Are you interested in innovation and the role it plays in society and the economy? Could you help craft policy ideas for a more inclusive economy? If so, this role as Senior Policy Advisor could be perfect for you.

About Nesta and the programme

Nesta is an innovation foundation. For us, innovation means turning bold ideas into reality and changing lives for the better. We use our expertise, skills and funding in areas where there are big challenges facing society. Nesta is based in the UK and supported by a financial endowment. We work with partners around the globe to bring bold ideas to life to change the world for good.

Our work on inclusive innovation policy asks who benefits from government investment in innovation and looks at how policy can be designed so that the risks and rewards of innovation are more equally shared. In the past year we’ve published a series of reports arguing for radical change to broaden participation in the innovation economy, challenging existing approaches to allocating innovation resources and proposing new ways to evaluate innovation practice.

About this key role

You will help us take this work forward, working with partners inside and outside Nesta to craft, test and campaign for ambitious, creative policy proposals that spread the benefits of innovation to more people. You will help to position Nesta as an influencer in national and international policy debates. You will achieve this by proactively working with policymakers in the UK and internationally to advocate for change and acting as a spokesperson in print, broadcast and social media, providing commentary and opinion on new policy developments. Writing policy briefings, working papers and responses to government consultations and helping the team to develop new project ideas to further our work in this field are also key elements of this exciting and challenging role.

What we are looking for

You will need a good grasp of UK policy relevant to innovation policy and/or related areas such as labour market issues, local economic development, education and skills policy or the future of work. The ability to engage with technical detail of policy and legislation and to propose creative and more provocative ideas that can stimulate debate will be important too. An outstanding communicator, with strong writing skills, you will be able to compose briefings, reports, blogs and media pieces for expert and general audiences, and critically assess and justify policy proposals with research evidence.

Closing date: 10th June 2019 (8:00am).

First interviews will be held 17th June 2019.

Second interviews will be held 24th June 2019.

Please note: After the job advert closes, your answers will go through a sift process: randomising and anonymising answers for taking out individual information that biases hiring decisions and facilitating us to review each answer by more than one person so you can benefit from the wisdom of the crowds. People scoring the applications will not have seen your CV at this stage so please try your best to answer questions without rephrasing your CV, they will see this later! Click here to know more about the principles behind the blind review process.