About the job

Job summary

This position is based Nationally

Job description

We encourage applications from people from all backgrounds and aim to have a workforce that represents the wider society that we serve. We pride ourselves on being an employer of choice. We champion diversity, inclusion and wellbeing and aim to create a workplace where everyone feels valued and a sense of belonging. To find out more about how we do this visit: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-justice/about/equality-and-diversity.

Overview of the role: The Ministry of Justice is a major government department at the heart of the justice system. We deliver some of the most fundamental public services including courts, tribunals, prisons, legal services, youth justice, probation services, and attendance centres.

The organisation works together with other government departments and agencies to bring the principles of justice to life for everyone in society. From our civil courts, tribunals and family law hearings, to criminal justice, prison and probation services. We work to ensure that sentences are served, and offenders are encouraged to turn their lives around and become law-abiding citizens. We believe the principles of justice are pivotal and we are steadfast in our shared commitment to uphold them.

Our vision is to deliver a world-class justice system that works for everyone in society.

Our 4 strategic priorities to deliver our vision are:

A prison and probation service that reforms offenders.

A modern courts and justice system.

A Global Britain that promotes the rule of law.

A transformed department that is simpler, smarter and more unified.

For more information on who we are and what we do, please visit: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-justice.

The People Group within the Ministry of Justice

The people who work for the Ministry of Justice are responsible for its success; and the role of the Ministry of Justice People Group is to support the organisation by enabling our people to be the best that they can be.

We operate as a cluster of HR services working seamlessly to provide expert support, advice and delivery throughout the employee lifecycle. From the time people join the organisation, to the point at which they leave, we strive to make a positive contribution to their work experience. We want everyone who works for the Ministry of Justice to feel confident in their skills, ambitious for the future and fulfilled by their work and relationships with their colleagues.

The role sits in the Change Delivery Directorate within People Group which provides specialist advice and interventions to support the wider organisation improve and transform its services.

Summary: The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is a fast-paced and rapidly changing part of government responsible for broad-ranging policy and service delivery. The MoJ has ambitious plans to reform the justice system and at the same time transform itself into a smarter, simpler and more efficient department.

The 3rd Generation Shared Services Programme (now called: MoJ Synergy Programme) has been set up to reinvent the way our HR and Finance Services work putting User need at the heart of what we do.  The programme has a challenging timeline to ensure new arrangements are in place prior to the end of the current commercial contract.

We are looking for individuals who will need to be innovative, flexible, driven, highly organised, be able to see the bigger picture and have a high level of energy and attention to detail. Whilst you will be working in a fast-paced project environment, strong leadership, engagement and interpersonal skills are just as important as project and change management knowledge/experience in what will be a challenging but exciting programme.

Programme delivery has been organised into a number of phases to support review and assurance at key decision points.

•           Strategy & Vision

•           Design & Validate

•           Construct & Test

•           Deploy & Adopt

•           Run & Evolve

All roles across the workstream will contribute to the successful delivery of these phases for the MoJ Synergy Programme. 

We have Grade 7 roles available within the MoJ Synergy Programme. These roles are to support the programme journey until 2025 and are therefore fixed term for this period. Secondments and loans will be considered on an individual basis. If at a later date a/the vacancies become available on a permanent basis, there may be opportunity to convert successful fixed term candidates to permanent, subject to further approvals.

The role can be based anywhere in the UK and travel when appropriate will be required to support the delivery of the programme.

This key role will lead the shaping and delivering the business change strategy for MoJ Synergy. This is a complex programme where leads will need to be influential that mentors and advises senior leaders on the direction and deliverability of this change. It is an influential role that mentors and advises senior leaders up to and including Exco level on the direction and deliverability of their people reforms so your decisions have wide ranging impact across our business. 

You will be responsible for embedding our new service, enhancing the reputation and credibility of our technical platforms.  We operate a mixed arrangement of both direct and matrix managed teams to ensure we embed the change, build capability and give our people the opportunity to build their knowledge and capability. Matrix management of our business champions up to circa 20 people. 

A priority for this role is to establish, build and maintain professional relationships with delivery partners, leadership and stakeholders of all levels, both internally and externally. The successful candidate will be required to demonstrate strong leadership, influencing and consulting skills to ensure the alignment of all business change initiatives across the MoJ organisational areas within MoJ. 

You will be expected to recognise and respond to changing or conflicting priorities during significant delivery challenges and use your knowledge and professional judgement to provide recommendations for senior leadership to ensure sound strategic decisions are made, which directly impact business services across the programme.  These are exciting roles that you will play a part in making transformational change through a smarter, simpler and more efficient technology platforms.

Responsibilities, Activities & Duties:

Leadership & Delivery Management   

Provide visible and strong leadership, thinking strategically and applying knowledge and professional judgement to influence the direction of change with senior leaders and customer boards.    

Delivery of the business change strategy for the programme, being able to be flexible and review as per stakeholders/customer needs.

Lead on maintaining check lists to demonstrate the ways of working that are changing and track them through to completion, and beyond (where former systems or processes need to be retired) working on ensuring the benefits are realised.

Act as trusted advisor to senior stakeholders by regularly providing pragmatic advice and expertise on complex, high profile and highly sensitive change issues, often with conflicting priorities and during significant delivery challenges. 

Navigate complex political and ambiguous landscapes to develop robust change strategies and plans ensuring appropriate and proportionate project management disciplines are in place to achieve the strategic benefits.

Lead a multidisciplinary team of change practitioners (civil servants, contractors and suppliers) managing performance, outputs and measurement, ensuring a collaborative approach draws in expertise to deliver the programme outputs.

Building effective delivery partnerships with the functional communities, HR, Finance and Digital to ensure the right capabilities are available to support and achieve the successful delivery of the project.  

Work as part of the MoJ Synergy Programme to provide insight, guidance and direction that continuously improves the service and develops the potential within our people and themselves.   

Financial   

Contribute to ensuring the benefits realisation of the programme deliverables, ensuring that business case demonstrate both investment costs and potential savings to support the case for change; undertake all necessary procurement and approvals.  

Stakeholder and Communications Management   

Quickly build trust and credibility through effective relationships with SROs, Sponsors and Leaders confidently challenging approaches and boundaries to drive forward the required changes.  

Lead robust Stakeholder Management to support organisational change – assessing levels of engagement in Leaders and actively managing to achieve high levels of commitment.  

Lead the change communications strategy and own or direct the programme communications plan that supports the understanding and acceptance of change ensuring a focus on achieving cultural and behavioural change outcomes.   

Shape and lead the change approach in a way which maximises employee engagement with the projects and drives faster adoption of cultural and behavioural reforms.

The duties/responsibilities listed above describe the post as it is at present and is not intended to be exhaustive. The Job holder is expected to accept reasonable alterations and additional tasks of a similar level that may be necessary.

Behaviours & Strengths (for Recruitment/
Success Profiles):

Applicants must be able to demonstrate the following behaviours at Grade 7 level:

• Changing and Improving (lead behaviour)
• Seeing the Bigger Picture
• Communicating and Influencing
• Leadership
• Working Together

Candidates will be asked to provide their CV and a 500 word Statement of Suitability covering the essential criteria (person specification and qualification) set out below.

In the event of a high volume of applications the initial sift will be undertaken on the Statement of Suitability followed by the lead behaviour. 

The Interview will cover behaviour, experience, technical and strength-based questions. You will also be asked to deliver a 5 minute presentation; further details will provided to candidates invited to interview.

Essential Knowledge, Experience and Skills:

Person Specification

Strong evidence of visible and effective leadership, building confident senior stakeholder relationships in a complex, fast paced change environment with conflicting priorities. 

Experience of navigating ambiguous requirements, adapt to changing circumstances and adverse situations whilst remaining calm, reassuring others and maintaining performance.  

Proven track record of leading Transformational Change from a Business Change perspective and support the delivery of Business Case benefits and outcomes. Champion the use of best practice project management standards and processes.

The ability to establish and develop productive relationships with internal and external stakeholders, bringing people together to benefit the project. Managing and influence, change and impact decisions with both internal and external stakeholders.

Qualification

Qualified in one or more of the following or working towards: APMG Change Management Practitioner, PROSCI, PRINCE 2, Managing Successful Programmes or Project Leadership Programme 

Desirable Knowledge, Experience and Skills:

Experience in organisational development and delivering cultural and behavioural change 

We may consider any evidence within the application form that demonstrates meeting the desirable criteria as set out in the job description. This will only be after essential criteria is scored and where there is a need to differentiate between closely scored candidates.

Person specification

Please refer to Job Description

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £54,358, Ministry of Justice contributes £15,165 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, Experience and Technical skills.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.