About the job

Job summary

Discover a career in your hands at HMRC. Whether you're seeking purpose, growth, or a workplace that gives you a true sense of belonging, hear from some of our employees as they share their story about what it’s really like to work at HMRC. 

   

Visit our YouTube channel to watch the full series and come and discover your potential.

Service designers design the end-to-end journey of a service. This helps a user complete their goal and government deliver a policy intent. This work may involve the creation of - or change to - policies, services, transactions, products and content across both digital and offline channels provided by different parts of government.

A service designer is a confident and competent designer with relevant work experience. You develop designs based on evidence of user needs and organisational outcomes.

You can be trusted to make good decisions and can recognise when to ask for further guidance and support. You may have responsibility across a service or project and be part of a team that includes policy experts, user researchers, designers, product managers, and technology experts.

You’ll be part of our active and supportive service design community in HMRC and across government.

Job description

As a Service Designer you will:

Provide service design expertise on projects.

Develop user-centred services that meet user needs and fulfil business outcomes.

Use best practice and standards to design usable and inclusive services consistent with the rest of government and HMRC.

Analyse pain points and failure points within services and create recommendations to address any issues identified.

Map current service journeys and design service blueprints for new and/or improved services.

Effectively communicate information and ideas using sketches, scenarios, diagrams, maps, prototypes, and written narratives.

Build collaborative relationships within team and with stakeholders across different teams and service domains.

Effectively use facilitation skills with teams and stakeholders to build a shared understanding of problems to be solved and work through challenges.

You’ll also be expected to:

Actively participate in the design communities within HMRC and broader government by helping to facilitate community sessions and support initiatives.

Seek out opportunities for learning and improvement by getting feedback from your colleagues and the business.

Person specification

Essential Criteria:

You will already have demonstrable experience in:

Designing services that meet user needs and organisational outcomes for digital and/or offline channels.

Using user research and data to understand user needs, identify problems and inform design decisions.

Communicating information and ideas, using things like sketches, scenarios, diagrams, maps, prototypes, and written narratives.

Planning and facilitating workshops with stakeholders, end users and/or front-line service providers.

Engaging with teams and stakeholders to help define the problem that needs to be solved and work through challenges.

Desirable Criteria:

Ideally you will also have knowledge and experience of:

Working with the Government Service Standard and Service Manual / Design System.

Experience working in agile teams.

Webinars information

A series of webinars for prospective applicants will be held on: 

Friday 14th between 2:00pm - 3:00pm 

Join the meeting now

Meeting ID: 372 488 701 971

Passcode: hgJZKa

Thursday 20th between 12:00pm - 1:00pm 

Join the meeting now

Meeting ID: 329 388 934 826

Passcode: W3Qs4o        

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £42,618, HM Revenue and Customs contributes £11,506 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 Experience and Technical skills.

How to Apply 

As part of the application process, you will be asked to provide the following: 

• A CV including your job history.
• A 500-word personal statement.

Your CV should cover your job history and will be scored against the roles and responsibilities outlined in the advert.

Your Personal Statement should be used to describe how your skills and experience would be suitable for the advertised role, making reference to the essential criteria and person specification outlined in the advert.

Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form. 

Please take extra care to tick the correct boxes in the eligibility sections of your application form. We understand mistakes sometimes happen but if you contact us later than two working days (Monday-Friday) before the vacancy closes, we will not be able to reopen your application for you. If you do make a mistake, please contact us via: ubsrecruitmentexcellence@hmrc.gov.uk – Use the subject line to insert appropriate wording for example – ‘Please re-open my application – [insert vacancy ref] & vacancy closing date [insert date]’

To check that you are eligible to apply for this role, please review the eligibility information before submitting your application.

Sift 

The sift will be carried out against the CV and Personal Statement, with the successful candidates being invited to interview.

We may also raise the score required at any stage of the process if we receive a high number of applications. 

Interview 

During the panel interview, you will be asked about your Experience (how you meet the Criteria) as well as Technical questions which demonstrate the things you do well and/or are motivated by.

You may be asked to conduct a design exercise for interview or be asked a scenario-based question – the details of this will be shared at a later stage, prior to interview.

You will be asked to present your portfolio at the interview. A portfolio could include summaries of projects, accomplishments, skills and samples of work that provide evidence of what you have done.

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

• Evidence and context-based design

• Strategic thinking

• User focus 

Interviews will take place via video link. Sift and interview dates to be confirmed.

Reserve list

A reserve list may be held for up to 12 months from which further appointments may be made for the same or similar roles – if this applies to you, we’ll let you know via your Civil Service Jobs account.

Merit list

After interview, a single merit list will be created, and appointments will be made in strict merit order until the set demand is filled in each location. If successful, you will be informed which locations are available when we reach your position on the merit list.

Criminal record

Applications received from candidates with a criminal record are considered fairly in accordance with the DBS Code of Practice and the Recruitment of ex-offenders Policy.

Reasonable Adjustments

We want to make sure no one is put at a disadvantage during our recruitment process. To assist you with this, we will reduce or remove any barriers where possible and provide additional support where appropriate. 

If you need a change to be made so that you can make your application, you should: 

• Contact the UBS Recruitment Excellence Team via ubsrecruitmentexcellence@hmrc.gov.uk as soon as possible before the closing date to discuss your needs. 

Complete the “Assistance required” section in the “Additional requirements” page of your application form to tell us what changes or help you might need further on in the recruitment process. For instance, you may need wheelchair access at interview, or if you’re deaf, a Language Service Professional.

Diversity and Inclusion 

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy.

Diverse perspectives and experiences are critical to our success at HMRC, and we welcome applications from all people, from all backgrounds, with the experience and skills needed to perform this role. 

We’re committed to creating a great place to work for all our colleagues, and we want everyone to feel valued and supported to achieve their potential. 

Click here for more information on how we make this happen.

Important information for existing HMRC contractual homeworkers: 

This role may be suitable for existing HMRC employees who are contractual homeworkers. Occasional attendance to the office will be required where there is a business need. Please consider the advertised office locations for this role when applying and only select locations from the ‘location preferences’ section that you can travel to.

Terms and Conditions 

Customer facing roles in HMRC require the ability to converse at ease with members of the public and provide advice in accurate spoken English and/or Welsh where required. Where this is an essential requirement, this will be tested as part of the selection process. 

HMRC has a presence in every region of the UK. For more information on where you might be working, review this information on our locations. 

The Civil Service values honesty and integrity and expects all candidates to abide by these principles. The evidence you provide in your application must relate to your own experiences. 

Any instances of plagiarism or other forms of cheating will be investigated and, if proven, the relevant application(s) will be withdrawn from the process. 

Recording of interviews is prohibited unless explicit agreement is sought in line with the UK General Data Protection Regulations. 

Questions relating to an individual application must be emailed as detailed later in this advert.

Applicants who are successful at interview will be, as part of pre-employment screening, subject to a check on the Internal Fraud Database (IFD). This check will provide information about employees who have been dismissed for fraud or dishonesty offences. This check also applies to employees who resign or otherwise leave before being dismissed for fraud or dishonesty had their employment continued. Any applicant’s details held on the IFD will be refused employment. 

A candidate is not eligible to apply for a role within the Civil Service if the application is made within a 5 year period following a dismissal for carrying out internal fraud against government.

New entrants will join on the minimum of the pay band. 

If you experience accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert, please contact the email address in the 'Contact point for applicants' section.

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. 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.