Chief Nursing Officer - RCN02595
Nursing | RCN UK HQ | £138,033 (including inner London weighting of £5094)
Contract type: Permanent
Chief Nursing Officer
RCN London with hybrid working, 35 hours, Permanent
£132,939 – £146,079 per annum plus London Weighting
The Royal College of Nursing is the largest professional body and trade union for Nursing in the world. We are the voice of Nursing in the UK and support over half a million members with unwavering loyalty and total commitment. We represent and develop them, support their practice and lobby on their behalf to make a positive difference to their working lives. If you would like the opportunity to be part of an exciting future that could enable you to support and uplift our members and help shape nursing policy then the this is the post for you.
We're accredited with Investors in People Silver Standard. Our people are our greatest asset, and we want people who can contribute to our purpose in line with our values.
We’re looking for an exceptional senior nurse leader to join us as our Chief Nursing Officer to provide strategic leadership to the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), our members and to the wider nursing profession across all four Countries of the UK, providing leadership and direction on all areas of nursing practice that is focused on improving patient care. In this pivotal role you will provide strategic and operational support to the Institute of Nursing Excellence/Nursing, ensuring that is the enabler for the RCN to inspire, educate and support nursing members. Ensuring equity, diversity, and inclusivity is the bedrock of our organisation.
As well as having responsibility for ensuring evidence based professional policy advice underpins policy decision making, you will provide professional advice and direction to the RCN Council and associated Committees and have responsibility for leading, supporting and directing the priorities of the Professional Nursing Committee (PNC) ensuring Nursing provides leadership and managerial support to the respective Professional Forums, Networks and Fellows reporting into the PNC.
In this varied role every day will be filled with possibilities. You will get involved in anything from the RCN Institute of Nursing Excellence to the elimination of corridor care. We'll look to you to lead nursing. It's a great way to build on your skills and experience and develop your potential.
To join us you’ll need to be an influential, highly skilled senior nursing leader with significant experience of leadership at a senior level in a complex organisation as well as relevant senior board level experience.
You could be working in any sector of nursing, the NHS, Social care, the Independent sector or Education, whatever your background, you'll need to be able to demonstrate a high level of understanding in professional and political issues facing nursing in the UK and four country health and care structures and processes within the UK and internationally.
To succeed at the Royal College of Nursing all you need to do is think bigger, better and brighter. And with an attitude like that, anything’s possible.
What we offer you
We expect you to look after our nursing professionals. And we expect you to be rewarded for it. We offer an impressive range of benefits, a broad range of learning development opportunities and an award-winning health and wellbeing programme. We offer annual leave up to 32 days plus bank holidays and three additional days for the Christmas break plus generous maternity, adoption, paternity, and shared parental leave packages.
*We offer a competitive pay structure with annual pay progression until you reach the top of the salary scale. We normally offer new employees the first point of the salary range, although you may be able to negotiate a higher starting salary depending on your skills, experience and current salary.
We are a diverse organisation and understand everyone has different needs and many of our employees enjoy flexible working enabling them to deliver results whilst having a good work life balance. Our hybrid working model allows for a degree of flexibility to work from home but for this important leadership and member facing role it will be predominantly based at RCN HQ and you will need to be visible across the entire UK.
Our selection process
Please click the ‘apply now’ button to submit a CV and answer the supporting questions online demonstrating how you meet the criteria for this role. You may not be shortlisted if you don’t. Please ensure your CV is in a simple format with minimal tables and sections. Any identifying information in your application will automatically be anonymised for shortlisting purposes.
We want your experience applying for a job with us to be the best it can be. We may hold our interviews and assessments in person or by video call. If you foresee any problems, please let us know.
Equal opportunities for everyone
Equity, diversity and inclusion are a priority for us and we aim to foster an inclusive environment so our people can bring their authentic selves to work. This is integral to our mission to enable you to support our members and ensure their voice is heard by all UK governments to get the best outcomes for them and their patients.
As a proud member of the Disability Confident employer scheme we actively encourage applications from people with disabilities.
Contact details
For more information or for an informal discussion about the role please contact Danielle Boyle on 020 7647 3781 or Frankie Gee on 020 7647 3946.
For more information about the recruitment and selection process please contact recruit@rcn.org.uk
Opening date: 23 January 2025
Closing date: 11.59pm on 16 February 2025
If we receive many applications after two weeks of advertising, we may close this vacancy earlier.
Selection dates: first stage assessments on 27 February 2025 and second stage interviews on 11 and 12 March 2025.
Interview date:
Contracted hours: 35