Published On: May 1, 2023|450 words|2.3 min read|
Career of the Month: Heritage Officer

Throughout the month of May people across the UK will be celebrating ‘Local and Community History month’, so we thought it fitting to explore the career of ‘Heritage Officer’ – a job ideal for someone passionate about history.

Heritage officers support teams to take care of buildings, monuments, and places valued for their cultural and historical importance.

During May, you may visit heritage sites for Local and Community History month in your area or find out more about heritage projects at local libraries, museums, or via talks of local historic interest. Most of these events will be closely connected to the work of heritage officers working behind the scenes to ensure important historical places are preserved and their stories are not forgotten.

Job Description

Salary Range: £18,000 to £48,000

The job of a heritage officer is to ensure buildings, monuments, and places of cultural and historic importance are taken care of.

Day to day, a heritage officer will review building plans for works planned on historic sites, give technical advice to teams working on conservation projects and inspect historic buildings and monuments to assess work to be completed.

They will be required to conduct research using archives, heritage legislation and conservation standards, respond to queries and give advice to members of the public and organisations and attend public events to present project proposals.

Heritage Officers will need to put together project plans and reports and take project management responsibility to ensure work meets project deadlines, budgets and conservation standards

This job requires you to have a keen eye for detail, strong communication skills, and ability to work well with others.

You will need knowledge of building and construction gained through your studies and work experience along with a passion for history.

One of the main benefits of a career in heritage is that you will have a role that works both in an office and outdoors and could potentially allow you to travel to historic sites.

Qualifications

To become a heritage officer, you will need to explore a degree course in a topic such as:

  • history
  • geography
  • cultural heritage studies
  • building conservation
  • architecture
  • archaeology
  • Earth or natural sciences

A Levels in History, Geography and Sciences would be useful to get on the above courses.

What can I be doing now?

Work experience and volunteering are important for this role, in fact, many find paid work through first volunteering with an organisation. Opportunities can be found with organisations like English Heritage, Historic England, National Trust, or The Heritage Alliance. Your local council also may be useful to contact to see if they have opportunities in departments like planning or regeneration and keep your eye out for local cultural organisations involved in heritage projects.

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