maturing the metrics used to assess the performance of content, complementing the wider work of the organisation’s data team
5. Considering how Citizens Advice promotes content proactively to make sure we’re reaching the people who most need our help

The role will report to the Executive Director of Advice & Advocacy and will oversee the day to day work of the organisation’s content and expert advice functions - the content designers and legal experts who collaborate to produce online content for the Citizens Advice website and adviser-facing intranet.

Citizens Advice is needed more than ever as demand for advice rises as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic. Meanwhile, our service faces the challenge of supporting people in a remote context, making it all the more important that we have best-in-class online content. We face a number of fascinating challenges in relation to content, requiring a candidate who can operate at a strategic level:

• We are in the process of migrating from a legacy content platform to a new headless content management system, including a move toward a more modular architecture for our content
• We face a significant challenge - as with many organisations - with legacy content, which makes it hard for us to maintain our content at high levels of reliability and accessibility
• We are considering how best to bring digital capabilities, and our website and content itself, closer together with operational delivery teams as part of the organisation’s wider digital transformation

We need to make progress on these strategic challenges while at the same time meeting the significant daily demands of high volume online service delivery, particularly in the context of high demand as a result of Covid-19 and Brexit.

The ideal candidate for this role will be dedicated to internet-era ways of working: starting with user needs, focusing on delivery and outcomes over process, and working in the open. You will be able to evidence your commitment to diversity and inclusion in the way you recruit and build teams and in your approach to accessible digital services.

Please note, in the event of a high number of applications, we reserve the right to close the application early. 

The National Citizens Advice Operates from offices in England and Wales, with 5 regional offices based in Cardiff, London, Birmingham, Leeds, and Liverpool, therefore all successful applicants must be based within England or Wales.