About Police Now  

Our mission is to transform communities, reduce crime and anti-social behaviour, and increase the public’s confidence in the police service by recruiting, developing and inspiring outstanding and diverse leaders in society and on the policing frontline. 

We are working towards a day when every community, whatever the socio-economic background of its residents, can thrive without being fearful of crime. We are looking for talented, committed and mission-aligned individuals who will drive us towards achieving our ambitions.

Police Now recruits and trains graduates and career changers with leadership potential to become inspirational police officers and outstanding crime fighters on our National Graduate Leadership Programme and our National Detective Programme. Beyond these programmes, our officers may join our Frontline Leadership Programme and be further developed giving them the best possible chance to progress through the policing ranks and have a lifelong connection with us.

Our 115-strong not-for-profit organisation aims to create systemic change. We need highly capable impactful staff to support the recruitment and development of our officers and to cultivate strong relationships with partner forces and the wider sector.

The purpose of your role

We’re looking for a Recruitment & Selection Officer to join our award-winning team to deliver our recruitment and selection processes to enable us to achieve our ambitious mission.

You will be responsible for recruiting and supporting a pipeline of candidates onto our two flagship programmes. This is a fast-paced and varied role that will involve working closely with candidates throughout the application journey, alongside various internal and external stakeholders, to ensure we meet our targets. Your responsibilities will be varied including delivering selection activity including assessment centres and quality assuring our selection outcomes. You will be dedicated to delivering an excellent candidate experience at every stage of the recruitment and onboarding process, until they start on our programme. You will also act as the dedicated recruitment link to a few of our partner forces, working collaboratively with force HR and Talent Acquisition teams to ensure a smooth onboarding experience.

Alongside operational delivery, you will work closely with the Recruitment Manager, Selection Manager and Head of Recruitment on future evolutions to our recruitment and selection processes to ensure we remain market-leading in our  approach. This includes designing content, piloting new approaches and using data and evaluation to inform future developments and improvements.

Key responsibilities

• Work collaboratively within our Recruitment sub-team of seven, and across our Selection sub-team of four, contributing to a high-performance culture and ensuring a quality candidate experience, as well as delivering on targets. 
• Oversee the running of assessment centres in the role of the assessment centre manager (ACM) to ensure all candidates receive a positive candidate experience and working with assessors to ensure consistent and fair assessment assessed across all exercises. In addition, when required, you will act as the facilitator for assessment centres being the main point of contact for candidates on the day or an assessor delivering exercises yourself.
• Be the face of Police Now for our candidates, maintaining an exceptional standard of candidate care throughout the end-to-end recruitment process. You will build relationships with them, engaging and supporting them through each stage with regular quality communication, persuasive techniques and relationship management skills.
• Develop and deliver recruitment pipeline interventions such as pre-assessment centre phone-calls, un-submitted application calls, group coaching sessions and other tailored communications, so that candidates are fully prepared for each stage of the application and selection process.
• Oversee progress towards specific candidate pipeline targets, flagging areas of concern with a focus on under-represented groups and escalating and implementing actions as required in order to exceed target expectations.
• Act as the main point of contact for successful candidates throughout their lengthy onboarding journey, ensuring they remain engaged and enthusiastic about joining Police Now’s programme and resolving any barriers they may face.
• Work closely with a select number of our partner police forces, being the main point of contact for in-house force HR and Recruitment teams. You will collaborate to build strong relationships to ensure every single candidate progresses quickly and smoothly through the post offer processes, including vetting, medical, fitness, as well as referencing and degree checking.
• Support and lead on projects related to process improvement, content design and candidate journey and assessment evolution. This will involve working on developments to our assessment activities and materials when required, gaining stakeholder input into selection criteria and testing new methodology to ensure rigour.
• Conduct ongoing analysis of parts of the recruitment and selection process, as well as end of campaign analysis, and communicate outputs to relevant stakeholders.
• Work closely with the Recruitment management team to identify areas of need and focus for that week, splitting your time across multiple teams/people, as needed.
• Develop strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders that support the recruitment process, such as Police Now’s Force Partnerships Team and our external suppliers.
• Ad hoc duties to support our busy team, including, attending events and supporting with onboarding processes.
  
  

Key requirements

• Proven recruitment and/or selection and assessment experience, preferably in a high-volume graduate environment or experience working in police recruitment services.
• Proven background in proactively managing high-volume candidate pipelines in a tailored and strategic way and using pipeline insights to improve candidate outcomes and progress to targets.
• Have diversity and inclusion at the heart of all you do, contributing to the ideas and delivery of our strategy to hire outstanding and diverse individuals.
• High level of planning and organising ability, with confidence managing multiple activities and deadlines, strong project management skills and good judgement and decision making to consider conflicting priorities. Ability to work at speed whilst ensuring attention to detail.
• Excellent interpersonal skills and the ability to confidently persuade, communicate and build relationships with a wide variety of internal and external stakeholders and target audiences.
• Awareness of key graduate recruitment marketplace issues and ability to communicate these succinctly.
• A strategic mindset and the ability to manage change, ambiguity, and high levels of complexity.
• The ability to work well independently, recognising when to act with autonomy and when to escalate. 
• A strong team player, able to build relationships with a large team to understand priorities and flex working style appropriately.
• Proficiency in Excel, Word, PowerPoint and Outlook and ability to develop knowledge and proficiency of Police Now’s applicant tracking system and digital assessment centre platform.
• Willingness to travel within England and Wales for meetings and events, and to work occasional evenings as required, as well as extended days during periods where assessment centres are running. Assessment centres are currently delivered digitally but we plan to deliver both face to face and digital assessment centres in 2024
  
  

What you'll get from us

• A bright, airy and modern office in Zone 1. 
• Competitive salary of £36,000-£41,000 per annum. dependent on experience 
• Flexible working
• 27 days holiday each year, plus bank holidays 
• Access to a benefit platform, which includes salary sacrifice schemes such as cycle to work and smart tech as well as access to over 750 retailers and discounts.
• Sanctus coaching (private mental health coaching for the workplace)
• Access to the Vitality programme which includes healthcare benefits, an Employee Assistance Programme and discounts
• Training opportunities for personal development. 
• Participation in a pension scheme (with 6% employer contributions and 2% employee contributions)
  
  

Please note

The closing date for this role is 9am on Friday 8 March.

This role is London based (2-3 days per week in the office) and national travel to events will also be required, along with attendance at assessment centres. 

Applications will be screened as they are received and invited to interview accordingly.  Police Now reserves the right to close the advert prior to the advertised date, early applications are therefore encouraged.  We strongly encourage candidates to look through our Leadership Principles included in the job pack as these underpin our culture and values, and feature heavily in our recruitment process

This job description is issued as a guideline. It is not exhaustive, and we would be pleased to discuss any constructive comments you may have. Due to the evolving nature and changing demands of our business this job description may be subject to change. You may, on occasions, be required to undertake additional or other duties within the context of this job description and according to the needs of the organisation.

Please note that some roles within Police Now require certain levels of National Security Vetting or screening in order to effectively work with our partners. Therefore, we may ask you to complete this if you are successful.

Download the Recruitment and Selection Officer Job Pack