About the job

Job summary

About HM Treasury

If you’re interested in making a difference to people’s lives, the Treasury can offer you an exciting opportunity to influence decision making that affects the whole of the UK. Working at the heart of government, we collaborate across government to promote responsible public spending and drive strong and sustainable economic growth.  

Our work ranges from protecting customers through the regulation of the financial sector, helping to reduce carbon emissions and creating a greener economy, to promoting British trade around the world and supporting people across the country on jobs, growth and more.  

We are part of the Darlington Economic Campus, a pioneering new cross-government hub which brings people together to play an active role in the most important issues of the day whilst working closer to the communities we serve. The campus provides the opportunity for people from all over the UK to help shape the future of the country, and our flexible working practices ensure you can collaborate effectively with our partners. It’s central government, made more accessible to you! 

Job description

About the Group 

The Public Services Group is at the heart of Treasury’s work to secure sustainable public finances and drive economic growth. We manage public spending of more than £250bn. across key public services and departments, including health, education, the criminal justice system, local government, housing, defence and the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.  

We do this by working with other government departments, ministers, and other Treasury teams to ensure that spending plans support high quality public services, help the economy to grow and provide value for money for the taxpayer.   

Our roles offer a range of opportunities to work with senior leaders in other government departments and on the frontline of public services and ensure the effective delivery of public services.  

The Group is committed to being an excellent place to work, with a relentless focus on good management, learning and development and continuous improvement in everything we do.  

About the Team 

The Group Management Service (GMS) team works together to provide an efficient and professional administrative service to the eight teams within Public service group. We seek to ensure all support helps the teams meet corporate and management objectives. Another key service is the PA assistance we provide to the groups senior civil servants (SCS).

About the Job

Candidates should have, or be keen to develop, a rounded set of high-level PA skills and be proactive with the ability to use their own initiative. The key accountabilities of this aspect of the role include:

1. Proactively managing diaries to prioritise the most important meetings, arrange meetings in the most efficient order, identify and resolve clashes before they happen, arranging any travel or other logistics i.e., meeting room and desk booking when based at all HMT sites, tech support where needed when joining or hosting virtual meetings. Have confidence and knowledge on whom and when to delegate meetings to other members of the group where this is appropriate.
2. Proactively managing email and phone calls to prioritise the most important and/or urgent messages and draw attention to them, whilst filtering out irrelevant messages. To ensure all relevant meeting papers and pre meeting prep/materials have been provided to the Deputy Proactively forward on/delegate messages to other members of the group where this is appropriate.
3. Ensuring the Deputy Directors are clear on what their agenda is for the day and the coming week, alongside all key priorities. Clear instructions on arrival time and location for each of their appointments and any additional support required to keep the meeting on track, i.e., building passes or procedures if offsite. Anticipating when appropriate to intervene in meetings to pull the Deputy Directors out to keep their day on track or make them aware of an urgent action.
4. Thinking ahead to identify any issues or tasks that the Deputy Directors will have to deal with e.g., giving support on recruitment processes, tracking team budgets, taking minutes for team meetings and proactively making suggestions about the best way to organise and keep on track of team objectives.
5. Building good relationships with internal and external stakeholders; At times the post-holder may be asked to provide cover to additional members of the management team to cover for staff absences in the GMS.
6. Working collaboratively across the group workstreams on behalf of the GMS, supporting and contributing to the wider group work.
7. Administrative group support - The post-holder will work collaboratively with the other members of the Public Services Group GMS to provide high-quality administrative support to the Group though the GMS mailbox. This means that the post-holder will gain experience of working across a number of teams and will also have the opportunity to shape the future of the GMS.

Required Skills 

• Good personal organisation and attention to detail
• Ability to demonstrate effective knowledge and records management.
• Comfortable and effective in communicating with senior staff and high-profile external stakeholder
• Experience using Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook and SharePoint, to deliver high quality administration support to teams and wider group.

As part of your role you will complete a Level 3 Business Administration apprenticeship with Paragon. You will need to meet the eligibility requirements for apprenticeship funding, more information is available here, and pass an assessment of prior learning from the apprenticeship provider to ensure funding is being used to develop new knowledge, skills and behaviours. 

If you would like to speak to the hiring manager informally prior to the closing date for applications to find out more about the job, please contact Natalie Phillips (Natalie.Phillips@hmtreasury.gov.uk)

Person specification

We are looking for the below skills, experience and behaviours and we will ask you to demonstrate these in your application form. Please review the Candidate FAQ document that is attached to the advert for guidance on how to complete your application form.   

1. Managing a Quality Service: Deliver service objectives with professional excellence, expertise and efficiency, taking account of diverse customer needs.
2. Making Effective Decisions: Use evidence and knowledge to support accurate, expert decisions and advice. Carefully consider alternative options, implications, and risks of decisions. To use own initiative and good time management to make effective decisions under pressure.
3. Working Together: Form effective partnerships and relationships with people both internally and externally, from a range of diverse backgrounds, sharing information, resources and support. 

The lead criterion is: Managing a Quality Service. 

If we receive large volumes of applications, we will conduct an initial sift on the lead criterion only. 

Candidate Guidance Support Session – Microsoft Teams
 
We will be running an overview of Success Profiles and the STAR approach including top tips for the application and interview process and an opportunity to ask general questions around our recruitment practices. Please note that this session is not role specific, so we will be unable to answer specific questions about roles we are advertising. If you would like to join us, please use the link below to join the call at the right time.   

Thursday 1st August at 12:30: Join the meeting now

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £25,280, HM Treasury contributes £7,078 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

Things you need to know

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Strengths and Experience.

Recruitment Timeline 

Closing date: 4th August 2024

Shortlisting: w/c 5th August 2024

Interviews: w/c 12th August 2024 

This timeline is indicative and may be subject to change. We will inform you if there is a substantial change to the recruitment timeline. 

If your contact details change at any time during the selection process, please ensure you update your Civil Service Jobs Profile. 

Please note that only applications submitted through Civil Service Jobs will be accepted.

Eligibility Statement  

A candidate is not eligible to apply for a role in the Civil Service if the application is made within a 5 year period following a dismissal for carrying out internal fraud against government. Checks will be performed as part of pre-employment checks in line with this. Please refer to the Candidate FAQ document attached to the advert for more information. 

Everyone working with government assets must complete Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) checks. Additionally, individuals appointed to the Treasury group will be subject to National Security Vetting. The level of security vetting required for this role is Counter Terrorist Check (CTC).  

To allow for meaningful checks to be carried out, applicants will need to have lived in the UK for at least 3 out of the past 5 years. In exceptional circumstances, a lack of residency would not be a bar to security clearance however the Department will need to consider eligibility on a case by case basis once the advert closing date has passed. 

Please read the Vetting Charter for information on what to expect during the vetting process and what will be expected from you.  Many areas of your life may be explored during your vetting journey, and it is important that every individual, regardless of their background and experiences, should feel comfortable going through this personal process, whilst having confidence that it is fair, proportionate, and inclusive.  

These short videos address common concerns and preconceptions which applicants may have about national security vetting.  If you have questions relating to security clearances, please contact HMTSecurityVetting@hmtreasury.gov.uk

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is counter-terrorist check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window). People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window). The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.