Business Continuity and Protective Security Officer

Job summary

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is the UK’s largest producer of official statistics, covering a range of key economic, social and demographic topics. These include measuring changes in the value of the UK economy, estimating the size, geographic distribution and characteristics of the population, and providing indicators of price inflation, employment, earnings, crime and migration.

Protective Security and Business Resilience Operations provide resiliency design,consultancy and advice to projects and business as usual operations, encompassing both subject areas. Services support secure by design and international business continuity standards and approaches to build security and resilience into ONS operations and enable better security assurance.

Core activities enable the identification of business disruption and security risk and also mitigations to meet ONS risk appetite. The division also provides oversight and quality assurance of physical security measures and business continuity planning to ensure efficacy and conformity to required standards.

Job description

This role forms part of the Protective Security & Business Resilience Operations Team within the Security and Information Management Division. It reports the Business Continuity & Crisis management Lead who report to the Head of Protective Security & Business Resilience operations.

The primary focus of the role is providing advice, guidance and oversight Business continuity, with Secondary focus of Incident & Crisis Management within ONS. A key aspect is supporting the delivery of organisational goals for the Business Continuity Management System within the current strategy period through to 2026. Key outcomes from the role are advice and quality assurance and the effective delivery of the ONS Business Continuity integrated into ONS business operations, verifying the effectiveness of organisation wide security and business continuity measures and effective response to security incidents and business disruptions impacting the delivery of prioritised ONS outputs. The role will have Physical Security responsibilities at ONS Sites.

The role includes development opportunities and you will be supported to work towards a formal qualification with the Business Continuity Institute (BCI).

Information about the Government Security Profession framework - Government Security Profession Career framework (opens in a new window)

Responsibilities

• To be a system lead administrator for the Business Continuity Management System (BCMS).
• Provide initial advice to business areas on the development of Business Impact Analyses.
• Provide initial advice to business areas on the development of Business Continuity Plans.
• To assist in the delivery and facilitation of Business Continuity exercises for all areas of the ONS.
• Identify and document business continuity risks and issues and escalate as required.
• Contribute to an accurate and up-to-date organisational picture to include risk owners and lines of accountability.
• Support incident response structures for strategic, tactical and operational disruptions.
• Support development of the business continuity capability by establishing, maintaining and reviewing the organisation’s policy and programme activities for each stage of the business continuity life cycle.

Person specification

Essential Criteria:

• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, with experience engaging effectively with a diverse range of stakeholders, including senior leaders. Strong interpersonal and teamwork abilities, enabling smooth integration into fast‑paced environments and proactive support to business areas.
• Self‑motivated, proactive, and able to work independently, ensuring tasks are progressed efficiently and to a high standard.
• Keen to learn and develop professionally within the fields of security and business continuity, with a strong commitment to continuous improvement.
• Proficient in Microsoft Office applications, with experience in gathering, analysing and presenting management information to support informed decision‑making.
• Ability to work under pressure and manage competing priorities, consistently delivering high‑quality outputs in dynamic and demanding settings.

Behaviours

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

• Communicating and Influencing
• Changing and Improving
• Working Together

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £28,138, Office for National Statistics contributes £8,151 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

The Office for National Statistics is part of the Civil Service, and as such we share a number of key benefits with other departments, whilst also having our own unique offerings to support our valued colleagues across the organisation.

Whether you are hearing about us for the first time or already know a bit about our organisation, we hope that our careers site will give you a great insight into the benefits and facilities available to our colleagues, and our fantastic working culture.

Inclusion & Accessibility

At ONS we are always looking to attract the very best people from the widest possible talent pool, and we are proud to be an inclusive, equal opportunities employer. As a Disability Confident Leader we’re committed to ensuring that all candidates are treated fairly throughout the recruitment process.

As part of our application process, you will be prompted to provide details of any reasonable adjustments to our recruitment process that you need. If you would like to discuss any reasonable adjustments before applying, please contact the recruitment team in the first instance.

If you would like an accessible version of any of the attachments or recruitment documents below or linked to in this advert, please contact the recruitment team who will be happy to assist.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

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

Security Clearance

For ONS the requirement for SC clearance is to have been present in the UK for 3 consecutive years immediately prior to applying and the department will consider eligibility by exception on a case-by-case basis. You will be asked to provide information regarding your UK residency during your application, and failure to provide this will result in your application being rejected.

If you are unsure that you meet the eligibility above, please read the information available on Gov.uk on this link or contact the recruitment email on the advert before applying to discuss, as failure to meet the residency requirements will result in your security clearance application being rejected and any offer of employment being withdrawn.

At the point of SC application, you will need to provide or give access to the following evidence:

• Departmental or company records (personnel files, staff reports, sick leave reports and security records)
• UK criminal records covering both spent and unspent criminal records
• Your credit and financial history with a credit reference agency
• Security Services records

Please note we will reach out to you once the advert has closed to confirm eligibility for this role, this will be via an e-mail. Please check your junk e-mails for any correspondence.

Application Process

Number of Stages: 2 stage process

Stage 1: Application

Stage 2: Interview

Stage 1 – Application

The assessment process at the application stage will be based on your work history, skills, experience, CV, and personal statement. It is important that your application is tailored to highlight the skills, knowledge, and experience relevant to the role.

A personal statement is required at application stage, it will state the maximum word count allowed, which should not be exceeded. Where it is a requirement to make a personal statement, you should provide evidence for each essential skill criterion listed in the person specification. As these criteria are scored, it is advisable to give clear examples for each one, including the impact of your actions, ideally utilising the STAR technique (Situation, Task, Action, Result).

Please note that Success Profiles Behaviour examples are not required at this stage of the application process.

In instances where a high number of applications are received, the sift pass mark may be adjusted, and candidates will be invited to interview based on merit order, i.e., those with the highest scores.

Stage 2 – Interview

If invited to interview, you will be assessed using techniques aligned with the Civil Service Success Profiles framework, covering all behaviours listed in the job advert and any required technical skills.

Interviews will be via Microsoft Teams.

A reserve list may be held for a period up to 12 months from which further appointments may be made.

Important Dates

• Eligibility Security Clearance checks from 06/02 - 13/02. We will be sending you an e-mail with a form to fill out. Please check your junk e-mails for any correspondence.
• Sift will be conducted from 14/02/2026
• Interviews will be conducted from 02/03/2026

For the full terms and conditions of the post, please see attachment.

Please note that all campaigns may be subject to withdrawal at any stage if the internal resource position changes.

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 the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

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.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see theCivil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

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 : Government Digital and Data Recruitment
• Email : Government-Digital-and-Data-Recruitment@ons.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : Government-Digital-and-Data-Recruitment@ons.gov.uk

Further information

If you feel your application has not been treated in accordance with the Recruitment Principles and you wish to make a complaint, in the first instance, you should contact recruitment.complaints@ons.gov.uk. If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from the Department, you can contact the Civil Service Commission

Attachments

2721 Advert 1B Permanent - ONS National Opens in new window (pdf, 83kB)