Local Community Advisor

• Contract: 10 Month Parental Leave Replacement (until late March 2025)
• Work pattern: 0.8 FTE (4 days a week – minimum 2 days per week in the office in the CBD/Carlton)
• Salary: This role is offered as an Electorate officer Grade 2.1 under the Parliament of Victoria enterprise agreement – $81,832 per annum (pro rata) plus superannuation.

WHO WE ARE

Ellen was elected in 2014 as the first lower house Greens MP in the Victorian Parliament and has been re-elected two times. She is the Deputy Leader of the Victorian Greens and holds the portfolios of climate change, environment and emergency services.

Our office is small, collaborative, nimble and strategic. Our staff are innovative, enthusiastic and driven to achieve outcomes for our local residents and on the big issues we care about. We pride ourselves on bringing a positive attitude, organisation and great attention to detail to our work.

ABOUT THE ROLE

Ellen is seeking a motivated and organised staff member who can be the main point of contact between the local Melbourne community and Ellen’s office.

We’re looking for someone who is organised, loves working with people, and gets excited by achieving outcomes for the local community.
The job includes managing Ellen’s diary, managing her inbox, working with local community groups to help get outcomes on the things they care about, and working one-on-one with residents to address their concerns.

We are a small team that also includes a communications advisor, policy advisor, and some part-time staff who help with local community work.

The role is responsible for:

Constituent support

• Greeting people who contact the office, answering the phone and being helpful, friendly and approachable to all who come to us for help.
• Managing Ellen’s inbox – including making sure everyone is responded to in a timely manner, triaging the inbox and responding to urgent requests.
• Supporting constituents with more complex needs – such as writing to Ministers and advocating to government agencies and sometimes meeting one-on-one with constituents who need our assistance.

Community engagement

• Going to local community group meetings with Ellen, or on behalf of Ellen.
• Developing briefings for Ellen prior to local events and writing speaking notes for her.
• Building and managing relationships with local groups – such as schools, community leaders, local sporting groups, etc.
• Proactive community outreach – such as coordinating vouchers, prizes, congratulatory letters and awards for students, schools and other community organisations and groups throughout the year and for residents with major birthday, wedding or achievement milestones.

Local issues and campaigns

• Keeping track of what’s happening in the local Melbourne electorate and bringing things to Ellen’s attention when needed.
• Identifying, developing and driving local issues campaigns. This includes identifying strategic opportunities, working with local stakeholders, and developing campaign plans, then running the local campaign! This might be everything from working with groups of local parents to get more funding for their school upgrade, working with residents to get better pedestrian crossings in their area, or working with public housing residents to campaign against the privatisation of public housing.
• Pitching ideas for local news articles, writing media releases and lines, copy for Ellen’s website, writing petitions and surveys etc.

Parliament

• Writing letters to Ministers, attending meetings with Ministers if they relate to local issues
• Doing research and writing speeches for Ellen in Parliament

Diary management

• Managing Ellen’s diary – triaging event invitations and requests for meetings, preparing briefing notes for meetings and events and supporting Ellen to use her time efficiently.

This role requires:

• Values that align with the Greens’ values of social justice, environmental sustainability, peace and non-violence, and grassroots democracy.
• Passion for working one-on-one with members of the community across a range of complex issues, including public housing, accessing local services and helping them navigate government departments and agencies.
• An interest in working in a political/parliamentary environment and someone who enjoys campaigning to get outcomes on local issues.
• The ability to maintain a friendly and approachable manner with people of all backgrounds and personalities and develop and maintain strong relationships particularly under pressure.
• The ability to stay positive even under pressure. Sometimes residents have complex needs and we can’t always resolve them, but we need someone who tries to help as much as possible and stays positive even when circumstances are frustrating.

Key skills/attributes:

• The capacity to comprehend complex issues and quickly adapt to changing circumstances at short-notice
• The ability to digest a large amount of information, identify what is important and communicate this concisely to Ellen.
• Excellent written communicator, comfortable writing for many different audiences. You’ll be asked to write everything from letters to Ministers and speeches for Parliament, through to writing content for our website and drafting flyers for local community groups.
• Reliable and organised, self directed, able to track and manage competing priorities, and meet tight deadlines. We’re a fast-paced office with lots of competing priorities and it’s important that you’re able to work in this environment.
• Self motivated. Our team is small, so you’ll often have to work by yourself, especially when Ellen is out in Parliament or at events in the community, while still being motivated.

Overall, we want someone who is passionate about working for a local Greens MP to help our local community, and is organised. Enthusiasm and motivation are more important than having all the skills and experience listed in this job ad.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Note:

Electorate Officers are employees of the Victorian Parliament, directly accountable to the Member of Parliament whose electorate they are employed. Electorate Officers are required to support the MP, a position that requires a high degree of loyalty, versatility and the ability to maintain confidentiality on behalf of the MP and those who contact the office.

Days & Hours

• A standard day is 7.6 hours, to be worked between 8am and 6pm.
• Some limited overtime and weekend work may be required, such as attending community events on behalf of the MP, and is compensated with time off in lieu.

Key Dates

• Applications are open now.
• The successful candidate will ideally start on our team on Monday 13th May and commence a two week handover period with the outgoing advisor.

next steps

Please click Apply Now to submit your application.

Note: As part of the application process you may also be required to undertake a short practical exercise.

For more information, please email the office at [email protected], using the subject line: Local Community Advisor enquiry via EthicalJobs.