About this vacancy
Department and salary
Department – Communications and Digital
Salary – £40,071.33 - £42,925.41 (Grade 7)
Working Hours – 37 hours (consideration will be given to job sharing / reduced hours in line with our flexible working policy)
Location – Cardiff, Hybrid
Who we are
Sport Wales is the national organisation responsible for developing and promoting sport and physical activity in Wales. We are the main adviser on sporting matters to the Welsh Government and are responsible for distributing National Lottery funds. We aim to not only improve the level of sports participation at grassroots level but also provide our aspiring athletes with the support required to compete successfully on the world stage.
Equality, Diversity & Inclusion is at the heart of everything we do at Sport Wales. Further information on this can be found in our Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Statement here.
We are a progressive employer that offers excellent employee benefits and promotes a healthy work life balance, offering a range of flexible approaches to support you.
Language skills (bilingualism & multilingualism) are desirable characteristics across all roles within Sport Wales. We are passionate about promoting the use of Welsh language and, as part of our development programme, give everyone the opportunity to learn Welsh if they wish to do so, offering learning programmes from beginner right through to fluent.
Sport Wales embraces a blended approach to work, where you will be able to split your time between the office and home.
Sport Wales careers are funded by Welsh Government and the National Lottery. Find out more about Sport Wales’ relationship with the National Lottery.
How you'll contribute
This is an exciting opportunity in a brand-new role to make a real impact within a busy Communications and Digital team at Sport Wales. With a wealth of experience in providing communications support to wider business operations, you will become a respected source of guidance, advising across various functions of the organisation, developing and managing the delivery of communication and engagement plans that add value to key organisational projects.
With strong influential skills and proven ability in implementing communications strategy and monitoring success, you will work closely with the Communications Manager providing a multi-disciplinary, innovative and evolving communications offer. Working across all elements of the communications discipline you will take a leading role in improving and developing our approaches across all activity.
Having excellent organisational and coordination skills you will help to ensure that the output across all Sport Wales channels delivers a consistent and timely narrative. You will take responsibility for line managing the organisation’s Communications Assistants, coordinating their work programmes and supporting their personal development.
Who you’ll work with
You’ll be an influential member of the Communications and Digital team and will work across all departments at Sport Wales as well as supporting our partners’ work. You will be comfortable working at all levels and confidently advise those in Executive positions.
You will be responsible for managing contracts with external agencies and suppliers, ensuring that they meet project briefs to agreed timelines.
You’ll generate contacts across the sector and beyond and be comfortable working with peers from aligned organisations on joint work projects.
You will use your knowledge and passion to support and advise colleagues in using communication activities to achieve organisational objectives. Where appropriate, you will also share your knowledge with partners to support their approach to communications.
What you'll need
With significant experience of working in communications, you’ll be looking to apply your skills and share your knowledge, being passionate about the value that communications activity can bring to an organisation. We’re looking for someone who can influence, negotiate and develop solutions-focussed plans to best meet organisational needs, providing outstanding results across the business.
You'll need to have proven experience of taking complex information to create compelling content suitable for a wide variety of stakeholders, and be passionate about using insight and learning to evolve our approach.
You will need to be equipped for the challenge that comes with being part of a small but busy in-house team. This is a superb opportunity to work across multiple platforms, with multiple stakeholders, using your creativity and skills to make a real difference to people in Wales.
What happens next
You should read the full job description (please note we do not accept CV's).
You can apply for this role now.
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Closing date
27/06/2025 9am
Provisional interview date
15/16th July 2025
Full job description
Responsible to
Communications Manager
Responsible for
Communications assistants
Job purpose
This is an exciting opportunity, in a brand-new role to make a real impact in a busy Communications and Digital team.
In this role you will ensure that communications activity supports wider operations, enhancing reputation and making an impact against priorities by becoming a respected source of advice and guidance across all levels of the organisation. You will add value to multiple projects by developing and managing the delivery of communications and engagement plans.
You will work closely with the Communications Manager in providing a multi-disciplinary, innovative and evolving communications offer to support the organisation and its objectives, continuously monitoring performance and looking to develop and improve our approaches across all activity.
You will help to ensure that the output across all Sport Wales channels delivers a consistent and timely narrative supporting the Senior Communications Lead to plan content across multiple channels and coordinating others in the team to deliver against this. You will support the production of this content by developing and generating new contacts internally and across the sector.
You will take responsibility for line managing the organisation’s Communications Assistants, coordinating their work programmes and supporting their personal development.
You will be an important member of a busy communications and digital department and will be expected to input on a wide range of projects using a range of communications methods, supporting colleagues where necessary.
Main duties
Advise across the organisation at all levels, including those in Executive positions, on where communication activity would be appropriate, how it could add value, and on the appropriate course of action.
Work across the organisation to develop and manage the delivery of communication, marketing, and engagement plans to support business priorities and organisational projects.
Support the Communications Manager on the implementation of the communications strategy, working with external agencies to continually monitor performance and develop our approach to different channels.
Work with the Senior Communications Lead in the planning of all Sport Wales content ensuring that output across all Sport Wales channels delivers a consistent narrative, supports overall reputation and business objectives.
Take a coordinating role with Communications Officers and Communications Assistants to deliver content in line with plans.
Work across the organisation and sector proactively looking for new ideas to produce quality content, as part of a wider content plan, ensuring it can be used across a variety of platforms, and that it supports organisational key messages.
Manage creative agencies on key Sport Wales projects and ensure they deliver accurate, thought-provoking content and communication assets.
Line manage two Communications Assistants.
Work with the insight team to package up key messages, insight and data into engaging content that will encourage people to think differently about sport and Sport Wales.
Take a coordinating role for Sport Wales corporate events and provide advice across the organisation for smaller scale and project level events.
To support media liaison, handling incoming enquiries, preparing responses, briefing spokespeople, and issuing statements.
Support the management of our social media channels where required.
Work across the sector offering support and advice to communications professionals and help others understand the important role communications can play in supporting sport in Wales.
Support the Communications Manager on communications activity with Welsh Government, sponsored bodies, regulatory bodies and other public sector organisations playing an active role in identifying opportunities for shared messaging and collaboration.
Monitor and identify issues that have the potential to cause significant reputational damage and where necessary take a lead in managing them on strategic and tactical levels.
Take part in an on-call rota offering communications support out of hours. This will involve handling relevant media enquiries as well as monitoring and identifying issues that have the potential to cause significant reputational damage.
Fulfil responsibilities which contribute to delivering an exemplary service for Sport Wales in respect of our statutory duties, including the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales), Equality, Information Security, Risk Management, Safeguarding, Financial Regulation and Health, Safety & Environment.
Work flexibly, performing any other duties as required, where relevant to the post and appropriate to the grade.
Our values
Our approach to enabling sport in Wales to thrive is evolving. We are committed to continually challenging ourselves to:
Learn Together - Constantly exploring, testing and reviewing
Deliver Together - Sharing outcomes, nurturing open and honest relationships, providing robust feedback, constantly improving performance
Celebrate Together - Recognising our shared successes through effective partners
By:
Acting with Integrity - Understanding and Respecting each other’s culture and values. Promoting equality and diversity
Adding Value - Ensuring the optimum mix of support, challenge, investment, skills, and expertise to achieve our shared outcomes.
Encouraging Innovation - Welcoming new ideas and approaches and supporting ambition and fresh thinking. Not being afraid to feel uncomfortable.
Person specification
| Area of focus | Essential Requirements | Desirable Requirements |
Education
| Degree in communications, marketing or a related subject
Evidence of continuous professional development (further qualification preferable) | |
| Experience | Significant experience within a Communications or Marketing team.
Experience of developing and delivering complex multi-channel communication plans.
Experience of coordinating successful communications projects.
Experience of influencing colleagues, including senior management regarding communications and engagement activity.
Experience in implementing communication strategies and in evaluating their success.
Experience of line managing others.
Experience of coordinating others to deliver agreed communications output.
Experience of using complex data and insight to produce engaging material to influence stakeholders.
Experience in copywriting content for multiple channels and specific audiences.
Experience of briefing and managing numerous creative agencies to deliver high-quality content, to spec and on time.
Experience of evaluating communications activities and projects.
Experience of using a wide range of digital platforms in a professional capacity including CMS platforms, X, Instagram, facebook and LinkedIn
Experience of developing a range of corporate communications material used on a variety of channels.
Understanding of the UK print, broadcast, local, regional, national and trade media and experience working with journalists and handling media enquiries.
Knowledge and experience of CRM systems.
| Experience of working with or in the sport and/or public sector.
Experience of working with public sector bodies on communications projects.
Experience of supporting and managing corporate events.
|
| Skills, Aptitudes & Abilities | Excellent communication skills - both written and oral.
Ability to influence internal and external stakeholders
Ability to develop and lead communications projects
Ability to coordinate others to deliver specific outputs
Ability to translate strategic intent into operational delivery
Ability to translate strategic intent into operational delivery.
Ability to write concise, compelling online and off-line written copy for a variety of stakeholders.
Able to handle confidential data and information sensitively.
Able to organise own work and effectively plan, schedule and prioritise tasks.
Able to line manage others
Ability to organise and coordinate numerous suppliers to deliver output as part of a wider plan.
Project management and delivery skills
Excellent IT skills, including good working knowledge of CMS and CRM systems.
Ability to work under pressure and to meet deadlines.
| Ability to communicate in Welsh - both written and spoken.
|
| Special Circumstances | Able to work flexibly, including out of normal office hours and participate in on call rotas.
Able to travel as required, holding a full UK driver’s license. |
