PR Manager, BFI Festivals

Salary: £37,374 - £44,163

The BFI are seeking a PR Manager to manage the press and public relations for BFI Festivals: the BFI London Film Festival and BFI Flare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival.

Fixed Term Contract: 31 March 2024

Key responsibilities include:

• The role manages press and PR for BFI Festivals year round, managing the profile and reputation of the BFI London Film Festival as the UK’s largest fim festival and a significant international event, and BFI Flare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival as one of the world’s most significant and long-standing queer film events in the LGBTQIA+ calendar. .
• The role is responsible for external and internal communication around festivals involving extensive media relations and stakeholder and industry communications and will ensuring that internal BFI teams are appropriately briefed, and that press coverage, campaign reporting and evaluation is communicated effectively.
• The role drafts and oversees an overall PR campaign plan to incorporate all campaign activity and milestones in the festival’s cycle, including key announcements, press briefings and key dates in line with on sale etc) .
• Managing an external PR agency and two in-house press roles and work alongside a rage of internal teams.

We are looking for candidates who have:

• Significant years’ experience in an agency or in-house press and communications role with experience of both team management and working with external PR agencies.
• Knowledge of and a passion for the UK and international film industries, including sensitivity to issues of diversity and inclusion.
• A proven track record of delivering PR campaigns, preferably in a festival or similar high pressure environment,  and working with a multitude of internal and external stakeholders, managing their expectations and influencing decision making.
• Strong project management skills, , with the ability to prioritise and ensure that key deliverables are monitored, on target or appropriate action taken if not.

About the BFI

We are a cultural charity, a National Lottery distributor, and the UK’s lead organisation for film and the moving image. We believe society needs stories. Film, television and the moving image bring them to life, helping us connect and understand each other better. We share the stories of yesterday, search for the stories of today, and shape the stories of tomorrow.

At the BFI you’ll enjoy benefits such as excellent support for working parents, 25 days annual leave (plus bank holidays), tickets to BFI festivals and events plus many others.

We support diversity and inclusion, and as an organisation recognise that we need to address under representation within our teams. As such we strongly welcome and encourage applicants from our under-represented groups; who identify as D/deaf and disabled and/or are ethnically diverse. We guarantee a first interview to our under-represented groups who meet our minimum requirements.

Corporate Press & PR on Inclusion

For all staff, artists, businesses and audiences, the BFI and its film festivals champion everyday inclusion, and recognise the need for intersectional equality, as we move towards being an antiracist organisation. 

We aim:

• To create an environment for the people who work in our teams, and those who work with our Festivals via partners to feel they can deliver their work in an environment that is inclusive, equitable, accessible and free from harm. 

• To build an environment where all partners, press, distributors and filmmakers feel respected and welcomed, and a culture in which they expect to be treated fairly and generously and see their work valued.

We are aware that we work in industries which are not always inclusive nor antiracist. Together with our own staff and with all of our contractors – essential members of our teams – we aim to hold ourselves to high standards of inclusion and accountability. 

Being a truly inclusive and antiracist arts organisation is a journey and commitment, and we ask all partners to go on that journey with us as we collectively strive to create a better culture. 

Inclusion at the BFI is in reference to all protected characteristics covered in the equalities act 2010, with the inclusion of class.

Our priorities are:

Race equality
Long-standing discrimination across the screen sectors has created barriers for Black, and ethnically diverse people. Sadly, this includes the experiences of colleagues at the BFI. By working with experts to embed anti-racism and accountability into our processes and provide training for our people, we hope to create long-term, sustained interventions. These will enable us to dismantle racism and champion best practice for the wider sector.

Disability equality
Prioritising disability and d/Deaf equality is a key but historically underdeveloped area of inclusion work. There remains a significant gap in understanding ableism and its negative impacts on representation. We have adopted the social model of disability including neurodivergence and relevant mental health diagnoses in our definition. We also partner with our Disability Screen Advisory Group to influence and shape our activity. We are led by the disabled community’s mantra, “Nothing about us without us”

Creating authentic representation and opportunity for people from low income and working class backgrounds
The working class make up 49% percent of the UK population, yet this isn’t reflected in the screen industries. The BFI works to champion working class perspectives, and dismantle barriers to opportunity and employment in the screen sector for those that come from low income and working class backgrounds. 

Promoting a culture of access and accessibility
We want everyone to feel included in the activity of the BFI, and that means looking at access and accessibility in the broadest sense. We consider physical access to our buildings, online access to our digital programmes and ensuring our work is felt in every region and nation of the UK crucial. We are committed to improving access to our digital platform and add closed captioning to all digital video services. And we will continue to remove the financial barriers that limit anyone’s ability to participate.

We believe in long-term interventions which are measurable, iterative and adaptable. By working in partnership with communities and marginalised groups, we can draw on their lived experience to deliver our work authentically and accessibly.

Applications

To apply, and for further details about the role, the BFI and our benefits please visit our website.

First interviews will be held on Thursday 6 April 2023

Second interviews will be held on Thursday 13 April

The closing date for this position is 22/03/2023 at 23:59