About the job

Job summary

The AGO is a ministerial department serving the Attorney General and the Solicitor General (the Law Officers).  The Law Officers are the Government’s chief legal advisers.

The Law Officers make important decisions that affect public life. Among other things, they decide whether to send criminal sentences that may be too low to the Court of Appeal; whether to open inquests into deaths (for example, the Attorney General made the decision to open new inquests into the deaths at Hillsborough); are the Government’s chief legal advisors, providing advice to both the Prime Minister and Secretaries of State on a range of pressing issues touching on every aspect of daily life in the UK; and they represent the Crown Prosecution Service and Serious Fraud Office in Parliament.

The Office comprises around 63 multidisciplinary, engaged and high performing team members advising and supporting the Law Officers in all aspects of their work.  We pride ourselves on our problem-solving creativity, sophisticated political and handling awareness, and smart ways of working. 

The Law Officers also work alongside the Justice Secretary and Home Secretary to provide a more efficient, effective, and accountable criminal justice system for victims and the public.

The AGO comprises a high-performing, multi-disciplinary, engaged, and resilient team that prides itself on our:

• legal professional excellence and creativity;
• role and reputation;
• team spirit, ethos, and values; and
• individual development and wellbeing.

While the workload can be demanding and there may be times of pressure, the AGO is committed to staff wellbeing and ensuring colleagues have all the support and resources they need to succeed and ensuring our staff maintain a healthy work-life balance. AGO operates a hybrid working policy where there is a requirement 40% office attendance.

AGO supports the Civil Service vision of being recognised as the UK’s most inclusive employer, by setting stretching diversity and equality objectives for our organisation.

AGO is an employer which promotes equality and aims to reflect the diversity of the society in which we live. It is committed to maximising the skills and potential of all its staff. We welcome applications from all suitably qualified persons irrespective of disability, race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origins, gender, age, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, marital status or religion/belief.

Further information about the work of the Law Officers and the Office can be found at www.gov.uk/ago

Job description

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Business Manager to join the Policy and Sponsorship Team at the Attorney General’s Office.

The AGO is a small ministerial department serving the Attorney General and the Solicitor General (the Law Officers). The Office comprises around 55 engaged and high performing team members from a variety of different disciplines, advising and supporting the Law Officers in all aspects of their work.  We pride ourselves on our problem-solving creativity, sophisticated political handling and awareness, and smart ways of working. 

This is a newly created role at the heart of a high-performing and dynamic team, with a critical focus on supporting the sponsorship of the Law Officers’ Departments and AGO’s place in the criminal justice policy landscape. The successful candidate will be afforded the opportunity to shape and grow the team’s business management function, including through line management, to deliver excellence. As many of our workstreams and projects involve partnership working across the Law Officers’ Departments, government and the wider criminal justice system, you will need to demonstrate effective leadership, interpersonal and communication skills.

We are looking for an enthusiastic, organised, and adaptable individual, ideally with recent experience in portfolio, project or business management, to lead the design, implementation and management of appropriate planning and reporting systems to allow the team to plan ahead and track long-term projects alongside short-term asks.

The successful candidate must have the skills to develop and deliver solutions across the P&S team to deliver high-quality, joined up responses to cross-Government commissions, Write Rounds, FOI requests and correspondence, and support the coordination of Law Officer visits. You will also be a vital part of helping the team to manage the regular drumbeat of the Ministerial superintendence and sponsorship of CPS, SFO, GLD and HMCPSI, alongside longer-term projects such as Public Bodies Reviews, all while remaining alert to, and delivering, the Law Officers’ priorities.

Person specification

• Develop and deliver a new approach to business management within the P&S team, promoting a collective sense of purpose and taking the lead in their area of expertise to deliver excellence.
• Build productive and self-sustaining relationships across the AGO, Law Officers’ Departments and wider to remain alert to policy and operational developments, representing AGO views and delivering the Law Officers’ priorities.
• Develop and maintain a clear and proportionate governance and reporting framework aligned to recognised best practice and tailored to the needs of the department.
• Maintain overall integrity and coherence of the P&S team forward-look, planning and reporting frameworks. Coordinate reporting from workstreams and collaborate with the wider department, including Private Office and the Executive Board, to remain alert to changing priorities and worked impacting and impacted by the team’s work.
• Collaborate with the immediate P&S team, and wider department, to influence priorities and programme approaches, identifying risks to delivery, and developing targeted and proportionate mitigations. Close working with the G7 Policy and Sponsorship Analyst to coordinate system-wide data collation, analysis and reporting.
• Provide direction, guidance, and development as a Line Manager to one HEO Portfolio/Business Officer, and supporting the continuous improvement of strategic planning and long-term success of the P&S team.
• The job holder will be responsible for ensuring that they share and capture their personal knowledge/skills/expertise across the AGO, by adhering to the file storage and retention policy as well as completion of Know-How guides, training, and mentoring.

Essential criteria

• Strong organisational skills
• Strong excel skills and data understanding
• Excellent communication skills across verbal and written communication
• Ability to work at pace and assess conflicting or shifting deadlines
• Ability to work independently and with a wide range of people, developing networks and close working relationships to help you deliver

Desirable Criteria

• Good knowledge and understanding of portfolio/business planning techniques and processes
• Experience of working with public bodies
• PowerBI skills understanding

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £40,898, Attorney General's Office contributes £11,042 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.

Required Skills, Experience and Behaviours  

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

Applicants must be able to demonstrate the following Success Profiles behaviours in your application and at the interview at SEO level:

• Behaviours:
  • Working Together - Lead Behaviour
  • Managing a Quality Service
  • Delivering at Pace
  • Changing and Improving

Your application will be sifted by an AGO panel. In the event that we receive a high number of applications, an initial sift will be carried out on the lead behaviour: Working Together

Interviews will take place w/c 25th March in person at 102 Petty France, London, SW1H 9EA. Please note this date is subject to change.

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.