Our mission at Smartbox is to ensure no one is left without a voice. We create assistive technology for disabled people who experience difficulty with speech, to communicate and live more independent lives. A big part of our culture is our passion, which drives us to continuously improve our products, services and ways of working, so the people who use our technology can achieve their ambitions.
Based in the UK, US, France, Germany, and the Netherlands, with partners in over 40 countries, we are a leading supplier in the global augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) community. We don’t take this for granted, and every person in our team is key to ensuring more people who would benefit from assistive technology can access it.
The successful candidate will join the Content team and support them to develop and deliver first class content for our Grid software. This content will be used by people with disabilities all over the world to enable them to communicate and live more independent lives.
The Content team aims to develop innovative, market-leading, user-friendly content, that is led by research, customer needs and technology advances. The team also aim to ensure that people can succeed with our products by creating supporting materials such as manuals and video tutorials and delivering training and webinars.
We are looking for someone with knowledge and understanding of the needs of people with communication difficulties. This knowledge will inform your work within the Content team, as you perform a range of duties to support with the development, improvement, and maintenance of grid sets. The position will require a strong understanding and experience of using Grid, particularly in the use and editing of grid sets.
The role will cover a wide range of tasks, including regular duties to test, maintain and improve our content, as well as one-off projects. The successful candidate will work with our full range of content, including symbol communication, text communication, accessible apps, and interactive learning. Examples of work will include updating our content to include new software features, making grid set updates across all languages, or creating versions of our symbol AAC grid sets using different symbol libraries. You will therefore be required to work systematically and logically, working consistently to update multiple grid sets in multiple languages.
A key part of the role will also include testing grid sets which are in development, to ensure that they meet our high standards of quality, before they are publicly released. The role may also require you to review and understand telemetry data that is collected on how our grid sets are used, so that we can learn usage patterns and work with colleagues to identify ways that we can improve our existing grid sets.
The successful candidate will become part of a talented, innovative, and highly motivated team, working at one of the world’s leading AAC companies. There will be ongoing opportunities to learn and develop your skills and knowledge of AAC and have a positive impact on the lives of thousands of people across the world who use our products.
·Develop and maintain an up to date understanding of the needs of people who use AAC and Assistive Technology and how they use our products. This may be achieved through visiting and observing users, following research, and attending conferences.
·Establish a strong knowledge of our grid set offering, across all key areas of Grid (i.e. symbol communication, text communication, accessible apps, etc).
·Learn about a range of alternative access methods and how these are used to access content in
·Coordinate and perform updates to our content, such as changes to take advantage of new software features, as well as fixing errors.
·Support team members to edit and develop new content, in order to meet project deadlines.
·Update and improve our localised content as required, to ensure our content is updated consistently across languages, with guidance from Content team colleagues.
·Systematically test new and existing content to ensure that all grid sets meet the highest standards possible, as well as problem solving any issues discovered and resolving these in a timely manner.
·Carry out routine testing of accessible apps to ensure that these continue to function as expected, with clear and timely reporting of issues to the AT Specialist.
·Work collaboratively with other members of the content team to review feedback from internal and external sources about existing grid sets and carry out agreed grid set improvements and fixes.
·Review telemetry data on grid set usage, running basic queries to report back to colleagues and work collaboratively to identify how we could make improvements to our content.
·Coordinate and perform grid set uploads to Online Grids.
·Create, review and maintain alternative symbol versions of symbol AAC grid sets.
The successful applicant will also be asked to perform other duties on an ad-hoc basis and will need a proactive attitude to this.
·A passion for making a difference with assistive technology
·Experience of Smartbox products, including Grid 3 and/or Grid for iPad – particularly creating and editing grid sets
·An exceptional eye for accuracy, consistency and detail
·Able to work to a deadline
·Excellent written and spoken communication skills
·Strengths in problem solving and collaborative working
·Highly organised and systematic
·High level of confidence in using technology, specifically Grid software
·Experience of working collaboratively on projects
·Experience of working with people with communication difficulties
·Knowledge and fluency in a language other than English
·In this role, you will have the flexibility to work between your home and our office locations in Malvern and Bristol. For this role, we require the candidate to work in the Bristol office twice a week as a minimum.
·You will need to maintain a deep understanding and knowledge of all our products and their uses.
·You will meet and keep in regular contact with other teams in the business.
Smartbox offers comprehensive benefits including:
·Company Pension.
·Group Life Assurance.
·Income Protection.
·Private Medical Insurance.
·25 days holiday plus public holidays.
·Flexible working.
·Cycle scheme.
·Office snacks.
·Benefit and Wellbeing app Yulife, with store discounts and wellbeing services available.
·Annual Charity Day.
·Long Service Award.
·Training and development opportunities.
·EV car scheme through salary sacrifice after 2 years’ service.
·Corporate gym membership discount.
·We are passionate about our people and offer many social events including team outings and get-togethers.
We welcome applications from all communities and those from diverse backgrounds and groups. Please outline your experience and ability to excel in this role within your cover letter.
We are proud to be a Disability Confident Employer and one of the sponsors for Purple Tuesday- the #1 brand working to improve the experiences of disabled people as customers 365 days a year. We are fully committed to the employment and career development of disabled people. To ensure everyone has an equal chance, we’re always willing to make reasonable adjustments to the recruitment process. Should you require further assistance or require any reasonable adjustments to be put in place to better support your application process, please do not hesitate to contact us via email: jobs@thinksmartbox.com or call 01684213075.
At our company, we are driven by a passion for making a positive impact on society, minimizing our environmental footprint, and meeting the needs of our stakeholders. We have been actively working towards becoming B-Corp certified, aligning ourselves with a global movement dedicated to eradicating poverty, protecting the planet, and fostering lasting prosperity for all. To learn more about our commitment to sustainability, please visit this link: Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability.