Programmes Officer

We are excited to create a new Programmes Officer role within our core team at the Natural History Consortium. We’re a small friendly team, working at pace, looking for an enthusiastic individual to work on our programmes, which connect hundreds of organisations and thousands of individuals each year. Our varied events programme aims to encourage positive action for the natural world. We’d love to hear from you if you’re organised, have excellent communication and administration skills and would enjoy working in a small busy organisation where everyone mucks in.

About The Natural History Consortium

The Natural History Consortium (NHC) is a charitable collaboration of 13 research, media, policy, and conservation organisations working together on a shared mission: engaging people with the natural world through collaborative action. Together our objective is to advance the public understanding of wildlife and the natural environment.

We achieve this by:

• Delivering entertaining and informative events and activities that inspire greater public interest, volunteering and action for nature

• Facilitating, developing, and disseminating novel communication techniques that engage the widest possible audience

• Building, supporting and piloting effective partnerships that bring together diverse organisations that face similar challenges and issues, and help organisations learn from each other

Our staff team exists to leverage the resources of 13 partners, who have extensive skills, experience and knowledge and meet regularly to input into NHC programmes.

Our annual programmes include City Nature Challenge, the Festival of Nature, and Communicate. In addition, we work on several one-off collaborative projects and programmes each year including citizen science projects. We are also delivery partners on the Wild Summit.

Contract dates: We are ideally looking for someone to start in January 2026 but will seek to negotiate later contract dates for the right candidate.

Working hours: This is a full-time role (37.5 hours/week) based at our office in Bristol City Centre. We would also consider a part-time role (minimum 30 hours per week) for the right candidate on a pro-rata basis. The majority of hours will be worked Monday - Friday, between our core hours of 8am - 6pm. The team typically work remotely on a Friday (optional) and we offer flexibility to work remotely on occasion on an ad-hoc basis (during non-event delivery periods).

Personal circumstances: Some weekend and evening work will be expected during event delivery, particularly during the Festival of Nature (6-14th June 2026) and to attend events as a representative of the charity. Time off in lieu will be given. Travel and overnight stays away from home typically happen 1-2 times per year with at least 4 months notice. 

Key event dates

Due to the nature of the role, we will need you to be available over the following key event dates:

• Festival of Nature: Sat 6th - Sun 14th June 2026 (plus pack down on Mon 15th June)

• Wild Summit: September 2026 date TBC (one day of delivery)

• Communicate: November 2026 dates TBC (three days of delivery)

Benefits

• 25 days holiday plus 8 bank holidays

• Work anywhere August: remote working option for the month of August

• Reading Week - a dedicated week for self-directed learning and professional knowledge growth

The Purpose of the Role

This role contributes to our aim of engaging people with the natural world through collaborative action through supporting projects and events.

The expected outcomes for the role are:

● Event production - supporting the planning and delivery of events aimed at public and professional audiences including Festival of Nature, Communicate Wild Summit. Events will connect audiences with our 13 partners and encourage participants to take action for nature.

● Citizen science programme development - working with our Citizen Science Programmes Manager, supporting the coordination and preparation of new regional citizen science surveys. This will include contribution towards survey design, stakeholder engagement, and evaluation.

● Administration - supporting all programmes, including event production

● Volunteer support - recruiting, supporting and managing event volunteers ● Building strong working relationships to deliver programme objectives

● Contributing to the successful operations of the charity.

Responsibilities and Activities

Communication and facilitation

● Communicating with event attendees in a friendly and efficient manner - before, during, and post events

● Liaising with NHC partners and our wider partnership of event contributors

● Facilitating online and in-person meetings with partners, event contributors, and volunteers

● Responding to enquiries via shared and personal NHC inboxes in a timely manner

● Supporting the Communications Manager with a range of communication and marketing tasks

Administration

● Administration of ticket sales in both public facing and professional facing contexts

● Administration and support for external content providers including conference speakers, exhibitors, traders and performers

● Working in a small team to support day to day administration tasks

Operational Delivery

● Supporting with in-person and online event logistics and event management

● Supporting on-site delivery of our large-scale programme of public and professional events

Evaluation

● Contribution to programme evaluation, including collecting data and analysing data

● Compiling reports for funders and supporters

Volunteer Management

● Managing volunteers including recruitment, support, coordination, and feedback

Other

● A range of other tasks and duties are likely to arise to support other programmes areas