Overview
Murray McIntosh is delighted to have partnered with Enginuity, the UK's leading skills charity for engineering and manufacturing, in their search for a Senior Policy & Public Affairs Manager.
Enginuity works at the intersection of data, policy, and skills development, investing over £2 million annually to tackle barriers to entry and progression in the sector - particularly for underrepresented and disadvantaged groups.
This brand new, pivotal Senior appointment offers a rare opportunity to lead and build an influential policy and public affairs function within a mission-driven organisation, helping to shape the future of the UK's industrial skills landscape
The successful candidate will be joining a growing, forward-looking policy team at a formative moment, with the opportunity to shape its direction and culture from the ground up. A key focus for the team in the coming months will be the launch of Enginuity's National Policy Centre - a collaborative space for beneficiaries and stakeholders in the small and medium enterprise market. This high-profile project offers an exciting prospect for new postholders to play a meaningful role in its development and delivery.
The Role
The Senior Policy & Public Affairs Manager will lead and develop a growing policy team, while also playing a central role in shaping and delivering Enginuity's policy and advocacy strategy. They will be responsible for spearheading the work of the newly established National Policy Centre and driving engagement across government, industry, and the education sector. Reporting to the Associate Director Charity Operations & Impact, the Senior Manager will serve as a strategic advisor to the executive team and Board, ensuring Enginuity remains a trusted, evidence-led voice in both national and devolved policy conversations.
Key responsibilities include:
- Leading a high-performing policy team to produce high-quality, timely policy insights and responses.
- Developing and executing an integrated public affairs strategy to position Enginuity as a go-to expert for engineering and manufacturing skills issues.
- Building and maintaining strong relationships with Ministers, parliamentarians, senior civil servants, policy makers, and key stakeholders.
- Representing Enginuity at senior-level forums, parliamentary events, and policy roundtables.
- Overseeing the production of policy publications, research reports, and media briefings aligned with the charity's mission.
- Providing strategic advice on policy trends, risks, and opportunities to internal stakeholders and governance structures.
Candidate Profile
The ideal candidate will bring a strong track record in team leadership, along with a strategic mindset, political acumen, and demonstrative experience in influencing policy in a complex stakeholder environment. They will also possess:
- A Bachelor's degree as a minimum, or equivalent qualification
- Substantial experience leading policy and public affairs functions, ideally within or closely aligned to the skills, education, or industrial sectors.
- A deep understanding of government frameworks and policy-making across the UK's four nations.
- Exceptional stakeholder management and communication skills, with the ability to influence at senior levels.
- A passion for creating systemic change and promoting inclusive access to skills and employment.
- Proven experience managing and developing high-performing teams.
Why Join Enginuity?
This is an exciting time to join Enginuity as they scale their impact and strengthen their voice on national policy. The successful candidate will have the opportunity to:
- Play a central role in shaping Enginuity's policy strategy and direction - an opportunity to design, build and define the agenda and make a lasting mark through your own thinking and leadership.
- Influence key policy agendas shaping the UK's industrial future.
- Lead on cross-sectoral issues that support both business growth and social equity.
- Work in a values-driven environment with a collaborative and ambitious team.
- Make a meaningful contribution to improving access to skills and employment across the country.
- Be part of a flexible, employee-centric culture, with strong commitment to an equitable, diverse and inclusive workplace.
Application deadline: 23:59, Monday 25th August
Please apply with a copy of your CV and brief summary demonstrating your motivation and suitability for the role.
Full right to work in the UK is required. Unfortunately, sponsorship cannot be offered, and support for relocation isn't possible.
Enginuity operates on a remote basis, with whole team meetings arranged on a quarterly basis. There may be some additional UK wide travel for events and stakeholder engagement.
Murray McIntosh is proud to be an equal opportunities employer on behalf of their clients. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, colour, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability or age.
Murray McIntosh is a specialist Policy, Public Affairs, Strategic Communications and Economics recruitment consultancy, recruiting positions at all levels and across all sectors. Our team boasts over 20 years of experience in this space, with expertise spanning all manner of industry and subject.
Anna Kelly
Principal Consultant – Policy, Public Affairs & Strategic Communications
Murray Mcintosh have been incredibly helpful in delivering a successful candidate for a challenging role at BEAMA. As a small organisation we don’t often lean on agency support and in the past this hasn’t helped us. But we found the right recruitment agent who help recruit fantastic candidates for a specialist role in the energy sector. In a competitive employment market their help has been so valuable and we are so pleased with the result. All candidates they shortlisted we incredibly impressive and we weren’t expecting to be faced with such a hard decision. Huge thanks to the team and we look forward to working with you again.
BEAMA - Yselkla Farmer, Chief Executive Officer at BEAMA
We moved ahead with a retained engagement, offering us the most thorough search with a quicker turnaround than other engagement types we had experienced before.
We first contacted Anna in August 2022. We were looking for help to fill a vacant Policy Advisor role within our team. In a tricky market we had been struggling since the start of the year to find the right candidates through our usual channels. Anna took the time to understand the challenges we’d experienced, the support we needed, and nature of the role, before providing a solution.
We moved ahead with a retained engagement, offering us the most thorough search with a quicker turnaround than other engagement types we had experienced before. Given our needs, this approach seemed like a no-brainer! As an executive non-departmental body, we have quite specific supplier terms, which Anna was able to accommodate. This willingness to be flexible and collaborative to get the terms right enables us to work together in the longer term.
Anna worked with us speedily and met for a role brief to define expectations before establishing a strict timeframe to ensure we could close the vacancy before Christmas. We got going at the end of November with a timeframe of 6 weeks. However, following a one-stage interview process with 5 strong candidates, we made an appointment after just 5 weeks, and the successful candidate has now joined the team and is already an asset!
Ben Hardy - Policy & Government Relations Manager at CITB
We will use the retained search again as they demonstrated that their network and market mapping process uncovers a strong selection of candidates.
We have recently placed our Head of Public Affairs using Murray McIntosh, an important hire for us as we are about to enter a period of transition for the organisation so the role is key support to our Director of Policy and Public Affairs. We had engaged another agency but did not see the quality of candidate we needed.
Lauren talked us through the retained search method and explained how this ensures a thorough search, tied to a timeframe. Our PPA Director found this particularly useful, as we could work around his diary in advance.
We met to brief the role and define expectations on both sides, including a check-in point halfway through the market mapping process to ensure a relevant shortlist was coming together. Lauren was insightful, reliable and very transparent throughout and the process proved to be very efficient.
We started in January. The role was placed 6 weeks later after seeing 6 video interviews on The Lobby platform, inviting 3 candidates for first stage interview, and seeing 2 for a final stage.
We will use the retained search again in future as they demonstrated for us that their network and market mapping process uncovers a strong selection of candidates. That being said, they only introduce those who have demonstrated their interest and commitment to the role, so our time wasn’t wasted by dropouts and the offer process for our favoured candidate was very straightforward.
HR Manager - HR Manager at London chamber of Commerce and Industry
Multiple successful placements across our Public Policy team as well as our Communications and International department.
We started working with Murray McIntosh in 2016, and have since made multiple successful placements across our Public Policy team as well as our Communications and International department. From Economists to niche Tech and Innovation policy roles, to our first permanent Government Affairs hire based in Brussels, they’ve shown a real understanding of the market and our organisational needs,
The MM team always make the effort to understand requirements thoroughly and beyond that, appreciate the importance of culture fit, too.
Working on a retained basis, they develop their process to suit our timescales and always produce shortlists of talented individuals who are well qualified on skillset as well as motivation.
Of our most recent process for a Senior Policy Manager, working on trade policy, our Head of Policy commented on an extremely strong shortlist of stand-out candidates from which it was tough to make a choice!
Katie Milbourn - Director of Group HR at The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders Ltd
It was critical that we engaged an agency that could work efficiently and knew how to promote us to a competitive market.
Energy UK has recently been through a restructure and this resulted in a number of key vacancies across our policy and communications teams. This not only presented a challenge for volume candidate attraction but also put pressure on internal administration and interviewing- made even trickier with the challenges the energy industry was facing, resulting in extra time pressures on our managers.
It was critical that we engaged an agency that could work efficiently and knew how to promote us to a competitive market. Having worked with Murray McIntosh for over 7 years, we knew that they had a great network and we put a project plan in place to deliver 10 roles in 10 weeks.
Following a salary benchmarking exercise, we developed a schedule for shortlisting, interviews and even 1st stage interview questions that allowed for unbiased assessment.
Candidates were screened by MM and shortlisted using recorded video interviews which really helped to reduce the impact on managers’ time.
MM understood not just role requirements but our values, including our commitment to D&I. The process was account managed, with regular updates and feedback.
We’ve successfully hired talented and enthusiastic new employees that we are confident will help us provide the best possible service to our members.
Nicola Rowland - Head of HR at Energy UK