About the job

Job summary

This is a Nationally based role

Job description

Do you have a passion for nature and the environment? Do you want to make a real difference and secure significant environmental gains in the present and the future? Do you enjoy working in a team? Can you see yourself advising communities and customers to maximise gains for the Natural Environment?

If this appeals to you, a career at Natural England offers rewarding opportunities to secure environmental improvements and play your part in creating a better future for people and nature.

The priority work Natural England is delivering includes:

• Establishing a Nature Recovery Network to help wildlife thrive.
• Monitoring environmental changes to identify and help reduce the effects of climate change;
• Working with farmers and landowners to develop greener food production methods;
• Advising on plans for new developments to maximise gains for nature, and
• Providing ways for people to better connect with nature, including green social prescribing.

We are the Government’s Adviser for the natural environment, playing a vital role in delivering the Government’s 25 Year Environment Plan, an ambitious vision which brings new opportunities to protect and enhance and to achieve real outcomes for the environment.

Find out more about the work of Natural England at www.gov.uk/government/organisations/natural-england

The Role:

This is an exciting time to be working for Natural England.  We do so much for Nature and are ambitious to do even more. 

As Deputy Director Business Change, you will report to the Director of Change and collaborate with a diverse array of stakeholders to drive change across the organisation. 

The role will have direct responsibility for a leading a dynamic, newly formed team of 17 colleagues comprising the Change Management Office (CMO) and the Organisational Change Programme (OCP).

Key tasks and principal accountabilities:

The CMO has responsibility for building visibility of our change pipeline, growing our capacity for change and embedding a change best practice culture.  Your leadership of the CMO will be instrumental in improving how we deliver change across Natural England.  Specific role responsibilities include:

• identifying the change load for the Organisation and assessing the business’s capacity to receive the change.
• recommending the support needed for employees to positively engage with the change and monitoring the effectiveness of changes delivered.
• setting the change standard with a clear and accessible framework, tools, and targeted change recruitment guidance.
• building confidence and competence to deliver change through training, development, and targeted work package facilitation.
• connecting and engaging stakeholders through clean, genuine communications and compelling stories.
• building empowerment through a network of Change Champions.

The OCP brings together core Project Delivery and Change Management expertise with business subject matter expertise distributed across the organisation.  This fusion of capabilities will enable Natural England to deliver the high-priority organisational change projects sponsored by our Executive Committee.  Your leadership of the OCP will be instrumental in empowering our people to deliver even more for Nature.  Specific role responsibilities include:

• Providing strategic direction to the programme manager and team to ensure alignment between project activities and the strategic benefits of: Ambitious Outcomes, Thriving People, Productive Working and Powerful Relationships.  
• Ensuring that the OCP team deliver the benefits forecast for three strategic projects:
  • Strategic Alignment – Setting our organisation up for success, with a clear operating model and effective internal control achieved via portfolio management (as per Governance Review). 
  • Ways of Working – Fostering a culture of productivity and efficiency through continuous improvement that enables us to maximise our resources. 
  • People – Ensuring that the NE workforce will have the right Capacity, Capability and Shape for the future (as per Strategic Workforce Planning).

If you're passionate about driving transformative change, developing and leading teams through complexity and making an impact for Nature, then we invite you to join us in the Change Directorate.

Benefits

Wherever possible Natural England accommodates requests for both full-time and part-time hours and other flexible working patterns to help employees achieve a good work/life balance and maintain their health and wellbeing.

Natural England provides excellent opportunities for career progression, training and development tailored to your role. From induction to ongoing learning and development, everyone in Natural England is supported to develop their skills and capabilities. Everyone has 10 days to devote to personal learning and development, as well as an additional 3 days to volunteer.

You will have access to Civil Service Pension and benefits arrangements and generous leave allowances (33 day per year pro rata), as well as flexible working, to help you achieve a work-life balance that works for you and us.

You will have access to a range of benefits including discounts on shopping vouchers, cycle to work scheme, and childcare vouchers. You can also join the Civil Service Sport club which offer discounts on a range of sports and leisure opportunities as well as social events.

Natural England is a fantastic place to work, where difference is celebrated.

We’re committed to fairness and equality for all, so you feel valued for who you are and what you do. Our shared values help us work together to benefit the communities we serve. Our thriving employee-led diversity networks support our inclusive culture and contribute to our Diversity Action Plan.

Locations

Natural England is adopting hybrid working – which means our staff work from a flexible range of locations, encompassing home, offices (ours and our partners) and relevant sites. All new staff will be formally linked to one of our 25 offices across England and the expectation is that all new staff will be able to access their local office to be part of the community of staff in their geographical area. Full time staff are expected to attend their associated office for a minimum of one day a week. Staff members are required to carry out all their duties working in this way and cannot do so from an overseas location at any time. Travel expenses will be paid if work related travel is required but does not apply to travel between home and your associated office.

National team roles can be linked with any Natural England office while Area Team roles will be linked with an office in the relevant geographic area. View a map of our office locations here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/natural-england-office-locations

Pay

It is Natural England policy to employ at the entry point of the salary range.

You will become an active member of the relevant local leadership community, the group of senior Natural England staff in each of the localities across England who we ask to provide support and co-ordination for the local group of staff.

Natural England is undertaking a review of its current Staff Framework to ensure that it continues to be fit for purpose for the future and able to deliver its ambitions as an organisation. It will enable us to attract, retain, and grow our people to deliver our ambitious mission to build partnerships for nature recovery and provide enriching careers for our people. Role responsibilities will not change as a result of the review, but all roles will be assessed against the new Staff Framework and will be aligned to one of the new 3 Job Families (Shaping, Enabling and Delivering).

How to Apply

We welcome and encourage applications from all communities. Natural England is accredited to the Disability Confident Scheme, which denotes organisations which have a positive attitude towards disabled people. Disabled applicants who meet the minimum requirements for the role at the shortlisting stage are guaranteed an invitation to interview.

If you require a reasonable adjustment at interview, or there is anything else you would like the panel to take into consideration, you should notify us of this at application stage where possible, or well in advance of your interview.

This vacancy uses competency-based assessment. We'll assess you against the competencies below during the selection process:

Technical Skills and Knowledge

Leading and Managing People

Personal Effectiveness

Work Delivery

When completing the application form you should present relevant examples using the STAR format. Give us an example of how you have demonstrated the competency (which can be work related or from another area of your life) and tell us about the Situation, the specific Task you had to undertake, the specific Actions you took, and the Result (both immediate and in a wider context) of your doing so.

Please note that STAR format is not required when answering the Technical Skills & Knowledge competency.

Examples should be given in no more than 250 words for each competency.

If we receive a significant number of applications, we reserve the right to evaluate applications on the first two competencies of Technical Skills and Knowledge and Leading and Managing People only.

If you are successful at the shortlisting stage, you will be invited to attend an interview via MS Teams or a suitable alternative, where you will be asked to give examples for all 4 competencies as set out in the Job Description.

Recruitment Framework

Competencies

Competence 1

Professional competency

Technical Skills and Knowledge

Description

Competency 1 – Technical Skills and Knowledge

• Proven experience of leading organisational change in a complex, fast-paced and dynamic transformation environment while displaying personal resilience, sound judgement and effective risk management. (Essential)
• Demonstrable expertise of change management methodologies and techniques, with the ambition to develop a deep specialism in this area. (Essential)
• Practical experience of managing programmes and/or projects with supporting qualifications. (Desirable).

Competence 2

Professional competency

Competency 2 - Leading and Managing People

Description

• Develop an inclusive and trusting team environment that positively safeguards team members' physical and mental wellbeing (Expert)
• Set clear plans and expectations for your team, explain reasons behind decisions, be clear on the outcomes to be achieved, and make things happen by sharing and delegating work to the right people (Expert)
• Use performance management to set clear expectations around delivery, ways of working and personal development, and use the approach to motivate, challenge, review, and develop your team’s performance (Expert)
• Lead by example, engage and support your team through change (Expert)

Competence 3

Professional competency

Competency 3 - Personal Effectiveness

Description

• Develop your personal impact skills in influencing, thought leadership, assertiveness by applying expertise in a proportionate and appropriate way and communicating to have impact. (Expert)
• Proactively communicate and present your data, evidence and analyses in ways that meet people’s needs so they can understand its implications and use it effectively to deliver positive outcomes for the environment (Expert)
• Be ambitious, identify and adopt ways to make improvements in your team and Natural England and inspire others to act (Expert)
• Act with integrity, addressing challenging issues and managing conflict through being open and objective (Expert)

Competence 4

Professional competency

Competency 4 - Work Delivery

Description 

• See the big picture so you can set your team's work within the context of the organisation's vision, mission and aims, and help them understand how their work relates to and supports this (Expert)
• Capture, assess, define and justify stakeholder needs to arrive at an agreed schedule of requirements (Expert)
• Ensure that activities are planned and completed to enable the business to implement the change and realise the benefits (Expert)
• Show strong financial awareness by understanding your team's financial position, highlighting risks and opportunities and taking management action if a material variance is likely to occur (Practitioner)

Person specification

Please refer to Job Description

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £58,625, Natural England contributes £16,356 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

Please refer to Job Description

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

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check. 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.