About the job

Job summary

The Team Leader role is a really rewarding role where you will be supporting and developing a technical team ranging in experience and levels. The role has a balance of leading / managing people and capability leadership, ensuring the development and delivery of your teams capability to meet current and future demand. A Team Leader may also undertake other technical or divisional activities alongside the leadership role to build a wide knowledge and skill base but not to the detriment of their line management responsibilities. It is desirable for team leaders to have a background in the technical area of the team, but it is not essential. The role requires leadership skills highlighted below. If the Team Leader hasn't the teams technical specialism, the ability to understand and manage a team and capability outside their technical field is required.

Dstl's Chemical, Biological and Radiological (CBR) Division provides solutions to MOD and wider government through the application of world leading capabilities across the physical, human and life sciences. These unique capabilities combine our incredible people with a large and varied suite of labs and other facilities to provide impact to our stakeholders across a full range of products and services; from cutting edge research, through test and evaluation, to direct support to operations. In doing so, we aim to understand and enhance the performance and protection of our people, and provide our stakeholders across Defence and Security with the S&T advantage to out-match and overcome our adversaries.

We are looking to fill the following team leader posts within CBR:

1. Toxicology and Quality Assurance Team Leader
2. Molecular and Computational Biology Team Leader
3. Operation and Assurance Capability Team Leader
4. CB Non Proliferation Team Leader
5. CBR Situational Awareness Team Leader
6. Statistical Data Science and Software Team Leader
7. Human Performance Team Leader

Job description

As a Team Leader in Dstl you will:

In this role you will:

Develop & sustain capability (people relationships, infrastructure, knowledge, licences to practice) to provide technical/scientific contribution to current and future projects across Dstl through effective use of the Team's resources/expertise:

• Maintain awareness of current and future demand requirements.
• Understand and use the different resource options to ensure an appropriate mix of team members.
• Understand and effectively develop capability to align with Division Capability plans.
• Build resilience through succession planning, including developing future leaders.

Direct Line management of a team of ca. 10-15 Team Members:

• Enable effective performance management and development of team members.
• Allocate employees to tasks or projects based on requirements.
• Coach and support Team Members career and personal development.
• Ensure that people have the necessary skills and competencies for the tasks assigned.
• Ensure employees have knowledge of and conform to all safety and security and resilience requirements.

Build employees engagement and create an environment which nurtures excellence through:

• Setting the direction for team, including how the team fits with strategic aims.
• Creating a positive and inclusive working environment that aligns with Dstl Values, champions diversity and enables employees to excel.
• Communicating and owning difficult messages.
• Challenging and addressing poor performance.
• Recognising and highlighting high performance.
• Networking with other Team Leaders and stakeholders to share good practice and ensure a coherent approach.
• Implement Dstl's policies and ensure compliance with the Management System.
• Provide individual technical/professional contribution as agreed with Line Manager.

Person specification

We are looking for someone who has:

• The ability to quickly develop good working relationships with a variety of people.
• Good networking skills.
• Tact and diplomacy in dealing with a wide range of issues/challenges.
• Persistence to see things through to a conclusion.
• Passion for developing capability and people.
• The ability to lead through change.
• Able to communicate coherently and sensitively, explaining complex issues in a way that is easy to understand.
• Emotional Intelligence, able to understand own and others reactions, motivations.
• Able to handle conflicting priorities successfully delivering to changing requirements.
• Able to successfully manage multiple tasks simultaneously.

We are looking for people with these essential skills 

• Effective leadership.
• Able to develop networks and use these to resolve issues/challenges.
• Management and/or supervision of people and tasks.
• Excellent communication skills.
• Sufficient technical and business management expertise to understand the tools, techniques and skills required within the Team and how to develop them.
• Understanding of safety, security and resilience risks in order to assess/mitigate those relating to the specific team.
• Understanding the business benefits of diversity and equality and how to create an inclusive working environment.
• Commercial Awareness - ability to understand what makes a business or organisation successful.  Understanding of the commercial implications of contracts and working practices.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £44,667, Defence Science and Technology Laboratory contributes £12,060 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, Experience and Technical skills.

Sift will be completed by 25th February

Interviews will be held from week commencing 4th March and will consist of a behaviour and skills interview.

We want you to have your best chance of success in our recruitment process, so If at any stage of the application process you would like help or assistance please contact the Dstl Recruitment Team dstlrecruitment@dstl.gov.uk and we will do all we can to support you.

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

Open to UK nationals only.

This job is not open to candidates who hold a dual nationality.

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.