Communications / Engagment Officer

The Civet Project Foundation seeks an experienced Communications Officer (with focus on social media) to join our team on a part time 12 month contract (0.2) with potential for hour and contract increase over time.

As our Communications Officer, you will make sure our campaign messages are suitable for the intended audiences by being culturally sensitive, data-driven, and hopeful. You will create powerful visuals that inspire people to protect civets from exploitation and make complex conservation, welfare and sustainability topics easily digestible. You will help us grow our audiences, engage major donors, and develop a consistent and authoritative voice for civet advocacy. Your work will bring people on our journey towards a world free from civet coffee and other harmful trade practices.

About The Civet Project Foundation

The Civet Project Foundation (charity number 1206208, est. 2023) is the first charitable organisation in the world dedicated explicitly to Viverrid species. The Viverridae family consists of civets, binturong, linsang and genets - all of which are small bodied carnivores endemic to Asia and Africa. Whilst these species are the most primitive of the Feliformia alive today, they are amongst the most poorly researched family of Carnivores. This is because civets and their Viverrid cousins tend to be nocturnal, solitary, and highly elusive which makes them very difficult to study in the wild.

Through our research and outreach activities, we promote the conservation, welfare, and protection of civets and related species. We focus on human-animal relationships and inspire empathy for lesser-known species including those yet to be formally recognised as vulnerable to extinction. Whilst many civet species are not formally listed as endangered, civet species are in decline across the world. We work with in-situ partners, NGOs and research institutions to protect civets from various threats including:

• Civet coffee
• Wild meat
• Unethical wildlife tourism
• Civet musk
• Climate change
• Unsustainable anthropogenic pressures
• Human-wildlife conflict

In 2026, our prime focus will be tackling the cruel civet coffee industry as we take our campaigns directly to all aspects of the supply chain. In Europe, we will be engaging directly with coffee companies and specialty coffee consumers to drive awareness and reduce demand for civet coffee imports. In Vietnam, we are working with local interest groups to best understand the trade processes involved in commercial civet trade (both for civet coffee and for other related industries) and to protect all animals and people involved. Hundreds of thousands of civets are traded each year in Vietnam - and so the welfare and conservation costs of this trade could therefore not be much higher. The scale of this trade has emerged only since 2020, so now is the optimal time to establish our program, whilst intervention is still early. We must secure our program now before the trade becomes so established that local economies depend upon it. This is where you come in!

About the Role

The Communications Officer will be responsible for developing and delivering the communications strategy of our organisation, which will include communicating to our supporters and donors the advances being made within each of our 2026 priority programs:

• World Civet Day - our annual day of civet celebration
• Civets One Health - our flagship program tackling commercial civet trade in Vietnam
• Coffee Free - our coffee industry and consumer engagement campaign to reduce civet coffee demand

The Communications Officer will work closely with our Founding Director, Programs Administrator, Civet One Health Program Officer, and all relevant program partners to ensure that our charity's mission and work are effectively communicated to a variety of public, professional and corporate audiences.

The Communications Officer will be responsible for developing creative, engaging and professional resources for scheduled dissemination on our social media channels (TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn), and website. Through which, the Communications Officer will produce content suitable for different cultural, age, and disciplinary target audiences.

The Communications Officer will build supportive and cooperative relationships with our program partners and be responsive to queries in a timely and professional manner. Through effective communication, our supporters will experience a long and trusting relationship with our organisation and will be inspired to adopt pro-animal welfare and pro-conservation behaviours in their day to day lives. Our communications will foremost raise the profile of Viverrid species, whilst assisting in the economically sustainable development of our organisation through supporter engagement streams.

This is a 12 month contract with possibility for extension and/or increase in contracted hours.

Flexibility in working schedule may be possible with agreement from the board, though occasional travel will be required for in-person events alongside meetings during unsociable hours to facilitate our Vietnamese staff.

Salary: £5,230 per year (0.2 FTE £26,150.00) equating to one day a week of 7.5 hours.

About You

As the Communications Officer, you will be responsible for engaging and growing our public reputation as the leading voice for Viverrids across the world. As such, you will be passionate about our charity's mission and ensure this mission is converted into positive action amongst our public and professional audiences.

You will have a proven track record of designing and implementing effective communication strategies using a variety of media including film, image, and audio recordings. You will be attentive to the different needs, expectations and sensitivities of diverse audiences and ensure all communications are culturally appropriate, inclusive and accessible in design and dissemination. You will have a keen eye for detail and excellent written English skills and an ability to adapt your communication strategy for different audiences. You will be brand conscious and consistent in our positive, professional and science-led approach to communications.

You will be highly organised and have competencies in design and scheduling software (including Canva Pro, Buffer, HubSpot and Wix) and will be experienced and knowledgeable of the differences between social media platforms. You will be responsible for exploring, testing, and assessing communication strategies across platforms and so should be well versed in the tracking of KPIs and engagement metrics (including Google Analytics) and have the confidence to adapt your approach accordingly.

In addition to public engagement on social media, you will be responsible for developing our monthly e-newsletter. You will communicate across our teams to ensure the most relevant and pressing information is disseminated to our supporter network.

Recruitment Timetable

Deadline for applications: 15th May, 5pm BST

Interview period: 20th-22nd May