About the job

Job summary

Please refer to job description

Job description

Senior Trade Policy Advisor

SEO

Judicial and Legal Services Policy

The Legal Services Trade team is recruiting permanently for an SEO Senior Trade Policy Advisor. This campaign is being run externally and so is open to all who consider themselves suitable for the roles and meet the eligibility criteria in the wider advert within Civil Service Jobs.

Location:

Successful candidates will have the option to be based at one of the following locations:

• 102 Petty France, London
• 5 Wellington Place, Leeds

Occasional travel between the two locations may be required.

In order for Policy Group to meet its evolving business needs all Policy Group staff are expected to attend their base location (102 Petty France or 5 Wellington Place Leeds) at least 2 days a week. This hybrid working arrangement is not contractual and as a result staff could be asked to attend their base location more frequently.

Ways of Working

At the MoJ we believe and promote alternative ways of working, these roles are available as:

• Full-time, part-time or the option to job share
• Flexible working patterns
• Flexible working arrangements between base locations, MoJ Hubs and home.

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 requiring the same skills and experience could be offered to candidates on the reserve list without a new competition.

We welcome and encourage applications from everyone, including groups currently underrepresented in our workforce and pride ourselves as being an employer of choice. To find out more about how we champion diversity and inclusion in the workplace, visit: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-justice/about/equality-and-diversity

Salary

New entrants to the Civil Service will be expected to join on the minimum of the pay range. 

If you are already a civil servant and are successful in an external recruitment competition for a role with us, your starting pay will be the better of:

• promotion terms or transfer terms, as appropriate; or
• pay on appointment arrangements (minimum of pay range)

The Ministry of Justice (MoJ)

MoJ is the largest government department, employing over 90,000 people with a budget of approximately £10 billion. Each year, millions of people use our services across the UK - including at 500 courts and tribunals, and 133 prisons in England and Wales.

Further information can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-justice

The Work of the Legal Services Trade team

Legal services are an important contributor to the economy and have a strong record of growth, as well as playing a vital role in facilitating global trade and investment. The UK’s world-leading legal services sector is helped by the international prestige of English common law and London’s position as a global centre for dispute resolution. Legal services contributed £34bn to the UK economy 2022, which accounted for 1.6% of the UK’s GDP. The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is responsible for supporting the UK legal services sector to thrive domestically and internationally. 

The Legal Services Trade team at the MoJ plays a central role in the Government’s work to ensure UK legal services, courts and English and Welsh law remain world leading. We do this by representing UK legal services’ interests in international trade agreement negotiations and promoting UK legal services globally. We are split into four sub-teams, each covering a distinct geographical region: Europe; Middle East, Africa and Central Asia; the Americas; Asia and Australasia. Geographical teams also have responsibilities for certain cross-cutting policy areas such as mobility and recognition of professional qualifications.

Senior Trade Policy Advisor - the role

This role will be based in the Europe team. You will be responsible for the development and delivery of the MoJ’s legal services trade objectives, in the context of HMG’s trade strategy. You will need to work with a wide range of stakeholders, within the department, in other government departments, and within the legal sector, to deliver these challenging policy objectives.

Your key responsibilities could include:

• Leading key policy work to address market access barriers in legal services and develop our trading relationship with Europe.
• Engaging closely with a range of important stakeholders including foreign governments, ministers and the UK’s top lawyers through different media (e.g. presentations, emails, sector events).
• Writing briefings, submissions and speeches to support ministers and senior officials.
• Leading on a legal services trade promotional programme for your region.
• Participating in the development and negotiation of legally binding international agreements (e.g. Free Trade Agreements) and relevant non-legally binding agreements (like Memoranda of Understanding with foreign governments).

Skills and Experience

Narrative Required

Essential:

• Excellent stakeholder engagement skills and the ability to build relationships quickly across Government and externally.
• Demonstrable capability for strategic thinking and policy development, and ability to make sound judgements.
• The ability to provide clear, evidenced briefing in both written and oral formats on complex policy areas to senior stakeholders and Ministers.
• Strong prioritisation skills and the ability to make effective decisions on how to make best use of your resources to handle time-sensitive work to achieve both short and long-term results. 

Desirable:

• An understanding of the justice system and legal services sector.
• Previous experience of working with the legal services sector and/or similar professional business and services sector.
• A keen interest in working in an international policy area to support HMG’s trade agenda.
• A keen interest or experience in policy development. 

Candidates applying from HMPPS should note that the Ministry of Justice does not have the same conditions of employment as HMPPS. It is the candidate’s responsibility to ensure they are aware of the terms and conditions they will adopt should they be successful.

The MoJ is proud to be Level 3 Disability Confident. Disability Confident is the approach through which we offer guaranteed interviews for all people with disabilities meeting the minimum criteria for the advertised role as set out in the job description.

Application process

You will be assessed against the Civil service success profiles framework.

You must ensure that any evidence submitted as part of your application, including your CV, statement of suitability and behaviour examples, are truthful and factually accurate. Please note that plagiarism can include presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own.

Experience

You will be asked to provide a Work History during the application process in order to assess any demonstrable experience, career history and achievements that are relevant to the role.

Behaviours

During the application process you will be asked to provide an example of how you have met the following behaviour (see Annex A for more information):

• Communicating and influencing (lead behaviour)
• Making effective decisions
• Seeing the big picture
• Delivering at pace

Please also refer to the CS Behaviours framework for more details at this grade:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/717275/CS_Behaviours_2018.pdf

Should we receive a large number of applications, we will sift primarily on the lead behaviour of communicating and influencing. Successful applicants will then be invited to an interview, testing both behaviours and strengths.

Candidates invited to Interview

Please note that interviews will be carried out remotely.

During the panel interview, you will be asked behaviour-based questions to explore in detail what you are capable of, and strengths-based questions to also explore what you enjoy, and your motivations relevant to the job role.

There is no expectation or requirement for you to prepare for the strengths-based questions in advance of the interview, though you may find it helpful to spend some time reflecting on what you enjoy doing and what you do well.

You can refer to the CS Strengths dictionary for more details:  Success Profiles - Civil Service Strengths Dictionary (publishing.service.gov.uk)

In addition to the behaviour and strengths-based questions, you will also be asked to undertake a short, written exercise prior to the interview. Details will be sent to candidates who are invited to interview.

Interviews are expected to take place in September 2024.

Contact information  

Please do get in touch with Josh Horsman (Joshua.Horsman@justice.gov.uk) if you would like to know more about the role or what it is like working in our team.

Annex A - The STAR method

Using the STAR method can help you give examples of relevant experience that you have. It allows you to set the scene, show what you did, and how you did it, and explain the overall outcome.

Situation - Describe the situation you found yourself in. You must describe a specific event or situation. Be sure to give enough detail for the job holder to understand.

• Where are you?
• Who was there with you?
• What had happened?

Task - The job holder will want to understand what you tried to achieve from the situation you found yourself in.

• What was the task that you had to complete and why?
• What did you have to achieve?

Actions - What did you do? The job holder will be looking for information on what you did, how you did it and why. Keep the focus on you. What specific steps did you take and what was your contribution? Remember to include how you did it, and the behaviours you used. Try to use “I” rather than “we” to explain your actions that lead to the result. Be careful not to take credit for something that you did not do.

Results - Don’t be shy about taking credit for your behaviour. Quote specific facts and figures. Explain how the outcome benefitted the organisation or your area. Make the outcomes easily understandable.

• What results did the actions produce?
• What did you achieve through your actions and did you meet your goals?
• Was it a successful outcome? If not, what did you learn from the experience?

Keep the situation and task parts brief. Concentrate on the action and the result. If the result was not entirely successful describe what you learned from this and what you would do differently next time. Make sure you focus on your strengths.

Person specification

Please refer to job description

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £39,868, Ministry of Justice contributes £10,804 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.https://justicejobs.tal.net/vx/candidate/cms/About%20the%20MOJ

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.