Deputy Director School Teachers Review Body and Major Review of Judiciary

Together the Pay Review Bodies make recommendations on pay for 2.5 million workers, with a pay bill of over £100 billion a year. All Pay Review Body reports are submitted to Parliament and are published on the OME’s website on gov.uk. You will be one of four Deputy Directors in OME, an independent civil service organisation of around 30 staff civil servants within DBT providing the secretariat for the eight independent public sector Pay Review Bodies.​

In this role you will have more autonomy than many DD roles and be responsible for enabling Pay Review Bodies to make recommendations which are authoritative and can bear the intense scrutiny which public sector pay policy attracts. You will be the key adviser to the chair and members of the School Teachers Review Body and to members of the Review Body on Senior Salaries for its ‘Major Review’ of the Judiciary salary structure. You will manage their strategic relationships with the sponsoring departments, the employer organisations, and relevant trade unions. 

Key responsibilities:​

• Lead the team supporting the School Teachers Review Body (STRB) which advises on remuneration of teachers in England, with a pay bill of c£12 billion. Enabling STRB to arrive at robust recommendations in its 2024 report, likely to be delivered in May, will be your main initial task.​
• Lead a second secretariat of the Senior Salaries Review Body (SSRB). This team is being created to conduct the Major Review of the Judicial Salary Structure. This fundamental review of the pay structure of the judiciary, the first since 2017-18, is expected to start in 2024 and to take 18 months.​
• With your small Grade 7-led secretariat teams, which include analytical support,  you will support their Review Bodies to provide sound, well-evidenced independent advice to government, meeting agreed deadlines for submitting reports. You will help the chair and members determine their priorities and, as reports are developed, ensure the clarity and quality of drafting.​
• Your STRB and SSRB tasks will require sensitivity to challenging contexts. Both the teaching profession and the judiciary are experiencing considerable pressures including recruitment shortfalls. There has been industrial action over teachers’ pay in 2023. The judiciary faces significant backlogs in the courts. Developing proposals for their future remuneration which respond to these challenges and offer the Government value for money for the taxpayer will require a strong grasp of the evidence and careful strategic thought.​
• As a member of the senior leadership team, you will also contribute to leading OME, developing its staff and organisational capabilities. ​
• It is expected that when the Major Review is complete you will take over the leadership of the SSRB secretariat, supporting it to produce future annual reports on all its remit groups.

Essential Criteria​

• A highly experienced and inclusive leader with the proven ability to lead and coach an effective team of professional and generalist staff and contribute to organisational capability​
• Excellent influencing and relationship building skills with the ability to collaborate and engage with a wide range of senior stakeholders including  across the public and private sector ​
• Excellent written and oral communication skills, with the ability to draft persuasive arguments and influence a wide range of internal and external stakeholders.​
• Proven experience of delivering at pace and working well under pressure in tight and inflexible timelines, with ability to apply good project management skills to ensure operational delivery of goals. ​
• Ability to analyse economic, statistical and other evidence to draw key conclusions ​
• A proven understanding and knowledge of the workings of government departments and the wider economy with experience in offering advice and recommendations for key policy areas.​

Desirable Criteria​

•  Some knowledge of  pay, the groups covered by and School Teachers Review Body, the Senior Salaries Review Body and/or  working with secretariats or boards would be helpful.

• 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%

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 : SCSRecruitment@businessandtrade.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : SCSRecruitment@businessandtrade.gov.uk