Innovation Strategy Lead

In DHSC, we are proud of our purpose – to enable everyone to live more independent, healthier lives for longer. To achieve this, and create a great place to work, we have four values: we are inclusive, we constantly improve, we challenge, and we are agile. If this sounds like an environment you would like to work in, we would love to hear from you.

The Innovation Division is responsible for addressing one of the Department’s top Ministerial priorities – to increase the adoption of safe, ethical and effective innovations in the health and care system.

It is a new function, established to set a compelling vision for innovation across the health and social care system, develop a clear strategy for achieving it, and coordinate delivery so the work gets done. It will address cross-cutting innovation policy questions through its projects team, promote and support a culture of innovation in the Department, and serve core briefing needs.

We are looking to staff this function with a team of creative self-starters who build trusting relationships easily and know how to get things done.

As a top Ministerial priority, it will have significant exposure to Ministers, the Department Board and the Department’s most senior officials. It will work closely with the Department’s wider policy teams and senior leaders in NHS England, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) and Health Research Authority (HRA).

This is a new team welcoming a diverse mix of skills and experience which we expect to be key to its success.

We are looking for four Innovation Policy Leads who are independent and creative thinkers to play an important leadership role developing the Department’s innovation agenda and making sure it is delivered. You will fully scope and deliver projects that support the Division’s objectives, which are to:

• Clarify innovation priorities: You will work with other key stakeholders across DHSC and its Arm’s Length Bodies to provide our policy teams, delivery partners and the wider health system with more clarity on the Department’s innovation priorities and turn this into an actionable and widely supported plan. You will remain aware of the bigger picture, using relevant insights to develop and challenge the system’s work on innovation and identify issues and trends. You will confidently provide recommendations for future work based on evidenced findings. Indicatively, this could include work to clarify overarching gaps and inconsistencies in the existing set of innovation-related strategies, build a single pipeline of future innovations and coordinate system efforts to support it, or identify which technologies are likely to be ‘game changing’ for the future health and social care system and how the Department should support their evolution.
• Coordinate system efforts: You will be well versed in building and maintaining networks, actively coordinating system efforts to ensure that the whole health and social care system is aligned behind the department’s strategy and delivers the elements that they are responsible for. You will oversee mapping of innovation challenges to prioritise and allocate responsibility for addressing any gaps in government provision. You will lead project management of the team’s activities, developing project plans and maintaining a record of progress against plans to report to senior officials and ministers.
• Solve high priority cross-cutting innovation challenges: You will lead exciting priority projects, progressing our highest-priority innovation challenges which currently span several policy teams or require independent challenge. Indicatively, this could include projects such as assessing how the health and social care system could capture more of the value it generates for commercial organisations and in doing so better align incentives to support the development and adoption of innovation.
• Promote and support a culture of innovation in DHSC: You will be instrumental in encouraging and developing a culture of innovation and continuous improvement throughout the health and care system. You will provide thought leadership and create platforms to encourage innovative policy thinking across the department’s grades and policy teams. Indicatively, this could include establishing internal competitions that allow innovative thinking to cut through hierarchy, supporting policy teams to run policy sprints, or developing approaches to more open policymaking.
• Briefing: You will oversee and support the completion of briefing commissions including correspondence, Parliamentary Questions and briefings for Department Board.

Role Responsibilities:

In completing this work you will be expected to:

• Work from start to finish with limited oversight, which will require you to be a strong independent problem-solver, have excellent time management and attention to detail, and exercise good judgement in what to escalate.
• Take an entrepreneurial approach to your work, including by contributing ideas for future work modules for the Innovation Division.
• Build a strong network of senior and junior staff across DHSC, its Arm’s Length Bodies and externally that can support your work.
• Manage the work of HEO and SEO team members and provide them with effective guidance, coaching and pastoral support.
• Present your work confidently to Ministers and senior officials in both written and verbal form.

The four roles will be split into a strategy team and a projects team, though all team members will be expected to work across the entire portfolio of work as required. The strategy team will focus on clarifying innovation priorities, coordinating system efforts and briefing and the projects team will focus on cross-cutting innovation challenges and building a culture of innovation.

You will be encouraged to share ideas and views in a positive and supportive environment and play an active role in shaping the direction of the team as its focus evolves.

Whatever your background, we are looking for proactive and organised individuals with the ability to think creatively, learn quickly, prioritise effectively, and manage a diverse portfolio of work.

Key Skills and Experience:

Essential:

• Leadership: You will be comfortable setting direction, using evidence and judgement to provide clarity to the wider team and deliver successful outcomes.
• Problem solving: You will be a strategic thinker, able to break down and solve problems effectively and independently. You will also be able to understand complex quantitative and qualitative information and present it clearly to support effective project delivery.
• Written and verbal communication: You will be a strong communicator, able to deliver complex messages simply and influence senior stakeholders and ministers. Your writing will only need very limited redrafting.
• Stakeholder engagement: You will be able to build relationships with and influence a wide range of stakeholders at all levels and manage upwards effectively.
• Delivering at pace: You will be comfortable delivering accurate work in ambiguity and under time pressure, remaining adaptable as and when circumstances change at short notice.
• Creativity: you will bring diverse, novel perspectives to tired problems, and be a trusted brainstorming partner for senior staff.

Desirable:

• Experience working in programme management and governance, such as successfully managing and supporting Boards / Committees
• Good understanding and experience of how innovation, science and technology can be applied to achieve impact in the health and care system

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

• Seeing the Big Picture
• Working Together
• Leadership
• Changing and Improving

We only ask for evidence of these behaviours on your application form:

• Seeing the Big Picture
• Working Together

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

• If selected for interview, you will be asked to complete an exercise that tests your problem solving ability.
• If selected for interview, you will be asked to complete an exercise that tests your ability to synthesise and communicate information.

• 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%

Job contact :

• Name : Andrew Wheeler
• Email : Andrew.Wheeler@dhsc.gov.uk

Recruitment team

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