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Job summary

At the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) we are committed to creating an inclusive and respectful work environment for all our colleagues and that reflects the diversity of the public we serve.

We want to maximise the potential of everyone who chooses to work for us and understand diverse perspectives and experiences are critical to our success. We welcome applications from all people from all backgrounds with the experience and skills needed to perform this role.
 
Are you a passionate about working in HR or Recruitment? Do you have experience of working in a HR Shared Services Function? 

Are you an individual that thrives on driving new ways of working, embraces new technology and gets results for the team and colleagues?  If so, then we would love to hear from you! 

The People Capability & Change (PC&C) Directorate provides direction, drives change and delivers support on the Department’s people issues. We are an exciting, fast-paced place to work, and we operate as a single team, working flexibly across projects as required, to use our combined knowledge and expertise in the most effective and efficient way.

This is an exciting time to be joining the HR Operations Centre within PC&C as we drive forward changes for the recruitment, on-boarding and transactional services teams. We have for the first time, moved all three teams under the same portfolio to provide centralised, more efficient processes.

We particularly welcome candidates from an ethnic minority background and other underrepresented groups to apply, as we work to continually improve our ability to represent the places and communities we support through our work.

Job description

Overview of the roles

HR Shared Service Centre 

This role will be based within the Department’s HR Shared Service Centre, which is an extremely busy and fast paced environment, we are looking for proactive Administrative Officers to join our team. Those Administrative Officers will be responsible for:

•    Dealing with first-line HR services, this will include payroll, pensions, onboarding and all employee lifecycle enquires. 
•    Providing timely, high-quality service to all customers, including candidates, Hiring managers and colleagues. 
•    Dealing with enquiries from other Government Departments and our third-party suppliers for Payroll and Pensions. 
•    Providing bespoke advice and guidance to hiring managers during the onboarding process
•    Developing a strong understanding of DLUHC recruitment policies and procedures.
•    Keeping up to date with Civil Service Commission Exceptions guidance
•    Escalating complex HR and Onboarding queries to necessary teams 
•    Organise and prioritise work effectively to meet deadlines

Recruitment

This role will be based within the Department’s Resourcing Hub. The successful jobholder will have a pivotal role in supporting the Resourcing Hub to effectively resource DLUHC with the right people with the right skills at the right time. This means a real focus on customer service and attention to detail – ensuring that we provide high quality resourcing advice and consultancy support. Those Administrative Officers will be responsible for:

•    Managing the administrative process on behalf of DLUHC hiring managers. 
•    Providing advice and guidance to hiring managers and candidates on the recruitment process
•    Developing a strong understanding of the CS Commissioner Recruitment principles and DLUHC recruitment policies and procedures
•    Uploading vacancies on to Civil Service Jobs and Be applied (e-recruitment systems)
•    Booking and logging interview slots
•    Managing the Recruitment Inbox and taking a proactive approach by responding to general queries and providing excellent customer service
•    Accurate record keeping in line with Civil Service commissioner and MHCLG requirements
•    Contributing thoughts and ideas to the team
•    Escalating any issues as necessary to the team

Apprenticeship

As one of our apprentices, you will be enrolled onto one of the following Apprenticeship schemes:

HR Support

The apprenticeship takes approximately 18-24 months to complete and during this time you’ll achieve the skills, knowledge and behaviours necessary to work effectively in your role.

To manage your learning, 20% of your paid working hours will be dedicated to ‘off the job’ learning you apprenticeship for you to focus on your training and developing your skills. The apprenticeship training will be provided as a blend of online learning and virtual classroom tuition delivered by an Apprenticeship Training Provider. You will be given assignments throughout your apprenticeship and you will use examples from your job to provide evidence for them. You will have regular meetings with a Talent Coach from the apprenticeship training provider and with your Line Manager from your job to ensure you are on track and are supported.

Person specification

Key skills/criteria: 

•    Excellent attention to detail skills, taking pride in their work to achieve thoroughness and accuracy when completing tasks
•    Prepared to work in a fast-paced environment and able to adapt and respond to change quickly
•    Excellent communication skills
•    Ability to build strong working relationships across DLUHC and able to convey difficult/complex information clearly
•    Excellent organisational skills and ability
•    Effectively work as part of a team

The successful candidate will be encouraged to undertake a professional learning qualification as part of the role through the Level 3 HR Support apprenticeship if this is in line with both business needs and the individual’s development needs. This is not a mandatory condition of accepting the role.

Behaviours

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

• Communicating and Influencing

• Working Together

• Managing a Quality Service

• Delivering at Pace

Benefits

• 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%

Things you need to know

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours and Strengths.

Selection Process Details 

We are for everyone 

At DLUHC we value diversity and inclusion and actively encourage and welcome applications from everyone, including those that are underrepresented in our workforce. We promote equality of opportunity in all aspects of employment and a working environment free from discrimination, harassment, bullying and victimisation. 

We would strongly recommend that applicants get in touch with the vacancy manager to find out more information about this role.  

We are for everyone 

DLUHC want to bring in a diverse workforce at all levels.  

Our application system is designed to remove as much bias as possible from the recruitment system – this means that a hiring manager does not know your name, your details, see your whole application in one go (or have your CV at review stage unless stated otherwise).  

Your answers are randomised and chunked up. This means that each assessor views sets of responses to questions for example all candidates’ responses to ‘Seeing the Big Picture’ rather than seeing a candidate’s full application. The science behind this is that recruitment can be subject to ordering and fatigue effects and we want to reduce this as much as possible.  

Most of our campaigns utilise multiple assessors and so it is possible that each of your answers would be viewed by different assessors. 

When writing your application, remember: 

• The assessor won’t be reading your answers sequentially.  

• Do not assume that the same assessors will have read all of your answers.  

• If talking about something in your first answer, make sure that you write the second answer as if you had not written the first (and so on!) 

At sift, we will be assessing 

Managing a quality service (Lead Behaviour)

Communicating and Influencing 

Working Together 

Delivering at Pace 

There is a 250 word limit per question. 

In the event that we receive a large number of applications, we may conduct an initial sift using the lead behaviour listed in the advert. Candidates who pass the initial sift may be progressed to a full sift, or progress straight to assessment/interview  

The interview will be of a blended nature consisting of the following success profiles elements:    

Behaviour 

Strength 

The strength based questions will require natural responses from the candidates.  

In the full campaign we will test the below Success Profile Elements: 

Behaviours: Communicating and Influencing, Working Together, Managing a quality Service, Delivering at Pace

Strengths: Yes

We do not consider direct CV applications to our Recruitment mailbox – you must apply for this role via the application link on Civil Service Jobs 

Please note that near miss offers may be made at the lower grade to candidates who do not meet the grade criteria for this campaign. 

AO salary 

• The salary for this role is £24,324 (National). 

• For existing civil servants, the usual policy on level transfer and promotion will apply and is non-negotiable. 

BENEFITS: 

Transfers across the Civil Service on or after 4 October 2018: 
Any move to DLUHC from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax-Free Childcare. Determine your eligibility at https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk 

For further information about the benefits available to DLUHC employees, please see the attached Candidate Pack. 

GEOGRAPHICAL LOCATION: 

• Birkenhead

• Wolverhampton 

SIFT AND INTERVIEW DATES: 

Sifting is envisaged to take place W/C 6th of June with interview dates to be confirmed. All interviews are currently being held remotely via videocall. 

RESERVE LIST: 
 
In the event that we identify more appointable candidates than we currently have posts available, we will hold applicant details on a reserve list for a period of 6 months from which further appointments can be made. This may include roles at a lower grade. Candidates placed on a reserve list will be informed of this. Due to the length of time CTC checks can take, our HR Shared Services team will contact reserve list candidates for London based roles to commence CTC checks. Those candidates who do not wish to remain on the reserve list should contact recruitment@levellingup.gov.uk to be removed from the reserve list. 

SC (Security Check) 

Important note 

 
Successful candidates for roles based in our 2 Marsham Street building must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is Security Check and the process can take up to 8 weeks to complete. 

Please note that successful candidates will need to pass the Security Check – this requires you to have been resident in the UK for the past 5 years. Please refer to the DLUHC Notes on Security Clearance section of our Candidate Pack for further information on Security Check (SC).  

Candidates should also note that with effect from 1st August 2018 the department will also check all applicants who are successful at interview, against the Internal Fraud Database (IFD) held by the Cabinet Office. In accordance with the Civil Service Internal Fraud Policy, any applicant who is included on the IFD will be refused employment by DLUHC. Please see the Candidate Pack for further information on the Internal Fraud Database. 

Candidate Pack Information 

Please see attached Candidate pack for further information. 

Before starting your application it’s very important to make sure that you are eligible to apply and meet the Civil Service nationality requirements. All candidates are expected to read the information provided in the DLUHC candidate pack regarding nationality requirements and rules 

Internal Fraud Database 

The Internal Fraud function of the Fraud, Error, Debt and Grants Function at the Cabinet Office processes details of civil servants who have been dismissed for committing internal fraud, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned. The Cabinet Office receives the details from participating government organisations of civil servants who have been dismissed, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned, for internal fraud. In instances such as this, civil servants are then banned for 5 years from further employment in the civil service. The Cabinet Office then processes this data and discloses a limited dataset back to DLUHC as a participating government organisations. DLUHC then carry out the pre employment checks so as to detect instances where known fraudsters are attempting to reapply for roles in the civil service. In this way, the policy is ensured and the repetition of internal fraud is prevented.  

For more information please see- Internal Fraud Register 

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window).

People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals

• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK

• nationals of the Republic of Ireland

• nationals from the EU, EEA or Switzerland with settled or pre-settled status or who apply for either status by the deadline of the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)

• relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals working in the Civil Service

• relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals who have built up the right to work in the Civil Service

• certain family members of the relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Apply and further information

This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans (opens in a new window) initiative.

Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name :Sarah Cubley

• Email :Sarah.Cubley@levellingup.gov.uk