Industry Liaison Officer - Sport & Public Services

Bridge the Student–Employer Gap and Empower Students’ Futures

East Kent Colleges Group is seeking an Industry Liaison Officer to join the us and play a key role in connecting students with meaningful industry opportunities.

As an Industry Liaison Officer, you will be responsible for securing, coordinating and monitoring work placements across a range of vocational areas. Acting as the main point of contact for employer engagement within your areas, you will build and maintain strong relationships with employers while supporting students to successfully prepare for, and complete, their industry placements.

About the Role

Key responsibilities include:

• Securing and managing industry work placement opportunities for students
• Acting as the primary liaison between employers, students and college teams
• Supporting the planning and delivery of employer engagement activities, including employer events and student workplace visits
• Ensuring employer documentation is completed and returned in line with college processes and national expectations
• Working with students on a one-to-one and small group basis to identify employability skills gaps
• Supporting students to develop their skills, confidence and workplace behaviours to achieve successful placements

This role is central to ensuring students gain valuable real-world experience and are well prepared for future employment.

Details of the benefits available when working for EKC Group can be found on our careers website.

Hours per week: 18.5 

Working pattern: Ideally on Tuesday, Wednesday & Friday. 

 Weeks per year: 37 weeks, term time

Outstanding Ofsted Provider

East Kent Colleges Group is an Ofsted Outstanding rated provider. It is proud to be the first General Further Education college organisation in the country to have received the Outstanding grade against each of the strands under the new Ofsted inspection framework. An inclusive provider, our colleagues place our students and the communities we serve at the heart of everything they do across EKC Group and this is illustrated in our ‘Strong’ skills grading by Ofsted.

Commitment to Safeguarding

We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults and we ensure that all staff are aware of their responsibilities for upholding these principles.

As a designated establishment, we are exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and therefore have an obligation to carry out checks to ensure that staff are suitable to work with children and vulnerable adults. These checks include conviction/caution self-declaration, Enhanced DBS check and obtaining sufficient referencing.

It is a criminal offence to apply for a post which involves engaging in regulated activity relevant to children if you are barred from doing so.

If you are successful in being shortlisted to interview, your suitability to work with children and vulnerable adults will be explored as part of the interview process.

Commitment to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

East Kent Colleges Group is an equal opportunities employer and welcomes applications from all members of our communities. We are particularly keen to increase the diversity of our staff body and encourage applications from candidates where there is underrepresentation in our workforce.

We are proud to hold the Positive About Disability Award and are a Disability Confident Employer. This confirms our commitment to interviewing all applicants who declare that they have a disability and who meet the essential criteria outlined in the person specification. With any successful candidate, we will explore any reasonable adjustments to a role due to a health needs or disability.

Similarly, we have a commitment to Care Leavers (Care Covenant Pledge) and to current or previous Armed Forces personnel (Armed Forces Covenant Pledge) with a commitment to interview applicants who meet the positions essential criteria and who have declared this on their application. 

We welcome applications from anyone wishing to work flexibly and those considering a return to work from a career break.

We do not engage with agencies for permanent staff and have an in-house recruitment team.