Shaping Our Lives

Valuing and celebrating diverse lived experience 

Shaping Our Lives actively seeks to work with people with a wide range of professional, voluntary, and lived experiences. We encourage applications from individuals from a variety of backgrounds, including those who have experienced barriers to finding or staying in employment or non-traditional work histories. 

We highly value lived, life, and voluntary experience. We do not expect candidates to have specific education or university degrees.  

We actively welcome applications from Disabled candidates. 

For us, the default is that all our staff members are home based, with some travel when required, although this is infrequent. Our staff are therefore entitled to the HMRC tax-free ‘working from home’ allowance. We endeavour to make 3% employer contributions to your pension, and all staff members are entitled to 25 days of annual leave (pro rata) plus bank holidays. 

 

Clear expectations and role clarity 

We are committed to providing clarity on how to apply, when to apply, and what we are looking for. This includes publishing clear, accessible application instructions, explicit deadlines, and a transparent timeline for the entire recruitment process. 

We focus on identifying the essential responsibilities of the roles we advertise and who the people carrying them out might be. This might include statements about what they practice in or what they are experienced in doing. 

 

Transparency and clear communication 

We understand that any recruitment process can be stressful and recognise the time and energy that each candidate dedicates to completing applications and preparing for interviews. We provide clear contact points for questions about the role and for access-related requests. 

When candidates are invited to an interview, we clearly outline the process, what steps we are taking to making it inclusive for them and ask if there are any further adjustments they require to support them to showcase their skillset. 

We communicate with candidates at each step of the process including: confirming that we received applications, what stage of shortlisting our panel is at, if we are experiencing any delays. 

Before the interview, we send a full briefing containing all essential information for candidates to prepare including: 

• Information on who will be on the interview panel 
• How the interview will be conducted (length, platform, instructions on how to use the platform, detail of who to contact if you experience issues logging on) 
• Interview questions 

 

Preventing, minimising, and eliminating bias and barriers in the application and interview process 

We ensure that the application stage is accessible and flexible by avoiding rigid expectations and formats. Candidates are encouraged to submit applications in the format that enables them to best showcase their skills and experience. 

We explicitly spell out our commitment to ensure our recruitment processes are as inclusive and accessible as possible. We recognise that asking for adjustments during the application process can be daunting for people, especially those who have had previous negative experiences getting their access needs met. With this in mind, and given that we recognise the diversity of needs and preferences of the talent we seek to attract, we take active steps to make our recruitment process inclusive and accessible by design. 

What we do for everyone by default:

• Flexible application formats 
• Flexible interview times 
• Interview questions sent in advance 
• All recruitment-related documents are sent in multiple formats and checked for accessibility 
• Information and joining instructions about the virtual or in-person interview environment 
• Permission to bring notes to interviews 

 

While we design for inclusivity by design, we remain fully committed to making specific, tailored adjustments when individual needs arise. This may include but is not limited to: 

• Requesting an alternative format (i.e., Large Print, Easy Read) 
• Communication support such as a British Sign Language interpreter or speech-to-text reporters 
• Involving a support worker or companion in the interview process 
• Extended time 
• Sensory adjustments  

Furthermore, to ensure our shortlisting process is as fair and objective as possible, applications are anonymised. All personally identifiable information – including names, gender, age, ethnicity, addresses, and educational institution names – will be removed from applications before they are presented to the shortlisting panel. 

Access-related requests are managed by a dedicated point of contact who will coordinate with candidates. 

Interviews are generally held online.