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About the Role

As a Business Engagement Lead, you will lead the strategic planning and delivery of high-quality engagement for Digital Services, fostering clarity, alignment and a strong sense of shared purpose across the function,  supporting delivery of the Digital Services Unit Business Plan, People Plan and business change through effective colleague engagement, stakeholder engagement and operational communications.

The role has two primary focuses:

• Internal engagement: Building alignment and shared understanding within Digital Services - ensuring colleagues understand priorities, progress and impact.
• Business change & stakeholder engagement: Supporting Digital Services programmes through effective stakeholder mapping, engagement planning and change communications, working in partnership with the University's central Internal Communications team where communications extend beyond Digital Services or contribute to University-wide strategic messaging.

Key Responsibilities

Internal Communications & Engagement (Digital Services)

• Develop and deliver an outcome-focused internal communications and engagement plan aligned to Digital Services priorities and leadership objectives.
• Translate the Digital Services strategy, priorities and objectives into clear and engaging communications for colleagues within Digital Services, aligned with the University's strategic messaging and corporate narrative.
• Design and deliver approaches that foster transparency, connection and a sense of belonging across a large, complex function.
• Use insight and feedback to measure effectiveness and continuously improve engagement.

Stakeholder Engagement

• Lead stakeholder engagement planning to support delivery of Digital Services programmes and strategic change initiatives.
• Work with programme teams to develop stakeholder engagement and change communication plans that support successful adoption of new services, systems and ways of working.
• Support Digital Services leaders and managers to communicate effectively with colleagues.
• Translate complex technical information into accessible language for colleagues and stakeholder groups.

Operational Communications & Coordination

• Coordinate local communications and engagement activity across Digital Services, ensuring colleagues receive timely, accurate and relevant information.
• Ensure communications are timely, accurate and aligned across programmes and teams.
• Act as the primary operational contact within Digital Services for the central Internal Communications team, ensuring joined-up planning and delivery of communications activity.

Stakeholder & Community Engagement

• Partner with the central Internal Communications team to coordinate communications activity where programmes have organisation-wide impact.
• Partner with Digital Services Leadership Team on engaging key stakeholder groups, including Associate Lecturers, Academic Services and VCE, ensuring alignment and impact.
• Support stakeholder engagement and communications planning during operational issues, technology change and service delivery programmes, escalating organisation-wide communications requirements through the central Internal Communications team where appropriate.

About You

Essential:

• Extensive experience leading colleague and stakeholder engagement, communications, and change adoption within large, complex organisations.
• Proven success supporting technology-enabled change, digital transformation, or major organisational programmes.
• Strong track record of developing and delivering stakeholder engagement and communication strategies that drive business change and organisational objectives.
• Significant experience planning and coordinating engagement activity across multiple diverse stakeholder groups and competing priorities.
• Expertise in stakeholder analysis, mapping, and engagement planning for complex programmes with experience working collaboratively with specialist communications teams to deliver organisation-wide engagement activity, advising on escalation requirements, and ensuring alignment between local and organisation-wide communications.
• Experience advising senior leaders and programme teams on engagement, communications, and change management approaches.
• Strong stakeholder management, influencing, relationship-building, and partnership-working skills.
• Experience managing intranet content, editing, and digital communication channels.
• Excellent written communication skills, with the ability to create clear, engaging, and audience-specific content.
• Ability to translate complex technical or programme information into accessible and compelling communications.
• Excellent facilitation skills, including designing and delivering workshops, consultation activities, and engagement sessions.
• Proven ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously, lead teams to successful outcomes, and respond effectively during periods of organisational change or service disruption. 

Desirable:

• Understanding of recognised change management methodologies.

Support with your application

If you have any questions, or need support or adjustments relating to your application, the recruitment process, or the role, please contact us on 01908 541111 or email careers@open.ac.uk quoting the advert reference number.

What's in it for you?

At The Open University, we offer a range of benefits to recognise and reward great work, alongside policies and flexible working that contribute towards a great work life balance. Get all the details of what benefits we offer by visiting our Staff Benefits page (clicking this link will open a new window).

Flexible working

We are open to discussions about flexible working. Whether it’s a job share, part time, compressed hours or another working arrangement. Please reach out to us to discuss what works best for you.

It is anticipated that a hybrid working pattern can be adopted for this role, where the successful candidate can work from home and the office. However, as this role is contractually aligned to our Milton Keynes office it is expected that some attendance in the office will be required when necessary and in response to business needs. We’d expect this to be a minimum of four times per month.

Next steps in the Recruitment process

We anticipate that interviews for this role will be taking place during the week commencing 7 September 2026.

Early closing date notification

While most roles will remain open until the advertised closing date, applications may be reviewed on an ongoing basis. In some cases, vacancies may close earlier if a sufficient number of suitable applications have been received and equality impacts have been appropriately considered. All roles will remain advertised for a minimum of one week before any early closure is implemented.

If you have started an application or were in the process of applying when the advert closed, we encourage you to get in touch. We are committed to understanding individual circumstances and can offer further support where needed, including reasonable adjustments for applicants with protected characteristics.

How to apply

To apply for this role please submit the following documents:

• CV
• A supporting statement of up to 1000 words. You should set out in your statement why you are interested in the role and provide examples of where your skills and experience meet the essential requirements for this role as detailed in the job description.

You can view your progress and application communications when you are logged into our recruitment system.  Please check your spam/junk folders if you do not receive associated email updates.