Lead specialist - appraisal and evaluation

Job summary

The Team:

The Economic Appraisal and Evaluation team is part of the Strategy directorate in Innovate UK. Innovation is a key component of economic growth, and it is the team’s role to ensure that appropriate evidence is collected and interpreted to inform Innovate UK’s decision making through economic appraisal and evaluation. This evidence will show how the overall balance of Innovate UK’s support may be best directed to achieve the benefits that are central to Innovate UK’s strategy.

Job Purpose:

The purpose of this role is to manage the evaluation function across our portfolio of programmes.

• Coordinate and maintain high quality evaluative evidence across IUK. This will involve writing strategic and proportionate evaluation plans for IUK's growth areas.
• Ensure the successful delivery of process, interim impact, as well as final and economic impact evaluations. The Lead Specialist will help to build M&E plans and structure ITT's for external contractors as well as support procurement of these contractors.
• Provide evaluation thought-leadership in IUK.
• Develop and deliver training on evaluation to the wider organisation.

You will lead the wider development of Innovate UK’s capability to create, understand, and use evaluation evidence to inform strategic decision making and design future interventions. You will report to the Head of Economic Appraisal and Evaluation and will need to build close professional links to, and working relationships with, programme teams across Innovate UK and analysts from UKRI, DSIT and other government departments.

Innovate UK is a non-executive public body, so this post offers the opportunity for the post-holder to work in an environment which faces both the public and private sectors. The post will require building an understanding of how businesses work, especially with regards to their innovation activities, and how the public sector analyses the impact of policy.

The successful applicant will be proactive, professional and ambitious, always pushing to create, build and deliver projects through a mix of communications channels. You will have the confidence to operate across busy multi-organisation teams and have the skills to manage a variety of tasks, which will include building relationships with both internal and external stakeholders.

Job description

Key Responsibilities and Accountabilities:

• You will lead the design of Innovate UK’s evaluation strategy. You will manage a programme of process and impact evaluations for Innovate UK activities. You will have knowledge of a broad range of evaluation methodologies, identify which are most suitable for specific programmes, and oversee the delivery of evaluations by independent researchers. You will have a keen understanding of both the Magenta and Green Book which will allow you to easily unpack the validity of evaluation approaches. Activities will include:

• Drawing on best practice to scope and specify evaluations of Innovate UK programmes
• Assess proposals from independent researchers to select high quality evaluations
• Provide day-to-day management of evaluation projects being conducted by contracted researchers
• Provide constructive challenge to such contractors to ensure high standards and robust analyses are delivered
• Developing a coherent communication strategy to enhance the use of evaluations across Innovate UK. We expect this ought to include a range of material, training, community fora, and enhancements to access to evaluations (including through the use of AI).
• Consider how AI may be used responsibly and sustainably by programme teams and contractors to enhance the evaluation process while maintaining high quality standards.

• You will lead stakeholder engagements and undertake analysis that leads to the development of Monitoring and Evaluation plans for public sector business cases. In doing so you will have or develop a strong understanding of the rationale for public support for innovation, and the evidence informing the most effective means of delivering it.
• You will work with the IUK sector leads and their teams to develop sector-wide Monitoring and Evaluation plans which align with a rubric-based approach.
• You will be responsible for the development of a high quality IUK level Theory of Change with the Executive Leadership Board as well as an appropriate contractor.
• You will work with other team members to support government-facing innovation evidence to inform Innovate UK’s policy. This will include working with other research organisations which have similar needs in terms of evidence, as well as engaging with research that can improve our evidence base and understanding of impact.
• You will support the directorate by leading analysis to support innovation systems and policy analysis

This is not an exhaustive list and you might be encouraged to undertake any other duties across the wider directorate, commensurate with the Band and level of responsibility of this post, for which the post holder has the key experience and/or training.

Person specification

Shortlisting criteria

(S) – Assessed at shortlisting

(I) – Assessed at interview

(S&I) – Assessed at both shortlisting and interview

Person Specification:

Experience & Qualifications:

Essential –

Applicants must either have a degree-level (or higher) qualification in a course which contained at least 50% of one of the following (S).

• Mathematics
• Economics
• Statistics and data analysis
• Social Research using qualitative or quantitative methods

Or have considerable experience applying these skills in a relevant work environment

• Knowledge of a range of quantitative or qualitative analysis methods (S&I).
• Broad experience in applying these methods and in interpreting their results (S&I).
• Evidence of strong written and oral communications skills, including explaining technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders (S&I).
• Experience in writing reports, working papers or research publications (S&I).
• Experience in the evaluation of investments within the public sector, using Magenta Book principles and an awareness of Green Book principles. (S&I).

Competencies:

All team members demonstrate compatibility with and capability against our Core Competencies such as:

Analytical Skill - Thinking and Problem Solving – Stakeholder management – Communication skills – Influencing – Self-awareness/self-management – Strategic awareness – Working with others– Project management

The following competencies will be assessed in your cover letter as well as in the interview: Analytical Skill, Influencing, Self-awareness/self-management, and Working with others. Please follow the STAR approach in highlighting your skills in this area in your cover letter. In the event of a high volume of applications, sifting will be done according to Analytical Skill.

Travel Requirements:

Field-based: You will be based at home. There will a requirement to travel (which will be paid for by IUK) from time to time for key meetings or conferences, mostly national, and there is some flexibility in this. Innovate UK staff make extensive use of telepresence tools for meetings to minimise unnecessary travel.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £58,589, Innovate UK contributes £16,973 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

• 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 employer contribution of 28.97%

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

1st interview incl presentation.

Interviews will either take place remotely via Teams or in person face to face.

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.

Medical

Successful candidates will be expected to have a medical.

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

Please note this Post is NOT regulated by the Civil Service Commission.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.

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

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Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name : Recruitment Team
• Email : recruitment@ukri.org

Recruitment team

• Email : recruitment@ukri.org