Department for Science, Innovation and Technology
Executive Assistant & Business Manager
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Executive Assistant & Business Manager
London
Job Summary
GDS
The Government Digital Service (GDS) is the digital centre of government. We are responsible for setting, leading and delivering the vision for a modern digital government.
Our priorities are to drive a modern digital government, by:
- joining up public sector services
- harnessing the power of AI for the public good
- strengthening and extending our digital and data public infrastructure
- elevating leadership and investing in talent
- funding for outcomes and procuring for growth and innovation
- committing to transparency and driving accountability
We are home to the Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (I.AI), the world-leading GOV.UK and at the forefront of coordinating the UK’s geospatial strategy and activity.
We lead the Government Digital and Data function and champion the work of digital teams across government.
We’re part of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and employ more than 1,000 people all over the UK, with hubs in Manchester, London and Bristol.
The Government Digital Service is where talent translates into impact. From your first day, you’ll be working with some of the world’s most highly-skilled digital professionals, all contributing their knowledge to make change on a national scale.
Join us for rewarding work that makes a difference across the UK. You'll solve some of the nation’s highest-priority digital challenges, helping millions of people access services they need.
Job Description
The Digital Identity Hub sits at the centre of one of the Government’s highest-profile transformation programmes: the delivery of a trusted digital identity credential for people in the UK. Working across DSIT, Cabinet Office and the Home Office, the Hub brings together policy, technical and delivery teams to coordinate programme activity, governance, stakeholder engagement and ministerial business. This is a unique opportunity to contribute to a major public service reform that will improve access to services, strengthen identity verification and reduce fraud. The Hub currently supports the Digital Identity Programme but may evolve to support other priority Government Digital Service (GDS) programmes within DSIT in future.
The jobholder will provide comprehensive business management and executive assistant support to the Deputy Director for the Digital Identity Programme. They will ensure smooth administrative operations and support the delivery of the Hub’s objectives including managing the Digital Identity Hub mailbox and supporting the Hub team with administration and logistics as required.
Person specification
Key Responsibilities
- Executive Support, Diary and Inbox Management – lead on managing inbox, calendar and logistics for the Digital ID Hub Deputy Director. Proactively balancing competing priorities to maximise available time, de-conflicting appointments, rearranging schedules and coordinating logistics for internal and cross-government meetings including with senior officials and Private Offices, sometimes at short notice.
- Senior Leadership Management: Develop deep understanding of Senior Civil Servant(s) priorities to effectively flag emerging issues they should be aware of, and act where necessary to support by building relationships with key senior stakeholders and their Private Offices to ensure they are kept up to date and informed of key decisions and trade-offs. Act as a conduit for information flow between the Deputy Director and wider programme teams.
- Digital ID Hub PMO Support – Support with managing the Digital ID Hub inbox, ensuring timely triage and response to queries. Maintain action log, calendars, and logistics when necessary.
- HR, Finance & Operational Support – Support recruitment, onboarding and team operations within the Hub, including coordination of recruitment processes and documentation. Provide support on financial administration and basic budget tracking as required.
- Business Management: Maintain oversight of overall Hub priorities, actions and key deliverables alongside and in support of G7 leads.
- Project Delivery Support: Ad-hoc project delivery support and coordination of cross-government meetings, including agendas, papers, notes and action tracking. Act as a point of contact within the Hub for general information, responding to queries and ensuring key stakeholders are directed to the appropriate sources.
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Essential Criteria
- Experience in business management, administration, or executive support roles.
- Strong organisational and multitasking abilities to organise a daily workload by priorities and able to meet deadlines in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to communicate concisely and coherently to a wide variety of audiences.
- Ability to manage correspondence and sensitive information.
- Proficiency in Microsoft 365/Google productivity suite and digital tools.
- Experience supporting senior leaders or teams.
- Comfortable with ambiguity, change and working flexibly.
Desirable criteria
- Understanding of programme, PMO or delivery environments.
- Experience in business management and information management.
- Experience supporting recruitment or onboarding processes.
- Experience in financial administration or budget monitoring.
Behaviours
We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:
- Delivering at Pace
- Working Together
- Managing a Quality Service
- Communicating and Influencing
Benefits
Alongside your salary of £39,850, Department for Science, Innovation & Technology contributes £11,544 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).
The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology offers a competitive mix of benefits including:
- A culture of flexible working, such as job sharing, homeworking and compressed hours.
- Automatic enrolment into the Civil Service Pension Scheme, with an employer contribution of 28.97%.
- A minimum of 25 days of paid annual leave, increasing by 1 day per year up to a maximum of 30.
- An extensive range of learning & professional development opportunities, which all staff are actively encouraged to pursue.
- Access to a range of retail, travel and lifestyle employee discounts.
- A hybrid office/home based working model where staff will spend a norm of 40-60% of their time in the office (minimum of 40%) over a month with flex dependent on balancing business and individual need.
Office attendance
The Department operates a discretionary hybrid working policy, which provides for a combination of working hours from your place of work and from your home in the UK. The current expectation for staff is to attend the office or non-home-based location for 40-60% of the time over the accounting period.
Artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence can 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 withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.
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Selection process details
This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Strengths and Experience.
As part of the application process, you will be asked to complete a CV and personal statement.
Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.
Please use your personal statement (in no more than 500 words) to explain how your skills and experience make you a suitable candidate for this role with reference to the essential criteria.
Applications will be sifted on CV and personal statement.
In the event of a large number of applicants, applications will be sifted on the personal statement only.
Candidates who pass the initial sift may be progressed to a full sift, or progressed straight to assessment/interview.
The interview will consist of behaviour and strength-based questions.
Sift and interview dates
Sift and interview dates to be confirmed.
Further Information
For further information on National Security Vetting please visit the Demystifying Vetting website.
This role is full time only. Applicants who wish to work an alternative pattern are welcome to apply however your preferred working pattern may not be available and you should discuss this with the vacancy holder before applying.
Reasonable Adjustment
We are proud to be a disability confident leader and we welcome applications from disabled candidates and candidates with long-term conditions.
Information about the Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) and some examples of adjustments that we offer to disabled candidates and candidates with long-term health conditions during our recruitment process can be found in our DSIT Candidate Guidance. A DSIT Plain Text Version of the guidance is also available.
We encourage candidates to discuss their adjustment needs by emailing the job contact which can be found under the contact point for applicants' section.
If you are experiencing accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert, please contact the email address in the 'Contact point for applicants' section.
If successful and transferring from another Government Department a criminal record check may be carried out.
New entrants are expected to join on the minimum of the pay band.
A location-based reserve list of successful candidates will be kept for 12 months. Should another role become available within that period you may be offered this position.
Candidates who meet the minimum benchmark may be placed on a Reserve List for consideration for similar roles, including those at a lower grade. Candidates who narrowly miss the benchmark and are not placed on the Reserve List may still be considered for an offer in a similar role at a lower grade.
Please note terms and conditions are attached. Please take time to read the document to determine how these may affect you.
Any move to the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax Free Childcare; for further information visit the Childcare Choices website.
DSIT does not normally offer full home working (i.e., working at home); but we do offer a variety of flexible working options (including occasionally working from home
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