The role
We are looking for a passionate, driven and creative comms professional or marketer to join our busy team. Someone who thrives in a fast-paced, entrepreneurial environment, who can take on projects and drive campaigns across multiple touchpoints, managing them from planning through to analysis, optimising throughout. You will be both creative and data proficient, eager to demonstrate impact.
This is a relatively new team that is shaping process and building a brand - a great opportunity to grow.
Ranked 3rd startup hub in the UK by the FT, The Royal Academy of Engineering Enterprise Hub supports talented entrepreneurs and decision makers to transform breakthrough engineering innovations into disruptive spinouts, startups and scaleups.
The aim of this role is to increase awareness of and engagement with the Enterprise Directorate’s activities, with a particular focus on the Academy’s regional Hub portfolio, which includes programme and ecosystem engagement.
You will be required to develop marketing plans and materials, tailor outreach to regional audiences, and identify and amplify stories and case studies from the Academy’s regional hubs in partnership with the wider communications and engagement directorate.
Our location
Our light, spacious head office is based in a fantastic location in central London with views over St James’s Park and close to the West End. We operate hybrid, flexible working practices with a baseline for office-based working of a mandatory weekly team day plus further days each week as required for the role and the Academy.
Who are we?
Engineering matters. It shapes our everyday lives, from our ability to turn the lights on, have a hot shower and commute into work, to the mobile phones we rely on to keep connected. It also plays a vital role in addressing some of the biggest challenges facing society today, from climate change, to global health pandemics and cyber threats.
The Royal Academy of Engineering is a charity that harnesses the power of engineering to build a sustainable society and an inclusive economy that works for everyone. In collaboration with our Fellows and partners, we’re growing talent and developing skills for the future, driving innovation, and building global partnerships, and influencing policy and engaging the public. Together we’re working to tackle the greatest challenges of our age.
With a diverse workforce and an inclusive and supportive culture, we look to attract candidates from wide and different backgrounds who have a passion for the role engineering plays in society. Our aim is to make the Academy the best place to work for the staff we have and those we seek to attract.
Why work for us?
We’re looking for people who are driven to make the world a better place. If you’re passionate about what you do and want to work collaboratively with talented colleagues to make change happen now and for future generations, we want you to get in touch.
This is the perfect time to join us. We have a dynamic, visionary CEO, a strong leadership team and an ambitious and exciting strategy. The value we bring as experts in our field and change agents is highly recognised and makes the Academy a motivating place to be. Our work today builds on a long, proud history with a focused and ambitious future which we’d love you to be part of.
We are looking for talented people who want to make a difference, to join our team – is this you? For more information and to apply, please visit our careers page.
Closing date: 5 January 2026.
Interview date: w/c 12 January 2026.
The Academy is committed to making reasonable adjustments to remove barriers that hinder applicants from applying or staff from working effectively and comfortably.
Salary: £46,698 (London) / £42,373 (National) per annum
Hours: 35 hrs per week
Contract: Fixed term contract (until March 2027)
Benefits
· 27 days annual leave + statutory holidays + 3 closures days over the Christmas period;
· Flexible working for all staff including working from home / hybrid working, and flexi-time/TOIL scheme;
· Attractive family friendly policies;
· Private healthcare cover;
· Season ticket loans;
· Employee awards, and training and development opportunities.
For more information about our benefits please visit our website.
Office locations: London, Bristol or homeworker
The role will involve spending a substantial amount of time in the East of England (including early starts/late finishes and overnight stays where required) and regular travel nationwide for NHF events and meetings.
Please note, if office based, the successful candidate will be expected to carry out two days in-person working per week on average which will include attendance at your office location.
Flexible working arrangements can be discussed and agreed with the line manager subject to role and business needs.
An exciting opportunity has arisen at the National Housing Federation (NHF) to join our team of External Affairs Managers on a fixed-term basis to cover maternity leave. The NHF is the voice of housing associations in England. We are the trade body to almost 600 housing associations, who have grown from philanthropic roots to provide 2.6 million homes to around 6 million people. You can find further information about the NHF on our website.
Could you be our new External Affairs Manager, working closely with our housing association members across the East of England?
This is a unique and varied role which would appeal to someone with a background in areas such as stakeholder management, policy, public affairs, communications, programme management – or a combination of these areas! For example, you may be looking to step into a role to further develop your leadership and stakeholder engagement skills, whilst still building on your policy or programme management experience and knowledge.
You will operate at the heart of social housing by working with key decision makers across the housing association sector – including managing relationships with chief executives, chairs of boards and executive directors. Strong communication and influencing skills are essential to the role, as well as the confidence to work at the most senior levels.
It is crucial that you can work collegiately to lead key programmes of work across the NHF with colleagues in other teams, for example from our policy, press, events, and public affairs teams. Equally, you will be comfortable working autonomously and shaping your own work programme.
The core of the role involves being responsible for engagement with a whole geographic region of our membership; and working closely on or leading one of the NHF’s key themes of work, which include areas such as supported housing; devolution; developing new homes; decarbonising existing homes; ensuring the building safety agenda is delivered; or representing our rural or smaller housing associations.
The role is wide ranging and in addition to stakeholder management and programme leadership, will include running roundtables between our members and government, chairing sessions at NHF conferences, and presenting political and policy updates to senior teams within housing associations.
You will be part of a team of eight External Affairs Managers sitting within the member services directorate, which is there to ensure that we provide excellent value for money for our housing association members.
Key elements of the role:
· You will build and maintain brilliant relationships with housing associations leaders, using your well-developed communication and advocacy skills to maximum effect.
· You will develop knowledge, insight and understanding of housing associations to shape our policy and influencing work and to create structured programmes of member engagement on critical policy and political issues.
· You will be the contact point for housing associations in your region, ensuring they receive first class customer service on the issues which matter to them. Working closely with NHF members you will facilitate the organisation of regional chief executive or leaders forums and sounding boards.
· In addition to your regional work, you will lead on the strategic planning and delivery of a key NHF policy priority. This will require collaborative working with colleagues from across the organisation and working with members across every region and specialism. You will play a leadership role, creating structured engagement strategies to ensure members are able to influence policy as well as engaging key NHF stakeholders and sharing best practice.
· Your role will be to implement structured member engagement to ensure our policy priorities, positions and influencing work are member-led. This will include working directly with members to inform our policy positions and lead our influencing work.
· You will influence debates at the highest level and you will spot in advance and act strategically to mitigate the risk to our membership. As such, this role requires a high degree of political and organisational acumen and the ability to horizon scan.
· You will work with colleagues in our Commercial and Events teams to maximise commercial opportunities and help shape content at our conferences, as well chairing conference sessions.
· To be the face and voice of the NHF with members, stakeholders and the media.
· To ensure that as an organisation we deliver as a whole team, seamlessly, to members to achieve greatest impact in line with the business strategy.
· To maintain high quality standards and follow NHF policy and process.
The successful candidate:
The successful candidate will be able to demonstrate:
· A sound knowledge and understanding of housing associations and issues affecting the wider sector.
· A sound understanding of the political and policy landscape that housing associations operate in.
· Demonstrable knowledge and experience of establishing and maintaining relationships with senior stakeholders, demonstrating excellent customer service and value for money.
· Effective communication skills, in person and in writing, including the ability to credibly and confidently present at meetings and events.
· Ability to listen to and influence senior stakeholders, demonstrating diplomacy, effective communication and negotiation skills.
· Clear leadership skills, able to lead complex and strategic programmes of work effectively, including experience of matrix managing and motivating a team.
· Excellent analytical skills and strategic nous with the ability to summarise complex information effectively to aid decision making.
· A commitment to excellent customer service.
· A positive, energetic and agile approach to work.
Equality, diversity and inclusion
The NHF has published its equality, diversity and inclusion strategy, which was co-created with staff. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and we value the contribution each individual makes to our work.
We are committed to equality, diversity and inclusion and are working to increase the diversity profile of our workforce. We are currently under-represented by ethnic minorities, people with a disability or disabilities and LGBTQ+, and would particularly welcome applications from people in these groups.
Disability confident employer
We are a disability confident employer and if you are a disabled person who meets the skills and experience we consider essential for the role, we will offer you an interview.
Please note: there may be occasions where it is not practicable or appropriate to interview all disabled people who meet the minimum criteria for the job. In certain recruitment situations such as high-volume of applications, we may be required to limit the overall numbers of interviews offered to both disabled people and non-disabled people.
In these circumstances the NHF will select the disabled candidates who best meet the minimum criteria for the job rather than all of those that meet the minimum criteria, as we would do for non-disabled applicants. This is in line with the Disability Confident guidelines.
We are happy to consider reasonable adjustments to our recruitment process if you have a disability or have a condition that you feel may affect your performance during the recruitment process. Please contact the People team with your request or to arrange a time to discuss in more detail.
Our role profile and job advert can also be requested in large print or in accessible format via this email address.
Completing our Application Form
To apply for this role, please complete our online application form. The application form includes your employment and education history plus you will be asked to answer questions in relation to your knowledge, skills and experience, why you are applying for the role and questions in relation to our values. The application form is anonymous and will not require you to upload a CV or cover letter. This will help us to shortlist candidates for interview based solely on their knowledge, skills and experience.
Right to work in the UK/UK VISA sponsorship
You must have the right to work in the UK and it is important to note that the NHF does not sponsor individuals to work in the UK.
Closing date for applications: 4 January 2026
Interview date: 14 and 15 January 2026
We are the voice of England’s housing associations.


The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.