Deputy Director, Transformation, Innovation and New Insights (close date extended to Sunday 1st October 2023)

This is an exciting opportunity to lead, develop and deliver the Joint Intelligence Organisation’s (JIO’s) digital transformation – a critical role at the heart of the UK’s intelligence assessment community. Working at the heart of national security, you will lead talented teams of specialists to deliver technology and tradecraft that will improve all areas of our work. This will involve a complex change programme – working to design and implement changes to the way we run the business of intelligence assessment.

You will have oversight of two of the teams leading JIO’s work on innovation: the Insights Hub and the Information and Data Exchange (INDEX). Through these teams you will need to create a culture of innovation, enabling specialists to adopt and embed solutions and services that enrich our intelligence assessments, and our day-to-day operations.

For INDEX, you will need to provide oversight and strategic direction to the team’s development of a cross-government digital platform. For the Insights Hub, you will need to support the team’s delivery of both self-serve capability and bespoke specialist services on data, technology (particularly AI), visualisation and open source.

You will need to build strong partnerships with JIO’s technology and transformation partners, both inside Government and out. You will be responsible for ensuring JIO’s digital requirements are included in the UK Intelligence Community’s (UKIC) digital transformation programme (DTX). This will include rolling out their Intelligence Exchange (iX) platform across the JIO, and identifying ways in which to leverage higher classification data analysis for strategic assessment in new ways.

As we approach the next spending review period you will be responsible for developing our bid for further funding for this digital transformation
programme – securing future funding for our innovation work.

You will work in close partnership with the Deputy Director for the Professional Head of Intelligence Assessment (PHIA) and JIO Operations –
to deliver modernisation across the cross-government Assessments Profession.

You will play a broader leadership role as part of the JIO’s senior leadership team and as a member of the Management Board, taking collective decisions to ensure JIO continues to thrive and adapt in a rapidly-changing landscape. You will set a culture that celebrates and encourages innovation, and which fully embraces diversity and inclusion and the benefits they bring to our organisation. You will help ensure JIO supports and invests in the wellbeing of its staff, recognising how it is critical to exceptional business performance.

This role is a fantastic opportunity for an experienced leader to bring significant expertise of working strategically across complex organisations and deliver service transformation. Success in this role will come from combining the strengths of multidisciplinary teams whilst drawing on your own expertise and credibility.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead a change and transformation programme across the JIO to expand and improve our use of technology (including AI), data and digital programmes – iX and DTX.
• Work with the Deputy Director (DD) of PHIA to deliver cross-community work on Professionalisation, Tradecraft and Standards – including AI Tradecraft & Standards, training and rollout of a new Professional Development Framework. Providing resilience for the DD on both PHIA work and JIO Operations (strategic workforce and budget planning, corporate functions).
• Identify and plan for technological modernisation for all JIO areas.
• Provide leadership to the JIO’s innovation functions: the Insights Hub and the Information and Data Exchange (INDEX) project.
• Ensure the JIO has the digital skills needed to support the production of cutting edge intelligence assessments.
• Building partnerships that enable us to access digital & data capability & expertise – UK (e.g. Office for National Statistics, Alan Turing Institute) and International. 
• Ensure Insights work forms a core part of JIO assessments, including expanding our data analysis and visualisation capabilities, and maximising our use of open source information. Lead our cross-community crowd forecasting tournament COSMIC BAZAAR. 
• Identify a pathway for our use of new technologies – particularly how the emerging use of Generative AI can help in the production of intelligence assessment. Oversee commercial acquisition of tools for the JIO, and deliver a programme of business change that will embed the use of technology into intelligence assessment processes.
• Identify where JIO can benefit from cross-community synergies and steer efficiencies that JIO can use to help our own capability build, and shape the long-term investment strategy for JIO’s digital transformation – across tech, skills, policy etc.
• Work with Deputy Director for Capability & PHIA to develop future spending proposals for the JIO – including future spending review bids/similar requirements. Oversee a cross community Spending Review bid that will support investment in digital tools and skills for intelligence assessment. Manage the INDEX and Insights budgets for technology investment.  

It is important that, through your CV and supporting statement, that you provide evidence of the professional skills, breadth of experience and personal qualities for this post.

Essential Criteria:

• A strong track record of excellent change management as well as delivery of digital projects, and the required level of business change.
• Exceptional communication skills, the ability to command credibility with senior stakeholders, build deep and inspiring collaborative partnerships across the Civil Service and/or external organisations.
• An ability to look at the bigger picture whilst driving and leading complex digital and data transformation in a fast-paced ever changing environment.
• Strong problem-solving skills with the ability to utilise excellent judgement.
• Experience of working within the intelligence community and National Security issues.
• You will bring inspiring leadership, including the ability to build, motivate and develop high performing, diverse teams.

Desirable Criteria:

• Experience working on large digital initiatives and delivering change.
• Experience leading or managing data focused teams (data analysis or data science). 

We’ll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Delivering at Pace
• Seeing the Big Picture
• Leadership
• Changing and Improving

Whatever your role, we take your career and development seriously, and want to enable you to build a really successful career within the Department and wider Civil Service. It is crucial that our employees have the right skills to develop their careers and meet the challenges ahead, and you’ll benefit from regular performance and development reviews to ensure this development is ongoing. As a Civil Service employee, you’ll be entitled to a large range of benefits. 

This includes:

• 25 days annual leave on entry, increasing on a sliding scale to 30 days after 5 years’ service. This is in addition to 8 public holidays.
• This will be complimented by one further day paid privilege entitlement to mark the King’s Birthday; 
• A competitive contributory pension scheme that you can enter as soon as you join where we will make a significant contribution to the cost of your pension; where your contributions come out of your salary before any tax is taken; and where your pension will continue to provide valuable benefits for you and your family if you are too ill to continue to work or die before you retire; 
• Generous paid maternity and paternity leave which is notably more than the statutory minimum offered by many other employers;
• Childcare benefits (policy for new employees as of 5 April 2018): The government has introduced the Tax- Free Childcare (TFC) scheme. Working parents can open an online childcare account and for every £8 they pay in, the government adds £2, up to a maximum of £2000 a year for each child or £4000 for a disabled child. Parents then use the funds to pay for registered childcare. Existing employees may be able to continue to claim childcare vouchers, so please check how the policy would work for you here; 
• Interest-free loans allowing you to spread the cost of an annual travel season ticket or a new bicycle;
• The opportunity to use onsite facilities including fitness centres and staff canteens (where applicable); and occupational sick pay.

As part of accepting this role you will be agreeing to the expected assignment duration set out above.
This will not result in a contractual change to your terms and conditions.
Please note this is an expectation only, it is not something which is written into your terms and
conditions or indeed which the employing organisation or you are bound by. It will depend on your
personal circumstances at a particular time and business needs, for example, would not preclude any
absence like family friendly leave. It is nonetheless an important expectation, which is why we ask you
to confirm you agree to the assignment duration set out above.

Job contact :

• Name : SCS Recruitment Team
• Email : scscandidate.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : scscandidate.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk