Senior Advisor – Health

Permanent: 39 hours per week

Salary range: £40,000 - £60,000 per annum, plus benefits

Based in Central London

The Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) is looking for an exceptional candidate to join as a Senior Advisor in our Health Team in London. The successful applicant will work on a range of projects applying behavioural insights to address policy problems. The role is likely to include working on projects that aim to improve the National Health Service in particular. Previous work in this area has included reducing missed hospital appointments, preventing antimicrobial resistance, and improving the health of NHS staff.

The Behavioural Insights Team

The Prime Minister created BIT in 2010 to apply behavioural science to public policy in the UK. In February 2014 we became a social purpose company, owned by the Cabinet Office, Nesta (an innovation charity) and our employees.

The Behavioural Insights Team works with governments around the world in almost every area of Government policy. Whilst the subject and output of our projects varies considerably, there are common threads: we try to understand the contexts in which people make decisions; we notice small details; we find out what has and hasn’t worked before; we come up with innovative ideas for solving policy problems and we measure everything we do as robustly as we can. BIT selects staff on the basis of cultural fit: all our staff believe passionately in our company values: always prioritising social impact; empiricism and humility; fresh thinking, collaboration; and public service.

Roles and Responsibilities

We are looking for somebody with a deep knowledge of the UK healthcare system and a strong understanding of research and evaluation methods, who can lead a small team and deliver innovative projects.

As a Senior Advisor, you will interact with senior government officials and other partners on a regular basis. You will be responsible for delivering a range of projects that seek to demonstrate the value of a behavioural approach to health policy, ensuring your projects are managed and delivered to tight deadlines and within budget. You will also play a role in ensuring that quality is maintained across the business, including by quality assuring outputs from other policy teams.

Senior Advisors work closely with Principal Advisors and the Directors across BIT. They also often also line manage one or more Advisors or Associate Advisors, and are responsible for coaching and mentoring these staff, and developing their skills and expertise.

Essential

• Substantial experience developing or delivering policy in government, academia, or for a consulting firm. Ideally this experience should be related to health policy.

• Excellent program and project management skills, including an eye for detail and commitment to quality in all aspects of a project.

• A deep understanding of the behavioural science literature and how it can be applied to help solve complex policy problems.

• Strong leadership and teamwork skills, including supporting team members to develop their own skills and expertise.

• Excellent client and stakeholder relationship management.

• Ability to support the design and implementation of rigorous evaluations, including but not limited to randomised controlled trials.

• Excellent written and verbal communication (for example ability to write short, to-the-point policy papers for Government Ministers or senior officials).

• High level strategic thinking, challenging existing assumptions and creative problem solving.

• Experience in responding to competitive tenders and preparing bids.

Desirable

• Masters in a relevant subject area (including, but not limited to behavioural economics, psychology, design thinking, evaluation methods).

• Experience of working with or within the UK healthcare system.