The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association Looking for Designer at RG7, Reading (Hybrid) Full Time

Are you a forward-thinking designer with a passion for creating a wide range of ideas-led branded design? Do you want to use these skills to help empower people with sight loss to live the life they choose?

We’re looking for a creative designer to play an active role in the design team at an exciting time for Guide Dogs. You’ll bring experience in developing new creative concepts that roll out equally well across digital platforms (social media, Guide Dogs website, email) as it does in print. You’ll be comfortable managing your own design projects, working directly with colleagues from all areas of the charity.

Together our design team:

• Approaches projects with creativity and passion
• Brings ideas to life, delivering concepts and designs which are best in-class brand expressions across all media
• Collaborates with colleagues across the charity (content team, marketing colleagues, fundraising, operations), combining relevant expertise and insight to inform design decisions in order to meet project objectives
• Takes ownership of briefs, project deadlines and deliverables
• Ensures a high standard of design execution across all work
• Presents designs in a clear and compelling manner, articulating and defending creative choices

This role is 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday, 35 hours per week, with 26 days paid holiday (excluding bank holidays) a year.

The role is based at our Reading Hub, but we recognise the benefits that hybrid working brings. This role can be split between home and the office and the successful post holder will spend a minimum of 2 days a week working in the office.

We offer a generous pension scheme, life assurance and enhanced pay for parenting and sickness leave. In addition, we provide an Employee Assistance Programme, flexible benefits package and discounts and cashback scheme to care for our people.

More details can be found in the attached candidate pack and job description.

We reserve the right to close adverts earlier than the closing date.

Diversity
Guide Dogs welcomes applications from all sections of the community and actively encourages diversity to maximise achievements, creativity and good practice. We positively welcome and seek to ensure we achieve diversity in our workforce and that all job applicants and employees receive equal and fair treatment, regardless of age, race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, disability or nationality. We encourage applications from people with disabilities as they are currently under-represented in the organisation and guarantee an invitation to interview for all applicants with disabilities who demonstrate, within their application form, sufficient evidence to meet the essential criteria for the job.

Safeguarding

Guide Dogs is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of all children, young people and adults at risk of harm with whom we work. We expect all our employees and volunteers to fully share this commitment.

Candidate requirements

To be able to fulfil this role, the skills and experience we are looking for in a potential candidate include;

Essential

• Degree or equivalent experience in graphic design
• Professional, friendly, positive attitude with strong work ethic and willingness to learn and continually improve
• Expert knowledge in setting up artwork for print and optimising output for a range of digital channels
• Up-to-date understanding of best practice principles of accessible communications and how to apply them

Desirable

• Experience of working in an inhouse creative team
• Design for accessibility from both a visual and technical perspective eg considerations in use of colour, typography and creating accessible PDFs
• Experience of motion design

For the complete list of essential and desirable criteria necessary to be successful in this role please see the Person Specification within the Job Description below. The candidate pack contains more information about this role & the recruitment process at Guide Dogs.

If you are successful you will need to provide evidence of your right to work in the UK. We cannot provide sponsorship for this role.

How to apply

If you have any accessibility issues, please contact our Recruitment Team.

Applications need to be made using the online application form, accessed using the ‘apply’ button above.

As part of your application ensure you provide evidence and examples of how your skills & experience meet the criteria as set out in the attached job description.

The system has a one-hour time limit. We would advise you to prepare your answers separately and then copy and paste into the online form once finalised.

If any mandatory fields are missed, a pop-up box will appear at the top of the page advising which sections require completion.

Please note that you’ll have to upload a CV as this is a mandatory requirement as part of our Safer Recruitment Policy.

Guide Dogs follow Safer Recruitment practices to ensure we are safeguarding the vulnerable people we work with. As part of this, we require a full work history with any gaps accounted for & a minimum of 2 professional referee details fully covering the past 5 years. If there is not enough space in your application form to provide this information, please ensure you upload additional documentation containing the additional detail.

Please contact our Recruitment Team if you require any support with your application.