About the job

Job summary

Shared Services for Government (SSfG) is a Directorate within the Government People Group in the Cabinet Office. We are at the heart of the Cabinet Office and play a key role in driving modernisation and reform across the whole of the Civil Service. What we do, how we work and all that we achieve, contributes to making this a great Civil Service.

The Shared Services Strategy for Government is an enabler of the Civil Service modernisation and reform agenda, playing a part in driving automation and interoperability across government. We are the centre of expertise working across departments to make it easier for civil servants to use platforms for HR, finance and payroll.  We launched the new Shared Services Strategy for Government in 2021, of which our overarching objectives are:

1) Meeting end-user needs, promoting excellence and convenience for both staff and managers;

2) Delivering value and efficiency, consolidating technology in cluster service centres, including all transactional services; and

3) Convergence around processes and data, including the consolidation and modernisation of technology platforms, while maintaining choice for departments.

This is an exciting opportunity to join the SSfG Directorate in a leadership role at what is a pivotal time in the implementation of the strategy. You will be working with a highly motivated and passionate group of people, helping to shape and drive forward the Shared Services Strategy for Government. Our leaders are transformational, innovative and exceptional at creating the right environment for our colleagues to grow and deliver. As Deputy Director for Shared Service Design and Cloud Transformation, you will be a valued member of the SSfG senior leadership team and play a crucial role in providing senior leadership to cluster programmes, including challenging System integrators with appropriate domain knowledge. This is a significant role requiring the successful postholder to act as an ambassador for SSfG, demonstrating exceptional leadership, strong stakeholder management and communication skills.

Our vision is to free up civil servants to focus on what they do best: engaging with and delivering for citizens. We are looking for someone who can buy into that vision and then use their skills and expertise to make it a reality

Job description

The Shared Services for Government Strategy (SSfG) will transform and modernise the back office of Government. It brings together 18 different departments, and dozens of arms length bodies, into five clusters to replace around 200 departmental-based legacy IT systems with 5 modern, user-friendly, cloud-based systems. It will deliver smarter, cheaper, faster systems and processes to create a synchronised Civil Service, providing value and efficiency, process and common data standards and methodology. It will harness modern technology to deliver value for the taxpayer and improved experience for users. By standardising data and aligning policy and process across clusters we will improve the level of insight, and information available to government to underpin decision making.

Respected in the sector, you will lead an expert team of technical shared service specialists and play a lead role in supporting clusters to design and implement their new shared service centres and business process support; providing expertise across the range of services required. As a senior leader within the Cabinet Office, Government People Group and SSfG, you will be expected to play a full role in the overall leadership of the Civil Service.

You will lead the team, working collaboratively with departments, clusters and functions. Working to the SSfG senior leadership team and Director, the role will cover the following key responsibilities:  

• Lead the implementation of the Shared Services Strategy for Government working with a wide community transforming the back office of Government.
• Work closely with clusters engaged in in-flight migrations to cloud platforms to support them in taking advantage of best practice implementation approaches and technology, to enable successful delivery.
• Lead an expert team of shared service specialists with in depth service and product knowledge. 
• Work closely with clusters to support the successful implementation of their GMPP programmes.
• Horizon scan across the technical and business service provider sector to provide insights to support successful delivery.
• Work with HMT’s Functional Convergence Programme to drive synchronised data and standards across clusters.

Person specification

It is important that, through your CV and supporting statement, that you provide evidence of the professional skills, breadth of experience and personal
qualities for this post.

Essential Criteria:
• Demonstrable experience of cross government working, delivering large scale programmes across departments and public bodies.
• Demonstrable experience of shared services transformation, with a focus on business service provision, process improvement and use of data.
• Experienced in implementing, enhancing and managing complex ERP systems.
• Experience of service design.
• Excellent analytical and data science skills and experience of operational research and data modelling to provide costed insight on potential future scenarios
• Strong strategic thinking skills, able to analyse complex problems and design and implement approaches to tackle them.
• Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills, with an ability to influence at a senior level.
• Strong leadership skills, with experience of managing diverse teams through a changing environment.
• An ability to motivate and inspire, creating an inclusive environment to deliver successfully through others.

Desirable Criteria:
• Experience of HR, Finance or Commercial.
• Experience of public sector working with private sector suppliers and contract management
• Experience of enterprise architecture.
• Experience of data architecture and data governance.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £75,000, Cabinet Office contributes £20,250 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 and Experience.

To apply for this post, you will need to complete the online application process, outlined below. This should be completed no later than 23:55, Sunday 14th January 2024.

1. A CV setting out your career history, with key responsibilities and achievements. Please ensure you have provided reasons for any gaps within the last two years.
1. A Statement of Suitability (no longer than 1000 words) explaining how you consider your personal skills, qualities and experience provide evidence of your suitability for the role, with particular reference to the essential criteria in the person specification.

Failure to complete both sections of the online application form (CV and Statement of Suitability) will mean the panel only have limited information on which to assess your application against the criteria in the person specification.

As part of the online application process, you will be asked a number of diversity-related questions. If you do not wish to provide a declaration on any of the particular characteristics, you will have the option to select 'prefer not to say’. See the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy for more information.

Should you encounter any issues with your online application please get in touch with us via: scscandidate.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk 

Shortlist

Your application will be acknowledged when it is received.

A panel, including the hiring manager, will assess your application to select those demonstrating the best fit with the role by considering the evidence you have provided against the criteria set out in the ‘Person Specification’ section. Failure to address any or all of these may affect your application.

The timeline later in this pack indicates the date by which decision is expected to be made, and all longlisted and shortlisted candidates will be advised of the outcome as soon as possible thereafter.

Assessment

If you are shortlisted, you may be asked to take part in a series of assessments which could include an Individual Leadership Assessment (ILA) and/or a Staff Engagement Exercise (SEE). These assessments will not result in a pass or fail decision. Rather, they are designed to support the panel’s decision making and highlight areas for the panel to explore further at interview.

Please see https://scs-assessments.co.uk/ for further information.
If you are successful at the application stage, you will be invited to attend a panel interview, in order to have a more in-depth discussion of your previous experience and professional competence in relation to the criteria set out in the Person Specification. We will be assessing against the success profile Behaviours at interview.

You may also have the opportunity to speak to Nathan Moores prior to the final interview to learn more about the role and the organisation. Please note this is not part of the formal assessment process.

Full details of the assessment process will be made available to shortlisted candidates. If you are required to prepare a presentation for the final interview you will be given the subject in advance.

If we receive applications from more suitable candidates than we have vacancies for at this time, we may hold suitable applicants on a reserve list for 12 months, and future vacancies in the Civil Service requiring the same skills and experience could be offered to candidates on the reserve list without the need for a new competition. 

Offer

Regardless of the outcome, we will notify all candidates as soon as possible.
We will send you a copy of any report for any assessment that you may have undergone as part of the recruitment process (if requested).

Feedback is only available to shortlisted candidates.

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.