Social Impact Communications Project Manager

Job Description

The Role:

Shape History is looking for a skilled project manager with experience in agency or in-house roles to ensure the smooth running of our global partnerships and become our next Project Manager.

Are you the type of organised individual who loves ensuring projects run efficiently with clear communication? Do you like sticking to a process, being informed by data and ensuring that others do too? Do you want to work on exciting social impact projects that aim to change the world? If that sounds like you, you might be just who we’re looking for.

Hello! We’re Shape History, the social impact communications agency based in London. We’re a full service agency and team up with our partners – that’s what we call our clients – charities, businesses, UN groups, academic brains, and big-hearted folks aiming to make the world better. We tackle some of the biggest issues facing humanity today, from climate change to gender equality, digital health to human rights.

As a Project Manager, you’re not just delivering effective project delivery, you’re creating real world impact. You’ll work closely with our strategy and creative teams to ensure their partnerships are running as efficiently as possible, paying special attention to budgets and timelines.  You will join the Operations and Project Management Team.

How you’ll be shaping history everyday:

• Project coordination and management: 
  • Project Setup: Develop budgets for new proposals, establish and manage effective team communication channels, and create and maintain detailed project folders.
  • Timeline Management: Create initial project timelines, populate them in our time management system, and ensure adherence to deadlines while managing expectations in the event of unanticipated project delays. .
  • Collaboration: Facilitate effective communication and collaboration between project teams, ensuring all deliverables are on track. Regularly update teams on project status and distribute status reports.
• Delivery oversight:
  • Facilitation: Facilitate conversations between Strategists and the Creative team to ensure project timelines and milestones are met.
  • Risk and Budget Management: Proactively identify and manage potential project risks and ensure all projects adhere to allocated budgets and timelines. Ability to manage scope creep and ensure projects remain profitable.
  • Purchasing and oversight:  Handle purchasing for projects, regularly review and update project costs and receipts.
• Systems and processes:
  • Process adherence and improvement: Ensure compliance with agency processes, manage scheduling, and time-tracking tools, and collaborate on workflow enhancements.
  • Documentation and archiving: Act as a systems superuser, maintaining the documentation system and overseeing the archiving of project documentation.
• Resourcing: Coordinate with other Project Managers to optimise in-house resource utilisation and manage our Shape History Collective of freelancers and consultants, including contract drafting and rate negotiation.
• Efficiency: Work together with the Senior Project & Operations Manager to ensure operational efficiency at Shape History. This includes identifying areas for improvement in project management and broader practices.

You’re exceptional at… (role requirements)

• Project Management: This might sound obvious, given the job title! We expect you to have project management experience, including keeping timelines and budgets in check. Your organisation is off the charts.
• Business acumen: You will have the ability to understand business situations and make strategic decisions to navigate those situations successfully.
• Attention to detail: You notice the small things no one else does.
• Proactivity: You don’t wait for people to come to you with tasks but instead, you actively seek out opportunities and present solutions, not just problems.
• Conflict management: You don’t have a problem managing different perspectives and personalities. You feel fully comfortable with holding our internal team accountable for their tasks.
• Collaboration: A respectful and competent individual but also a fantastic collaborator with the utmost confidence to challenge where necessary,
• Strategic planning and problem solving: You have a calm, practical and adaptable approach for solving roadblocks and thrive in it.
• Data collection: You have a proven track record with understanding how different data tools work and feel comfortable creating data sets to create greater efficiencies.
• Timelines and budget management: You have no problem building out timelines and adapting them as and when needed. You feel comfortable talking about money and making/tracking purchases on a regular basis.
• Details Matter: You have excellent attention to detail to pick up on pieces that others may miss.
• Creativity: You’re interested in the creative craft, even if it’s not your own. You bring your creativity to the table and collaborate with the team.
• Tech Savvy: You’re comfortable with the basics like Microsoft and Google Suite and enjoy using project management tools. Bonus points if you’ve dabbled in other tools that help teams collaborate better.
• Passion for Impact: You’re all about making a difference. You get the world-changing mission and you’re ready to dive into projects that matter.

Extra bit of awesome:

• Industry background: Knowledge and background in the social impact sector, whether that be working with charities, NGOs, funders, or institutions.
• Agency experience: Bring knowledge and drive of previous experience working in agencies.
• Hola. Bonjour. Shalom. Speak another language? Great! Our partners and projects take place across all four corners of the globe.

Inclusivity:

We are committed to having an inclusive culture in which everyone feels safe and supported to achieve their potential. We recognise that there is a long way to go in implementing race equity in the sector and we have a robust strategy in place for delivering this at Shape History. We actively encourage applications from underrepresented and minority groups, including those with lived experience of social issues we are working to address.

Equally, we are committed to creating an environment that both celebrates and supports neurodiversity, and whilst we’ve put measures in place to support you throughout this recruitment process (such as our pre-interview pack preparing you for what to expect), we’d actively encourage you to ask us for any additional support. As part of this strategy, we use blind recruitment in our first round of applications. When applying for this role, you will be taken to a Typeform link where you’ll be asked a series of questions.

How to Apply

Recruitment process:

• Applications open on Friday 16th August
• Applications close on Wednesday 4th September at 9am BST
• A short task may be shared in advance of interviews, which will be held w/c 9th August
• We aim to make a decision on the chosen candidate by Monday 16th September

Salary range: Base annual salary of £35,000 – £43,000 + discretionary yearly bonus (both personal and company)