Inclusion Associate

What are we looking for?

Watershed strives to be inclusive, it is one of our key organisational values and is understood as both a social responsibility and a creative imperative. We have a Creative Case for Diversity Rating of Strong by Arts Council England and have focused time and resources during the last year developing inclusive programming and facilities. However, we have not met our own targets to develop the diversity of our teams and have used lockdown to re-set our inclusion work – which is documented here.

Watershed’s business is complex and the approach, working structure, and working environment differs depending on the team. We want to establish and embed our Organisation wide inclusion principles, but also respond to each team’s inclusion knowledge and needs.

Through workshops and training sessions, the Associate will support Watershed staff to develop their own department-specific targets and plans.

The Associate will also feed into the development of; Watershed’s new people strategy, a process being led by the Head of HR to address how to recruit, manage and appraise staff, and our inclusive language guide which is being developed by the Communications team working with the Inclusion Working Group.

There are six different groups of teams for the Associate to work with:

• Creative Team (Cinema, Talent Development and Creative Technology)
• Communications
• Executive Team
• Infrastructure and Services (ICT, Projection, Facilities and Finance)
• Café and Bar and Kitchen (we are also planning to deliver some hospitality specific inclusion training)
• Front of House, Events and Box Office

The focus should be intersectional, but have a particular focus on including people who experience racism (who currently represent 16% of Bristol’s population and only 8% of our staff [1]).

The Associate will form an informal team alongside the Bristol+Bath Creative R+D and SWCTN Inclusion Producers and the Rife Mentor, to share knowledge, approach and peer support. This is a new approach, so we are open to feedback and suggestions for how it may be better structured to suit your needs or working preferences.

[1] Figures based on the 18/19 Watershed staff survey

What will you do?

We would expect the Inclusion Associate to arrive with ideas and best practice of how to structure the work, but imagine it could include:

• Design and delivery of inclusion training
• Working with each Watershed team to create, implement, monitor and report on their own inclusion plan
• Supporting the HR Manager to embed inclusion best practice in recruitment, training and employee development structures
• Exploring methods and best practice for monitoring and reporting on progress

The work could be in person or on Zoom, though we would like at least one in person visit. The fee is fixed and we don’t want to be specific at this early stage on how you will undertake it, but have allocated a total based on 30 days at £500 a day . The working structure will be agreed in consultation with the appointed Associate.

What we hope will be achieved:

• Every department has a plan and targets for inclusion in their own work including recruitment, roles and departmental culture
• All staff are engaged with developing the inclusion strategy
• Inclusion best practice is embedded into recruitment and appraisal structures
• Areas for development are identified and communicated to Executive Team who are clear on how to take the work forward

Your capabilities are likely to include:

• Experience of developing and delivering intersectional inclusion training and strategy development, with a focus on engagement with communities who experience racism
• Able to inspire change
• Organised and self-motivated
• A collaborative approach to work

How to apply

Please apply with a letter, video or audio file describing your experience and how you would approach this work. We welcome and encourage applications from those currently underrepresented in Watershed, particularly people from working class backgrounds, people who experience racism, people who are LGBTQ+, and d/Deaf or disabled people. We are committed to managing a fair and equitable process and will meet with anyone who identifies as one or more of the above. If you would like this to be a consideration in your application, please indicate in your submission.

Get in touch

Thank you for your interest in this opportunity – if you have questions or would like a chat please email Louise Gardner on louise.g@watershed.co.uk to arrange a call.