About the job

Job summary

This is an exciting opportunity to work at the centre of Defence and help shape the department’s approach to risk management.

The DRA team is part of the wider directorate of Assurance which centrally oversees the delivery of risk, assurance, counter fraud, cost assurance and cost analysis for the Defence enterprise. There are three sub teams within DRA, Risk, Assurance, and Insight & Innovation.

DRA sits at the heart of decision making, working with risk owners and leadership teams across Defence. We ensure risk management informs strategic decision making and prioritisation activity to support the delivery of Defence priorities. The team is led by the Chief Risk Officer and reports to the Defence Board, and other senior leadership groups including the Defence Audit, Risk and Assurance Committee (DARAC), the Defence Management Group (DMG) and Defence Delivery Group (DDG).

This is a high-profile role providing insight and understanding at a strategic level across Defence. The delivery of this role is crucial to enable DRA in leading effective risk management across Defence.

The job holder will be expected to operate in an analytical and advisory role, applying their critical thinking to identify, quality assure and analyse large volumes of data to develop management insight and information on the departments principal and strategic risks.

This position is advertised at 37 hours per week.

Job description

As a Risk Professional you will be responsible for managing a diverse portfolio of Defence business areas. Building collaborative relationships with stakeholders across the department, you will adopt a business partnering approach to enable effective risk management for your portfolio of areas. You will provide direct support to the Assistant Head of Risk, providing analysis of the department’s principal and strategic risks to enable DRA to deliver advice and guidance to the department’s senior boards and decision makers.

You will work in collaboration with the DRA Assurance and Insight & Innovation Teams to deliver priority outputs to mature risk management and assurance across the Department.

Key responsibilities/deliverables will include:

1. Use insights obtained through business partnering to draft and support the delivery of the department’s Quarterly Performance and Risk Reporting (QPRR).
2. Build effective stakeholder relationships for your portfolio, developing a detailed understanding of the risk landscape and specific risk factors.
3. Engage with senior risk owner teams responsible for managing the department’s risks to ensure risk assessments are accurate and effective mitigation plans are in place. You will act as a critical friend to the business providing effective challenge where required and building risk management capability across your stakeholder portfolio.
4. Work with stakeholders to ensure risk information is reviewed and updated in line with agreed governance arrangements.
5. Contribute to the development of the department’s risk management policy by producing and presenting framework ideas and solutions.
6. Support the business with analysis and feedback through reviews of the Defence Plan, Command Plans and Business Plans to ensure risk is appropriately captured.
7. Work with stakeholders to develop a broader understanding of risk within the department and the benefits and use of effective techniques by developing upskilling material and providing expert advice.
8. Assess the maturity of the department’s risk management processes. Ensuring alignment with policy and the HM Treasury Orange Book.
9. Develop and embrace opportunities for cross government and private sector working and learning.

Person specification

Essential Criteria:

Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to draft reports for senior leaders.

Excellent stakeholder management skills and a track record of building strong and lasting relationships with delivery leads, partners, and senior leaders.

Ability to work across organisational boundaries to deliver Departmental priorities.

Ability to analyse and manage large volumes of risk data and management information, to develop insights for senior, technical, and non-technical audiences.

Experience and working knowledge of Government risk management and assurance.

Qualifications

It would be required that any persons interested would hold, or be willing to work towards, an appropriate level risk management qualification.
For example:
   

• OGC Management of Risk foundation or practitioner.
• IRM Certificate in Enterprise Risk Management (or equivalent)
• Relevant professional qualification (such as qualified with CCAB, CIMA or equivalent)
• Equivalent experience will be considered on application.

Behaviours

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Working Together
• Communicating and Influencing
• Seeing the Bigger Picture

Technical skills

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

• HMT Orange Book Technical Competency: Analysis and Insight “Risk management professionals will apply numeracy and critical thinking skills to assess, quality assure and prioritise data when using modelling, forecasting and other relevant techniques to develop management insight and statistical information. This information will be presented clearly to relevant governance mechanisms and stakeholders, to enable informed decision making and prioritisation of activity.”

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £43,080, Ministry of Defence contributes £11,631 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, Experience and Technical skills.

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

As part of the application, you will be asked to complete:

• A CV (job history/qualifications/skills)
• Statement of Suitability (Personal Statement) (750 words maximum) to include evidence of the essential criteria.

At  interview you will be assessed against the following Success Profile Behaviours:

• Working Together
• Communicating and Influencing
• Seeing the Bigger Picture

Please Note: Expenses incurred for travel to interviews will not be reimbursed.

Technical skills

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process. This will be in the form of a short presentation delivered at the interview stage (details to follow):

• Analysis and Insight

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equality of opportunity. There is a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. If you need to advise us that you need additional help or reasonable adjustments for the recruitment process, please contact: DBSCivPers-Resourcingteam3@mod.gov.uk .

As a result of the changes to the UK immigration rules which came into effect on 1 January 2021, the Ministry of Defence will only offer sponsorship for a skilled worker visa under the points based system, where a role has been deemed to be business critical.

The role currently being advertised has not been assessed as business critical and is therefore NOT open to applications from those who will require sponsorship under the points based system. Should you apply for this role and be found to require sponsorship, your application will be rejected and any provisional offer of employment withdrawn.

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

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check. Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security 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.