Purpose of the post
Working within the Legal, Trust and Ethics team, the PPIE Officer is a pivotal role in supporting HDR UK’s mission and our strategy to build trust and confidence in health data research among patients, public, practitioners and key stakeholders. The best way to do this is to embed meaningful involvement where patients and the public are actively involved in shaping our work and decision-making – putting the patient and public voice at the heart of what we do.
The successful candidate will administer and provide secretariat support to HDR UK’s Public Advisory Board and other advisory groups that contribute to delivering our PPIE strategy. They will be willing to organise events on behalf of the PPIE team, comfortable supporting multiple projects at a pace in a complex organisation, and interested in trialling, developing, and delivering innovative approaches to PPIE.
The role is integral to developing partnerships with patients, members of the public, communities, and practitioners across our work. Reporting to the PPIE Manager, this role will support the delivery of our growing portfolio of PPIE activities which enables us to embed the patient and public voice at all stages of our work and work together as partners. It is an exciting opportunity for someone who is committed to seeking and using the views of the public to shape and influence our work across the UK and, increasingly, for our global programmes.
The postholder will have a central role in working across our distributed Institute and partnerships, drawing on expertise and knowledge to embed the voice of patients, public and practitioners and ensure their active involvement in health data science. Additionally, involving frontline healthcare professionals will be a new area of focus for the team and the postholder will have a central role to play in developing and implementing the approach.
Main responsibilities
- Provide support to the Public Advisory Board, ensuring the Chair, Deputy Chair and members are fully involved in between meetings, organising meetings, and act as the link between the members and the wider HDR UK team.
- Co-ordinate feedback and input from the Public Advisory Board, and other public contributors, on HDR UK’s projects and programmes.
- Working with the PPIE Manager, providing administrative and logistical support.
- Working with the PPIE Manager, drive and promote innovative ways of involving and hearing from patients, carers and the public, challenging traditional methods, particularly ensuring growing involvement from currently underrepresented and underserved groups and communities in health data science.
- Working with the PPIE Manager, supporting the development and implementation of a training programme for researchers, innovators and public and patient involvement leads on embedding meaningful involvement.
- Working with the PPIE Manager to ensure work is co-ordinated across the Institute-Wide PPIE programmes (e.g., Research Driver Programmes), Public Engagement in Data Research Initiative (PEDRI), UK Health Data Research Alliance, and work with senior colleagues and advisory boards to identify potential areas of collaboration.
- Working with the PPIE Manager to monitor progress towards implementation of the UK Standards for Public Involvement and PEDRI standards.
- Working with the PPIE Manager to support HDR UK to raise and sustain the external profile of our PPIE impact, sharing learnings through a range of platforms such as events, publication in journals, newsletters, and other channels.
- Support the delivery of HDR UK’s strategy for involving and engaging patients, public, PPIE professionals and other relevant practitioners where applicable.
- With support from senior colleagues, work with teams and our patient and public contributors to advise, identify and propose innovative and inclusive approaches to PPIE in health data science.
- Undertake specific involvement activities for both one-off and long-term opportunities (as appropriate, dependent on purpose and requirements), including, but not limited to, surveys, focus groups, workshops, national public dialogues, etc.
- Provide administrative support to the wider Legal, Trust and Ethics and PPIE Central teams. This includes, but is not limited to, maintaining patient and public contact lists, arranging meetings, coordinating team or PPIE events.
- Support the development of a positive culture, standards and values for patient/public partnerships across HDR UK.
- Act as an internal and external ambassador for PPIE.
Experience
- Experience of working with patients, carers and members of the public with diverse interests
- Experience / understanding of different patient and public involvement techniques and approaches
- Experience of planning, running and evaluating patient/public involvement activities
- Experience of organising and managing successful workshops and events
- Experience of facilitating meetings and delivering presentations
- Proven track record of effectively supporting patient and public involvement groups/panels
- Experience in collaborating across teams and/or organisations to help create and co-deliver shared goals
- A record of success in embedding patient/public involvement in health services or research
- Experience of working in a complex organisation
- Desirable – Experience of working with under-represented and underserved communities in research
Skills
Essential
- An understanding of public in PPIE in an academic/research/healthcare environment and an interest in and awareness of the science, data, technology, and medicine sector
- An understanding/willingness to learn how to embed the UK Standards for Public Involvement within organisations
- A strong ability to take minutes, ensuring that all perspectives are accurately reflected and comments are recorded clearly and concisely
- Excellent people and interpersonal skills, with expertise in working with diverse groups of people
- Ability to develop effective and meaningful working relationships with public contributors and other stakeholders
- Ability to facilitate and engage effectively with teams and public contributors
- Ability to use discretion and judgement in dealing with confidential and sensitive issues
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to liaise effectively and explain concepts without technical jargon
- Excellent attention to detail with the ability to produce high quality materials
- Proven track record of working under pressure and able to make decisions in a timely manner as required with a flexible and adaptable approach
- Excellent planning, organisation and time-management skills in a fast-paced environment
- Ability to prioritise a wide range of demands and requirements, and manage own workload with multiple projects
- Solutions and delivery focused with an innovative approach and strong experience of taking initiative
- Excellent IT skills with a willingness to learn how to update our involvement and engagement network databases and webpages
Desirable
- Knowledge of the public sensitivities of using data for research
- Awareness of sensitivity to health data access
Please note, as we are a UK-based organisation, applicants must be living in, and eligible to work in, the UK. We are unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment Visa at this time.
We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.
We politely request no contact from recruitment agencies or media sales. We do not accept speculative CVs from recruitment agencies nor accept the fees associated with them.
