View Vacancy - Engagement Support Officer- Strategic Engagement And Understanding Islamabad-EO, Islamabad
Note : All applicants are required to mandatorily fill the complete online application form including the employment and educational details, experience-based segment and the behaviours and technical/ professional skills based questions. We will be thoroughly reviewing the application forms only for all the required details. Forms that are incomplete in any respect will not be considered while shortlisting for the next stage.’’
This is a temporary position for 3-6 months.
Main purpose of job:
An opportunity to work in a high-profile job at the centre of one of the biggest foreign missions in Pakistan, managing several critical elements of the UK’s engagement with Pakistan including visa facilitation, bilateral engagement tracking, and event support.
Roles and responsibilities / what will the jobholder be expected to achieve?:
This is a temporary (three/six-month) role to provide additional resource to the Strategic Engagement and Understanding team and Private Office on three core functions:
Managing Visa facilitation requests
Visas are a key part of our bilateral relationship, and help underpin the strong people-to-people links between UK and Pakistan. The UK visa system is under strain due to pressures including Ukraine, causing lengthy processing times. Senior and influential contacts regularly lobby us for support in facilitating their applications. Your role will be to manage this process, developing and implementing a new tracking system to follow the full range of requests, coordinating judgements and decisions, and tracking processing and responses.
Leading on engagement and influence tracking
The Strategic Engagement & Understanding Team oversees and coordinates BHC and HMG engagement at senior levels, ensuring that we are building the right links to deliver on the UK’s objectives and sustaining load-bearing relationships at all levels. Your role will to be bring new structure and organisation to this aspect of the team to make the mission more effective, including through: a) developing a ‘contact grid’ that identifies and tracks key contacts and relationships versus key BHC positions and b) leading on regular ‘engagement forward look’ and ‘bilateral grid’ products, which set the agenda for our bilateral engagement.
Supporting on events and visits
Events remain a powerful tool to deliver on our diplomacy, whether large set-piece events such as the Queen’s Birthday Party to smaller scale receptions hosted by individual officers. Identifying and inviting the right contacts to these events is crucial to ensuring they are a success. You will oversee this process, coordinating with relevant teams to identify key contacts and issuing and tracking invitations.
- Review complex visa facilitation cases, analyse information to make efficient decisions with sound judgement, delivered within agreed standards.
- Stakeholder management - Coordinate internally within the visa team so high priority cases are processed smoothly, making sound decisions while interacting with key stakeholders and keeping the external stakeholders informed.
- Supporting on events and visits – Lead on event policy and oversee the entire events for wider impact, and coordinate with relevant teams to identify key contacts and issuing and tracking invitations.
- Responsible to own event policy and help advise on issues such as how to target our events for most impact, the types of people we should be aiming for, best size for most effect, etc.
About you
You will require the ability to build strong professional relationships at all levels of seniority, and across different teams and departments in the mission. You will need sound judgement, bringing in expertise from across the mission and building your own over time to be able to see how our approach fits into the wider context of UK interests.
You will be able to understand your own decision-making authority and ownership, while confidently identifying when you need to bring in senior oversight (such as sign-off from the High Commissioner or Deputy High Commissioner on high profile visas). You will need to demonstrate discretion and sensitivity including with other colleagues in the mission.
You should be confident in taking ownership of processes and products requiring accuracy and detail, often under time pressures and with unexpected changes or obstacles. Your work will be read and relied upon by seniors both in Islamabad and in the UK, shaping the agenda for UK engagement.
- Excellent communication skills in English - verbal & written.
- Strong interpersonal and communication skills. Able to articulate judgements and decisions clearly and accurately. Ability to deal politely and effectively with colleagues and contacts.
- Strong organisational skills and accuracy in your work.
- Strong computer skills including knowledge of Microsoft applications eg Excel/Word/Outlook.
Language Requirement
Language: English
Level of language required: Fluent (verbal & written)
Salary Details:
For BHC candidates, the Country Based Staff BHC Terms & Conditions will apply. For other than BHC candidates the basic salary will be PKR 145,759 per month.
The BHC is recognised as a good employer, with a robust, fair and transparent performance management & appraisal system linked to increments and staff bonuses. We have a 5-day working week, plus annual leave, public holidays, maternity leave provision, special leave, paid sick leave provision; ample development opportunities, travel opportunities, a good organisational culture, and excellent work/life balance.
Around half of our work forces are women. We treat people with respect and equality and have a policy of zero tolerance for any form of discrimination, bullying, or harassment.
This is a good opportunity to be part of a strong, diverse team, working in the biggest network that FCDO has anywhere across the globe. We are aiming to make it the best.
’Note : All applicants are required to mandatorily fill the complete online application form including the employment and educational details, motivational segment and the competency based questions. We will be thoroughly reviewing the application forms only for all the required details. Forms that are incomplete in any respect will not be considered while shortlisting for the next stage.’’
To Apply:
Please note applications without (a) and (b) will not be considered.
A. Complete the Online Application Form
B. Complete the Motivation and Competency Segment in the Online Application Form
Internal candidates applying for this position need to upload their appraisal forms for the previous 2 years (if applicable) and also inform their current line managers, else the applications will not be considered.
We will accept only online applications by 11th September 2022 (latest by 23:55 hours PKT).
Please note that all the applicants will be required to strictly adhere to the security guidelines for British High Commission
Employees who are not liable to pay local income tax on their Mission salary may have their salaries reduced by the equivalent local income tax amount.
Applicants who do not have the required qualification & experience should kindly abstain from applying, as their applications will not be considered.
Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and no telephone enquires will be dealt with.
The appointment will be subject to Police Verification and other checks including references, medical, educational and professional.
We welcome all applications irrespective of age, race, colour, gender, disability, sexual orientation, religion, belief or creed. We are also open to applications from people who want to work flexibly.
This opportunity is closed to applications.
