Project Manager – Seabirds (Ref: 5268)

East Midlands (England), East of England, London (region), North East England, North West England, South East England, South West England, West Midlands (England), Yorkshire and the Humber

This is a National Role

The team  

Do you have a passion for nature and the environment? Do you want to make a real difference and secure significant environmental gains in the present and the future? Do you enjoy working in a team? Can you see yourself advising stakeholders and communities and customers to maximise gains for the natural environment?

If this appeals to you, a career at Natural England offers rewarding opportunities to secure environmental improvements and play your part in creating a better future for people and nature. 

This role is based in Science Team which is part of the Chief Scientist’s Directorate in Natural England. This Directorate is responsible for Natural England’s Science, Evidence and Evaluation Strategy and supports its implementation to ensure Natural England is an evidence-led organisation. The science team leads on the development and application of natural, economic and social science and evidence to drive and enable the achievement of environmental outcomes both within Natural England and externally.

Science, evidence and analysis are at the heart of Natural England’s advice, operations and regulatory activity. To be successful in recovering nature, we need high quality, relevant and up to date evidence that is actively and confidently applied by all of us. This means we need, amongst other things, to understand what changes are happening in the natural environment and what interventions and actions work well. 

Our underpinning science, evidence and analytical capability continues to grow, as we pursue our ambition to be an evidence-led organisation.

The role will also be associated with Natural England’s Project Management Hub which is a national team of experienced project managers who work on a range of projects across the organisation.

Job description  

This role will be focused on Project ReSCUE (Reducing Seabird Collision Using Evidence). The Project Manager role will be key to the successful delivery of this exciting project. The project aims to provide critical evidence needed to help develop solutions to enable offshore wind development, whilst protecting important seabird colonies in England from the risk of seabird collision. ReSCUE is funded by the Crown Estate’s Offshore Wind Evidence & Change Programme, and is a multi-year, multi-partner project led by Natural England. The Project Manager will form close relationships with the funding organisation and other organisations involved. 

The Project Manager is responsible for driving and overseeing the delivery of the project, ensuring that objectives and delivery milestones are clearly defined. You will bring your knowledge of project management processes and tools to help Natural England deliver the project to quality, time, and scope.

Key Tasks and Accountabilities

Apply project management expertise to the day-to-day management of the project

Select and apply appropriate delivery methodologies and challenge current project approaches

 Actively engage with organisational standards and governance structures.

Provide timely updates to project boards

Coordinate development of the business case and project plan

Identify key stakeholders and develop effective relationships

Develop and maintain a detailed programme of work including key milestones, assumptions dependences and budget schedule resources to deliver plans. Maximise project benefits – keeping to time, cost, and quality

Identify and monitor project risks and issues. Develop mitigating actions and escalate as appropriate

Undertake lessons learnt and embed these into future ways of working

Seek appropriate support, guidance and coaching from the project community. Seek, analyse, and act upon feedback from those you work with to lead continuous improvement and enable better outcomes

Show commitment to personal development. Promote effective individual and team performance

As required give feedback on Natural England’s project management tools and processes.

Benefits

Wherever possible Natural England accommodates requests for both full-time and part-time hours and other flexible working patterns to help employees achieve a good work/life balance and maintain their health and wellbeing.

Natural England provides excellent opportunities for career progression, training and development tailored to your role. From induction to ongoing learning and development, everyone in Natural England is supported to develop their skills and capabilities. Everyone has 10 days to devote to personal learning and development, as well as an additional 3 days to volunteer.

You will have access to Civil Service pension and benefits arrangements and generous leave allowances (33 day per year pro rata), as well as flexible working, to help you achieve a work-life balance that works for you and us.

You will have access to a range of benefits including discounts on shopping vouchers, cycle to work scheme, and childcare vouchers. You can also join the Civil Service Sport club which offer discounts on a range of sports and leisure opportunities as well as social events.

We’re committed to fairness and equality for all, so you feel valued for who you are and what you do. Our shared values help us work together to benefit the communities we serve. Our thriving employee-led diversity networks support our inclusive culture and contribute to our Diversity Action Plan.

Locations

Natural England is adopting hybrid working – which means that our staff will work from a flexible range of locations, encompassing home, offices (ours and our partners) and relevant sites. All new staff will be formally linked to one of our 25 offices across England and the expectation is that all new staff will be able to access their local office to be part of the community of staff in their geographic area. Full time staff are expected to attend their associated office for a minimum of one day a week.

Staff members are required to carry out all their duties working in this way and cannot do so from an overseas location at any time. Travel expenses will be paid if work related travel is required but does not apply to travel between home and your associated office.

National team roles can be linked with any Natural England office while Area Team roles will be linked with an office in the relevant geographic area. View a map of our office locations here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/natural-england-office-locations

Pay

It is Natural England policy to employ at the entry point of the salary range.

How to Apply

We welcome and encourage applications from all communities. Natural England is accredited to the Disability Confident Scheme, which denotes organisations which have a positive attitude towards disabled people. Disabled applicants who meet the minimum requirements for the role at the short listing stage are guaranteed an invitation to interview.

If you require a reasonable adjustment at interview, or there is anything else you would like the panel to take into consideration, you should notify us of this at application stage where possible, or well in advance of your interview.

This vacancy uses competency-based assessment. We’ll assess you against the competencies below during the selection process:

Technical Skills and Knowledge

Work Delivery

Personal Effectiveness

Putting People at the Heart of the Environment

When completing the application form you should present relevant examples using the STAR format. Give us an example of how you have demonstrated the competency (which can be work related or from another area of your life) and tell us about the Situation, the specific Task you had to undertake, the specific Actions you took, and the Result (both immediate and in a wider context) of your doing so.

Please note that STAR format is not required when answering the Technical Skills & Knowledge competency.

Examples should be given in no more than 250 words for each competency.

Next Steps

Evaluation of applications will begin shortly after the closing date. Candidates will be invited to interview in late September/early October.

If you are successful at the shortlisting stage, you will be invited to attend an interview via MS Teams or a suitable alternative, where you will be asked to give examples for all four competencies as set out in the Job Description.

Competencies

Competence 1  

Professional competency

Technical Skills and Knowledge

• Appropriate project management qualifications (APM, Prince2, MSP, PP3, Agile) or a minimum of 5 years direct project management delivery experience (essential).
• A track record in successful project delivery and simultaneous management of multiple complex projects with multiple stakeholders (essential).
• Experience of developing and maintaining a detailed programme of work, including key milestones, assumptions, dependencies and budget (essential)
• Experience of identifying, recording and mitigating risks and issues (essential)
• Experience of co-ordinating the development of business cases and project plans (essential)
• Experience of leading organisational change projects (desirable)

Competence 2  

Professional competency

Work Delivery

• Set clear plans and expectations for the team, explain reasons behind decisions, be clear on the outcomes to be achieved, and make things happen by sharing and delegating work to the right people(practitioner)
• Handle data responsibly, understand your role in good governance, and comply with delegations, policies and procedures (practitioner)

Competence 3  

Professional competency

Personal Effectiveness

• Be ambitious, identify and adopt ways to make improvements in your team and your organisation and inspire others to act (practitioner)
• Act with integrity, addressing challenging issues and managing conflict through being open and objective (practitioner)

Competence 4  

Professional competency

Putting People at the Heart of the Environment

• Nurture trusting partnerships and collaborate to achieve pragmatic outcomes that help deliver your organisations vision, mission and aims. (practitioner)
• Listen to and understand diverse partners and customers so that you achieve the best outcomes for them and your organisation (practitioner)

Please refer to Job Description

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an average employer contribution of 27%

The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).

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Job contact :

• Name : Fiona Neale
• Email : fiona.neale@naturalengland.org.uk
• Telephone : 07879 430 358

Recruitment team

• Email : defra-recruitment-enquiries@gov.sscl.com