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Job summary

The Communities and Integration Directorate sits at the heart of the Government’s aim to level up opportunities for everyone and deliver DLUHC’s goal to establish socially and economically stronger communities. The Directorate leads on supporting communities, reducing inequality, tackling social harms and bringing people together. Working with local partners and other parts of the Government, we are focused on a number of priorities, including:  

• Promoting greater understanding between faith communities and others, most notably through the Faith New Deal  

• Delivering race equality and levelling up opportunity through our work with Windrush communities and improving outcomes for GRT communities  

• Pioneering integration and social cohesion work  

• Tackling hate crime, community tensions and religious hatred  

• Promoting societal resilience and laying the groundwork for a transformative programme of anti-extremism work  

• Exploring options for how we can bolster community empowerment and support local community spaces and relationships, including in line with the Government’s priorities for parks and greenspaces  

• Ensuring that public bodies function as a shared space for all and focus on their core purpose rather than take partisan stances that undermine community cohesion  

​This area of work now sits across four separate divisions – reflecting the growing mission of the Directorate and the heightened ministerial interest in these policies, with their strong links to the wider Levelling Up agenda. ​These four divisions are broadly divided as follows:​  

• DLUHC’s leadership of integration and social cohesion policy  

• Moving the Department into an ambitious new space to tackle extremism and social harms  

• Delivering the Government’s commitment for a Holocaust memorial 

• Progressing the 2019 manifesto commitment to ban public bodies from implementing their own direct or indirect boycotts or divestments against foreign countries and territories  

The Directorate is a highly specialised, fast-paced environment. The roles being advertised will be cross-directorate. You will be part of a team of committed policy, programme management and engagement experts, operating across a set of high-profile policies and delivery programmes. 

Job description

We are looking for candidates with strong organisational and people skills to work in our business management team.  

The Business Management team coordinates the core business of the Directorate and supports the senior leadership team (SLT) to deliver their priorities. This includes leading on business planning, internal communications, programme management, finances, recruitment, performance reporting, risk management, governance and directorate oversight of milestones and wellbeing. 

Business Management is a team that sits across all the policy areas in the Directorate and has a crucial role in connecting with other directorates and departments and getting things done. 

We are looking for two posts to support the directorate either to:  

Manage governance and risk, including maintaining risk registers, programme boards, reporting on milestones, achievements, outputs and outcomes 

Manage people-processes, supporting on managing recruitment, onboarding, wellbeing and learning and development. This could include: 

Both posts will include: 

Establishing relationships with internal DLUHC teams, OGDs and senior external stakeholders to make progress on our priorities, align our work across government and ensure that we are properly responding to facts on the ground. 

Working closely with Private Offices and briefing Ministers as these key policy areas develop, and regularly seek steers on the direction of the work.  

Horizon scanning to identify issues and developments with direct or indirect links to our work. 

Working with Legal, Finance, Commercial and HR Business Partner colleagues to explore operational impacts of our work and the wider implications for DLUHC and government more widely. 

Manage business management processes, including financial management and projection, risk management and programme delivery management 

Person specification

Essential criteria:

• Have excellent communication skills, able to communicate and influence internal and external stakeholders.  

• Be able to build relationships quickly. 

• Be able to work as part of a close-knit team, communicating and seeking relevant information with team members leading on different departmental, place and policy issues. 

• Lead cross-cutting tasks with creativity, able to operate in a fluid environment where it’s up to us to make the best case we can for our work. 

• Be capable of and enthusiastic about learning about new policy areas and places. 

• Have project and programme management skills or the ability to learn and develop in this area 

• Have an understanding of financial management and budgeting 

Behaviours

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

• Managing a Quality Service

• Changing and Improving

• Working Together

• Communicating and Influencing

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.

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 

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 

Behaviour 1 (lead behaviour) - Managing a quality service 

Behaviour 2 - Communicating and influencing

Behaviour 3 - Changing and improving

Behaviour 4 - Working together 

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 progressed straight to assessment/interview  

The interview will be of a blended nature consisting of behaviour and strength based questions as listed in the advert. The strength based questions will require natural responses from the candidates.  

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

Strength: Yes

Behaviours: Changing and improving, Managing a quality service, Communicating and influencing and Working together

We do not consider direct CV applications – 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. 

SEO salary 

• The salary for this role is £40,390 (London) or £37,064 (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. 

Location 

• Wolverhampton 

• Darlington*

• London

There may be opportunities for candidates to work flexibly depending on the business needs. This will be discussed with the vacancy manager on a case-by-case basis if you are successful for the role. 

*Please note: The Darlington Economic Campus (DEC) is a pioneering new cross-government hub which will bring together people across departments and public organisations to play an active role in the most important economic issues of the day. The work of the Campus will make a real difference to people both across the UK and internationally. There will be substantial career opportunities and exciting prospects - a career at the Campus means you will be working at the heart of Government, with access to the benefits and fantastic opportunities offered by the civil service. This role is based at DLUHC and we will be joined on the campus by: 

• HM Treasury  

• Department for International Trade 

• Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy  

• Office for National Statistics

• Department for Education  

For further information on the DEC, please take a look at the attached DEC candidate pack. 

Sift and Interview dates 

Sifting is envisaged to take place from 01/05/2023 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.Those candidates who do not wish to remain on the reserve list should contact recruitment@communities.gov.uk to be removed from the reserve list. 

CTC (Counter-terrorism Clearance): 

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 counter-terrorist check and the process can take up to 8 weeks to complete. 
 
Please note that successful candidates will need to pass the CTC security checks – this requires you to have been resident in the UK for the past 3 years. Please refer to the DLUHC Notes on Security Clearance section of our Candidate Pack for further information on Counter Terrorism Clearance (CTC).  
 

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. 

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 

Candidate Pack Information 

Please see attached Candidate pack for further information. 

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 counter-terrorist 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

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 :caroline Macdonald

• Email :caroline.macdonald@levellingup.gov.uk

Recruitment team :

• Email :recruitment@levellingup.gov.uk