Civil Aviation Authority
Continuous Improvement Coach
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Salary: Up to £55,000 - (Dependent on experience)
Contract Type: 12 Month Fixed Term Contract
Security Level: CTC
Location: Gatwick – min 2 days in the office per week.
Visa Restrictions: This position does not offer visa sponsorship
Closing Date: Friday 14th August 2026
Shortlisting: w/c Monday 17th August 2026
Interview Date: Wednesday 26th / Thursday 27th August 2026
We are the UK's aviation and aerospace regulator and recognised as a world leader in its field. Our activities are diverse, enabling the aviation industry to meet the highest safety standards, and we pride ourselves on our ability to adapt to the constantly evolving aviation environment.
The Role
Working with the Head of Continuous Improvement to develop a sustainable improvement capability which embeds a culture of Continuous Improvement (CI) and Operational Excellence within the CAA. This will involve building capability and skills to deliver knowledge and support across the business.
The CI Coach will work with business areas to deliver improvements to service quality and efficiency in addition to improved risk management and customer experience. You will ensure that changes to working practices and processes are well managed and any impact to Service Delivery is clearly understood and agreed with stakeholders in line with the CAA's strategic goals. This will require a strong network of relationships across the organisation; influencing and driving change at Head of Department and at operational process level.
These objectives will be met by a team of internal Continuous Improvement (CI) Coaches who, in partnership with Portfolio Delivery colleagues, will provide improvement expertise and coaching to CAA operational managers and teams in Continuous Improvement tools and techniques and creating a foundation for sustainable improvement in the longer term. This will mean needing the ability to share skills and knowledge across the team and also have the passion to improve themselves.
Core Accountabilities
Promoting a culture of Continuous Improvement
- Coaching, training and mentoring managers and teams in the appropriate use of problem-solving tools and techniques with the aim of reducing costs and improving service and efficiency. This will be complete across:
Projects
- Leading continual improvement focused projects using a 5D approach supporting business teams in reaching and improving on its year on year performance targets across Quality, Cost and Delivery
- Improve operational processes to reduce internal waste, build in quality and enhance customer service. Reducing the burden associated with internal rework and complaints.
- Enable business driven projects to deliver optimised processes by identifying and where appropriate delivering “end to end” improvement opportunities particularly but not solely before digitisation/technology activity.
- Act as a CI SME, working closely with project teams to ensure that system changes and enhancements are developed using Continuous Improvement principles, with error proofing in place to prevent passing defects downstream.
- Working with management teams to coordinate, schedule, and resource necessary operational readiness activities ahead of any significant change initiative.
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Service Design
- Ensure services address user needs by adopting a user-centered approach to design and improvement projects
- Design and refine service prototypes, testing them with real users to iterate and enhance
- Consider both short-term and long-term impacts of service design decisions, embedding quality and customer-centricity into change projects
- Create and maintain detailed service blueprints, covering both front-end and back-end processes involved in service delivery
- Document design decisions, user personas, journey maps, and other key artifacts for internal reference and communication
Relationships
- Develop close working relationships with Business teams to drive understanding of how the areas can work more effectively together and how shared processes can be improved, driving down error rates through the identification of root cause.
- Work with Portfolio Delivery colleagues to support Business Change activities at all levels (e.g. small scale change at a centre level or escalating large scale changes which impact business wide), through impact assessing the change and working actively with the business to implement the change with no adverse impact to the service.
Learning
- Facilitate/lead Continuous Improvement workshops, including as-is and to-be workshops developing new operating procedures, reviewing and improving existing quality procedures
- Research, explore and study the latest thinking in CI and OpEx to ensure we are bringing the CAA the latest thinking in this field.
- Contribute to, create and deliver CI training (including Operational Management training) for delivery to management and business teams
Strategy
- Contribute to the CI strategy for the CAA
- Support the CAA in building quality and customer centricity into its change projects
About You
Essential:
- Lean Minimum 2a / Six Sigma minimum Greenbelt / Process Improvement / Continuous Improvement Coach / Service Design appropriate certification required.
- Can demonstrate an ability to conduct a methodical investigation, analysis and documentation of business needs, including defining the Voice of the Customer and customer journey to meet all or part of the CAA's stated business functions and processes and associated information.
- Strong Project Management skills. Management of diverse, cross-functional project teams
- Strong engagement, influencing and relationship management skills
- Self-starter, motivated and tenacity to see projects and programmes through to implementation
- Experience in leading people through change
- Ability to prioritise tasks with differing timescales
- Ability to communicate clearly and effectively
- Ability to work under pressure
- Ability to understand the needs and sensitivities of the business
- Collaborative approach to getting things done.
- To work with the minimum of supervision.
Desirable:
- Good understanding of the broader aspects of major organisation restructuring – i.e. Communications, Stakeholder Management and Change Management.
- Sufficient seniority and credibility to advise business teams of ‘Subject Matter Experts’ (SME’s) on their projects and the ability to find ways of solving or pre-empting problems.
- Knowledge of how to use tools to diagnose, design and implement change interventions.
- Experience with RPA, AI and automation software and projects
- Experience of supporting process migration projects.
- Experience of working in a regulatory environment.
- Experience of working in the aviation industry.
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Additional Information
For many appointments within the CAA, these roles require access to operationally sensitive infrastructure and/or Nationally Protected information. For these roles the post holders must undergo National Security Vetting and achieve the appropriate level of clearance.
CTC - To be vetted we will usually expect a reasonable period of residency in the UK so that meaningful checks can be undertaken. For this role this will need to be 3 years.
If you do not meet these requirements, we may not be able to accept your application.
For more information on CTC and SC clearance please visit - Vetting explained - GOV.UK
The CAA values high ethical standards and personal integrity among employees. If invited for interview you will be asked to complete a declaration of interest.
Relocation & Property
The CAA will be relocating from Aviation House (Our Gatwick Office) to new premises in a few years’ time. Our move is driven by strategic, operational and environmental considerations.
We will be moving to a new local home, up to a 15-mile radius of Aviation House, to minimise disruption for our valued colleagues and customers.
We are now working with colleagues and visitors to understand what we need in our new office, before we start our property search. We will sell Aviation House and land, vacate the site and move to new premises, but we do not expect to move before 2028
Inclusive Recruitment
We are committed to building a diverse and inclusive workforce and welcome applications from all backgrounds. As a Disability Confident employer, candidates who meet the minimum requirements will be guaranteed an interview. Find out more about the Disability Confident Scheme. If you require any adjustments during the recruitment process, please let us know.
Use of Artificial Intelligence by candidates in the CAA recruitment process
We recognise that many of our candidates find Artificial Intelligence to be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be rejected on that basis.
Working With Us
Explore What We Offer section on our careers website to find out about our benefits and how we support work-life balance.
Our Values: Do The Right Thing, Never Stop Learning, Build Collaborative Relationships, Respect Everyone – For more information please Click Here
Closing Date: Friday 14th August 2026
Shortlisting: w/c Monday 17th August 2026
Interview Date: Wednesday 26th / Thursday 27th August 2026
We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.
No recruitment agencies please.
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