Campaign manager

By LIANE VOISEY

Name: Rebecca Lineham

Age: 27

Job title: Campaign manager

Working hours: Normal 40-hour week plus the odd weekend or evening if I need to work with volunteers or there's some protest event on.

Employer(s): Amnesty International New Zealand.

Average pay: $45,000 - $52,000.


Qualifications needed: No set qualifications but a good postgraduate qualification, MA level, related to international relations or political science is useful.

Career prospects: Field research, media work, public policy, political analysis, senior management work, director level work in a small NGO (non-governmental organisation) in New Zealand or moving into bigger international organisations overseas.

Q. Describe what you do

A. I manage the overall campaigning programme in New Zealand for Amnesty International. This means looking at what Amnesty's doing internationally and deciding what is most appropriate for its New Zealand members to be working on.

It involves political analysis, strategy development and a lot of media work and Government liaison.

I'm currently doing research work on the situation of violence against women in Sri Lanka, how common it is and how it is treated.

It involves working out what our policy line is, measuring it up to our internal policy and preparing our policy statement on it.

It's good to know I'm making a difference and not left to just sound off to somebody without having an outlet for doing something about it.

Q. Why did you choose this line of work?

A. It was mostly an interest in foreign affairs and politics and the fact that in this sort of organisation you can actually make a significant difference.

I was a member of Amnesty International since high school and so it was an organisation that I was really committed to and wanted to work for.

Q. What sort of training and/or experience do you have?

A. I had an MA in history and sociology from Massey University for which I focused on human rights issues. I had also been working for small NGOs for 2-3 years doing everything from project management and strategic planning to research and writing.

Q. What was your most memorable campaign?

A. Probably the current campaign [on Algerian asylum-seeker] Ahmed Zaoui. We've mostly done your standard banner and placard campaigns, but for this case we did some street theatre.

We built cages, like little mini jails and set celebrities in them to raise awareness of the case in Auckland and Wellington late last year.

It's good to see such a difference in his situation and the change in public opinion. It's a serious human rights issue in our own country as well. I haven't met Ahmed Zaoui because I'm based in Wellington but if he gets released I will.

Carrying our campaigns off to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting is exciting work.

Q. What skills/qualities do you need?

A. You need strategic thinking skills, the ability to work on a lot of things at once, flexibility, perseverance, creative flair, a degree of tough skin and self-confidence. A knowledge of an organisation and of human rights issues generally is good.

Q. How would you define success in your job?

A. Ultimately, a positive outcome in an individual human rights case or a general human rights condition like the treatment of refugees in Australia.

Success is having a well-researched strategy and all the resources out there to our members so that they can actively do something about it. And having good media coverage as well ...

Q. Best part of the job?

A. It's really good when you see someone released after you've been working on the case.

I get to travel a lot overseas for international meetings. I've been to some interesting places - Morocco, Slovenia, Turkey and Philippines - and have met a lot of people internationally who work for the organisation and are passionately committed.

It's quite exciting to meet people who you've been working with over email for years.

Q. Most challenging part of the job?

A. Realising that you're not going to get a positive outcome on every single thing that you're working on.

When it's a New Zealand case it can be much more impacting because your sense of being able to make a difference is even higher in those situations.

Q. What advice would you have for someone wishing to do what you do?

A. Get a good degree, see a little bit of the world and get experience through volunteering or doing an internship. Amnesty International offers a handful of 3-6 month unpaid internships which are really valuable. Very few jobs like mine come up, so get involved with the organisation well in advance of when you want to work for them. Build up your credibility as someone who is really committed to doing that sort of work.

Usually it's very passionate people doing this kind of work and you can put in more than 40 hours a week.

Q. What are your career hopes for the future?

A. I would like to specialise in conflict issues, peace negotiation and post-conflict reconstruction and prevention. With my partner I'm hoping to go and work in conflict zones such as Kosovo to do peace-negotiation work through journalism or direct negotiation work.