Content Designer

Summary

A content designer is responsible for creating, evaluating, updating and reviewing content at all stages of the end-to-end user journey. At this role level, you will:

be comfortable using evidence, data and research to make content decisions

build relationships across government to focus on the needs of the user and to influence stakeholders

contribute to and use the style guides and content patterns

engage with and contribute to the cross-government content community

Work Activity Components

Title	Details
Moderation and standards (Level 3)	Applies moderation and editing processes to content supplied by others.

Behavioural Skills

Title	Details
Attention to Detail	Applying specific quality standards to all tasks undertaken to ensure that deliverables are accurate and complete.
Interacting with People	Establishing relationships, contributing to an open culture and maintaining contacts with people from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines. Effective, approachable and sensitive communicator in different communities and cultures. Ability to adapt style and approach to meet the needs of different audiences.
Teamwork	Working collaboratively with others to achieve a common goal.

Technical Skills

Title	Details	Depth
Application Development Tools	Software tools which automate or assist part of the development process.	Familiar with
Database Software	Software that enables the user to capture, create, populate and manipulate data structures and where appropriate unstructured data.	Familiar with
Programming Languages	A set of codes and syntax (supported by software tools) that enables the unambiguous translation of specified functionality into source code for the creation of computer programs.	Familiar with
Web Specifics	Knowledge of web specific file extensions, Web 2.0, 3.0 and 4.0 and other latest standards/ practices. Use of multimedia and Active-X controls. Understanding of the nature of browsers and how to design cross-browser layouts. Effective knowledge of metadata (e.g. tags, XML) and related aspects of Search Engine Optimization (SEO).	Familiar with
Information and Data Visualisation/Presentation	The ability to visualise and present information and data in an appropriate format that helps stakeholders understand the significance of the information and data.	Familiar with

Training

Title	Details
Security Awareness	Tools and techniques to help users and employees understand the role they play in helping to combat information security breaches and for IT and security professionals to prevent and mitigate risk.
Graphic Design and Web Development	Tools and techniques for graphic design, user interface design (UI design), content authoring using standardised code and proprietary software, user experience design (UX design), web development and search engine optimisation.

Professional Development Activity (PDA)

Title	Details	PDA Group
Deputising	Standing in for supervisor or manager on a temporary basis during periods of absence.	Broadening Activities
Job Shadowing and Special Assignments	Undertaking temporary periods or secondments in other roles, particularly those that offer a new perspective on own function or exposure to other environments and cultures.	Broadening Activities
Gaining Knowledge of Employing Organisation	Gaining basic knowledge of the employing organisation, its business, structure, culture, policies, products/services, operations and terminology.	Increasing Knowledge
Gaining Knowledge of Surrounding Technical Areas	Gaining knowledge of IT activities in employing organisation external to own function.	Increasing Knowledge
Research Assignments	Exploring a topic which is not part of own normal responsibilities and presenting findings to colleagues and/or management	Increasing Knowledge
Involvement in Professional Body Activities	Attending meetings, seminars and workshops organised by professional body and reading published material, such as journals and web content.	Participation in Professional Activities

Qualification Components

Title	Awarding Bodies
Practitioner	FEDIP - The Federation for Informatics Professionals

Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework Skills

Skill	Level
Agile working (content design) Agile delivery involves encouraging teams to build incrementally, test and iterate their work based on regular feedback and other useful data.	Practitioner Agile working (content design) You can: understand and demonstrate awareness of Agile methodology, and can apply an Agile mindset to your work work in a fast-paced, evolving environment and use an iterative and flexible approach to enable rapid delivery appreciate the importance of Agile project delivery to digital projects in government be unafraid to take risks and willing to learn from mistakes ensure the team has a situational awareness of one other’s work and how it relates to objectives and user needs use a range of tools and platforms to plan and manage your work
Content concepts and prototyping Consultancy involves providing specialist advice to address stakeholder and business needs.	Working Content concepts and prototyping You can: understand different prototyping techniques, from paper sketches to coded prototypes, and can use them to visualise content in context choose the best option to make content understandable to different audiences and to demonstrate a proposed approach to content changes or improvements show the value of prototyping to the team
Stakeholder relationship management (content design) Stakeholder relationship management involves managing stakeholder requirements and communications throughout a project, while remaining focused on the user needs.	Working Stakeholder relationship management (content design) You can: identify important stakeholders and communicate with them clearly and regularly tailor communication to stakeholders' needs and work with them to build relationships, while also meeting user needs build and reach consensus work to improve stakeholder relationships, using evidence to explain decisions made
Strategic thinking (content design) Strategy involves creating a plan to achieve a team or organisation's objectives.	Practitioner Strategic thinking (content design) You can: contribute to content strategies and policies create content patterns or standards provide support for content improvement projects effectively focus on outcomes rather than solutions and activities
User focus (content design) User focus involves understanding the user needs to develop a detailed understanding of the problems that need to be solved.	Working User focus (content design) You can: identify tasks that will provide insights into a problem formulate hypotheses, gain insights from data and user research and make decisions on findings understand the range of different users who might access content and services, and can identify their needs based on evidence translate user stories into content that meets users’ needs, and propose suitable design approaches use quantitative and qualitative data about users to turn user insights into outcomes
User-centred content design	Working User-centred content design You can: design content to meet user needs and make complex language and processes easy to understand present the right information in the right format for what users need show robust experience in writing, editing and publishing digital content, and experience in using content management systems and content production processes to publish content write in plain language in a way that users understand, making information accessible to all understand government accessibility requirements and design content that works with common assistive technologies use data, research and evidence to review and evaluate content to make improvements consistently and effectively apply content standards and style guidelines to your work work to continuously improve content, and understand why content life cycle management is important work autonomously

Skill

Level

Agile working (content design)

Agile delivery involves encouraging teams to build incrementally, test and iterate their work based on regular feedback and other useful data.

Practitioner Agile working (content design)

You can: understand and demonstrate awareness of Agile methodology, and can apply an Agile mindset to your work work in a fast-paced, evolving environment and use an iterative and flexible approach to enable rapid delivery appreciate the importance of Agile project delivery to digital projects in government be unafraid to take risks and willing to learn from mistakes ensure the team has a situational awareness of one other’s work and how it relates to objectives and user needs use a range of tools and platforms to plan and manage your work

Content concepts and prototyping

Consultancy involves providing specialist advice to address stakeholder and business needs.

Working Content concepts and prototyping

You can: understand different prototyping techniques, from paper sketches to coded prototypes, and can use them to visualise content in context choose the best option to make content understandable to different audiences and to demonstrate a proposed approach to content changes or improvements show the value of prototyping to the team

Stakeholder relationship management (content design)

Stakeholder relationship management involves managing stakeholder requirements and communications throughout a project, while remaining focused on the user needs.

Working Stakeholder relationship management (content design)

You can: identify important stakeholders and communicate with them clearly and regularly tailor communication to stakeholders' needs and work with them to build relationships, while also meeting user needs build and reach consensus work to improve stakeholder relationships, using evidence to explain decisions made

Strategic thinking (content design)

Strategy involves creating a plan to achieve a team or organisation's objectives.

Practitioner Strategic thinking (content design)

You can: contribute to content strategies and policies create content patterns or standards provide support for content improvement projects effectively focus on outcomes rather than solutions and activities

User focus (content design)

User focus involves understanding the user needs to develop a detailed understanding of the problems that need to be solved.

Working User focus (content design)

You can: identify tasks that will provide insights into a problem formulate hypotheses, gain insights from data and user research and make decisions on findings understand the range of different users who might access content and services, and can identify their needs based on evidence translate user stories into content that meets users’ needs, and propose suitable design approaches use quantitative and qualitative data about users to turn user insights into outcomes

User-centred content design

Working User-centred content design

You can: design content to meet user needs and make complex language and processes easy to understand present the right information in the right format for what users need show robust experience in writing, editing and publishing digital content, and experience in using content management systems and content production processes to publish content write in plain language in a way that users understand, making information accessible to all understand government accessibility requirements and design content that works with common assistive technologies use data, research and evidence to review and evaluate content to make improvements consistently and effectively apply content standards and style guidelines to your work work to continuously improve content, and understand why content life cycle management is important work autonomously

The Professional Body Responsible for this job family is BCS. This job role profile was created in collaboration with BCS, using Role Model Plus.