Product Manager (Band 2/Grade 7)

Job summary

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is the independent regulator for work-related health and safety. We act in the public interest to reduce work-related illness, death, and serious injury across Great Britain’s workplaces.

Our digital services support our regulatory activities by providing secure, efficient, and accessible online systems that enable organisations and individuals to interact with HSE.

The digital team plays a vital role in supporting both change projects and live services by designing, developing, and maintaining digital solutions that meet user needs and organisational objectives.

An exciting opportunity is available for an experienced product manager to join the digital team to lead multidisciplinary teams throughout the product lifecycle, delivering value to users and the business.

Working Pattern

Part time working hours are available for this role. We can accept part time applicants who can commit to working a minimum of 30 hours per week.

Travel

This post can be based in any of the advertised HSE locations. However, there is the expectation that you will travel to other HSE offices across Great Britain periodically, including the HQ in Bootle, with some overnight stays for team meetings and to meet business need.

For details of HSE locations please see hereHSE Offices.

Job description

As a product manager, you will be working closely with projects, operational teams, developers, analysts, and user experience specialists.

You will lead multidisciplinary teams to transform and maintain our digital services to meet business and user needs, using efficient, and effective, processes and ways of working. You will play a key part in digital transformation within HSE.

Reporting to the head of product, you will be responsible for the quality of one or more products. You will manage your products throughout their lifecycle, working across projects and programmes, as well as business as usual.

Key Responsibilities

• Work closely with projects, operational teams, developers, analysts, and user experience specialists to deliver and maintain effective digital products and services.
• Lead multidisciplinary teams to transform and maintain digital services that meet business and user needs, using efficient and effective processes and ways of working.
• Manage one or more products throughout their lifecycle, working across projects, programmes, and business-as-usual activities, and ensuring product quality is maintained.
• Identify opportunities to improve business outcomes, enhance benefits, and continuously improve the quality, capability, and efficiency of products and services.
• Advocate for the user by understanding user needs and business goals to frame problems, support solutions, and set priorities for delivery teams.
• Identify opportunities to improve user and business outcomes through continuous improvement of products, services, and ways of working.
• Support digital transformation within HSE by ensuring products deliver value and meet organisational and user requirements.

Person specification

Essential Skills and Criteria:

• Demonstrate an understanding of leading the development of complex products within established governance frameworks, including project, change, and design governance.
• Knowledge of agile working in a multidisciplinary team, and supporting others to work in an agile way with an understanding of how the needs of the team and the product may vary between the different phases of a product lifecycle.
• Interpersonal skills with the ability to understand, empathise with, negotiate and influence individuals and groups.
• User focus with knowledge of applying insight and user feedback to evidence user needs, balanced against cost and value for the organisation.
• Awareness of working within constraints. You can anticipate how constraints might change and know when to challenge or remove them.
• Exposure to working with operational teams in a regulatory environment to deliver digital change to support operational efficiency.

Hybrid Working

At HSE, we are proud to be able to offer our people the opportunity to work in a hybrid way which combines working from home and the office. This is a voluntary, non-contractual arrangement, and your allocated office will be your contractual place of work.

There will be a requirement to travel to the office for various activities, e.g., collaborative working, supporting and training colleagues. If hybrid working is suitable for you and your role, you will be expected to attend the office, or other business-related site, for 60% of your working week. The arrangements will be determined primarily by business need, but personal circumstances and other relevant circumstances will also be taken into account.

Therefore, we would encourage candidates to consider if the commute from home to the office is a feasible distance to travel before making an application. Please note that if you are successful, hybrid working will be discussed prior to taking up the post.

Qualifications

Applicants must hold a recognised qualification in Agile methodology or an equivalent certification. Examples include Certified ScrumMaster (CSM), Professional Scrum Master (PSM), AgilePM, SAFe, PRINCE2 Agile, PMI Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP), or an equivalent Agile qualification, or have relevant experience.

Behaviours

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

• Communicating and Influencing
• Changing and Improving
• Making Effective Decisions

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £62,898, Health and Safety Executive contributes £18,221 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity

We invest in our people with;

• Competitive rates of pay
• Access to the highly competitive Civil Service Pension Scheme to which HSE contribute 28.97% far more than in the private sector.
• Family friendly policies and working hours to help balance your home life and career
• Carer friendly policies to help create a supportive working culture
• 185 hours annual holiday increasing to 222 hours after 5 years' qualifying service, plus public holidays and 1-day Civil Service privilege leave (recorded as 7.4 hours in addition to your annual leave balance)
• Parental leave benefits
• As a member of HSE you will gain access to a wide range of fantastic benefits that you can take advantage of such as the Cycle to Work Scheme, E-Gift Cards, and Vouchers via our partner EdenRed.

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, Strengths and Experience.

Test Information

Please be advised that the tests ARE NOT timed.

Upon submitting your short application form, you will be invited to complete a Civil Service Strength Test.

Please complete the online tests as soon as possible, within 24-48 hours is recommended, to allow time to complete your full application.

If you successfully pass the test, you will then be invited to complete the final stage of your application.

You must complete the online tests and your full application form by noon on the 9th November 2026. If you fail to complete the online test and full application form before the deadline, your application will be withdrawn.

Guidance for the test will be available when you are invited to take the test. The tests are administered online and accessed via the CS Jobs website.

There will be maintenance for online tests on Sunday 1st November 2026. This means you will be unable to access the online tests between 4pm and midnight. Your progress will be saved, and you will be able to continue once the tests are available again.

Application Information

As part of your application, you will be invited to complete an anonymised CV which should include your career history, experience, and qualifications.

Please ensure you tailor your CV to match the Essential Skills and Criteria as listed within the advert.

You will also be asked to complete an anonymised Personal Statement, of no more than 1000 words which demonstrates how you meet the Essential Skills and Criteria of the job advert.

Application Guidance

Please access the following link for guidance on how to apply and how to complete a Personal Statement How to Apply

Please access the following link for guidance and further information on the Civil Service Tests, including practice tests: Civil Service online tests - GOV.UK

Sift Information

The sift will take place week commencing 9th November 2026 when you will be assessed on your CV and Personal Statement.

IMPORTANT: Please note an initial sift will be conducted on your CV. If you meet the benchmark for the CV element, you will be progressed to a full sift in which the Personal Statement will also be scored. If you do not meet the standard for the CV, you will not receive a score for your Personal Statement.

Interview Information

Interviews will take place week commencing 23rd November 2026 when you will be assessed against the behaviours detailed within the job advert and your experience. You will also be asked strength based questions.

The lead behaviour, Communicating and Influencing, will be used in the event of a tie-break.

Sponsorship

This role is not open to application from those who will require sponsorship under the points-based system. Should you apply for this role and require sponsorship your application will be rejected, and any provisional offers of employment will be withdrawn.

Further Information

Please note that a Reserve List will be held for the period of up to 12 months. There is no guarantee you will be offered a role from our reserve lists, so if you see a vacancy on Civil Service Jobs that you are interested in, we recommend you apply.

HSE reserve the right to conduct additional checks, including Google and social media checks, when recruiting candidates into a role within HSE. These checks will be carried out in line with the Civil Service Commission Principles and, if used all candidates will be subject to these additional checks.

From 23rd June 2025, if you are successful at interview, as part of your pre-employment checks, HSE’s Recruitment Team are required to check your details against the Internal Fraud Hub (IFH), using your personal details – name, NINO, and date of birth. If you are included on the database, you will be refused employment. If you believe that there has been an error in the inclusion of your data and wish to make an appeal, please contact the CO email box internal.fraud@cabinetoffice.gov.uk.

Details of the types of internal fraud/dishonesty covered by this process are defined by the Cabinet Office and can be found here Internal Fraud Register privacy notice - GOV.UK

It is the candidate’s responsibility to ensure they are aware of the terms and conditions they will adopt should they be successful in their application. For a summary of HSE terms and conditions as part of Civil Service Reform, please see the attached HSE Terms and Conditions document.

Progression through pay ranges is subject to annual pay awards as permitted within annual Civil Service pay remit guidance and negotiations with Trade Unions.

HSE is proud to be a part of the Disability Confidence Scheme (DCS). As a Disability Confident employer, we positively welcome applications from disabled people. We are committed to making workplace adjustments to ensure anyone can participate in the recruitment and selection process.

If, during the application or interview process, you require any assistance due to a disability or a medical condition, please contact us at the email address below to discuss how we can support you. For example, if you have a disability, and you need an application form in an alternative format or you would like to know more about our recruitment process, please contact: HR.Resourcing-Team@hse.gov.uk

If successful in securing your role, HSE can provide suitable workplace adjustments to support you throughout your career with HSE.

Any move to HSE 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 here.

Please note, if you are a current civil servant and you are currently undergoing any of the following formal actions your application will not be progressed any further;
Formal discipline action, any formal action regarding attendance, poor performance or any restriction of duties as a result of disciplinary action.

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

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a basic (or equivalent) criminal record check.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 : Christine Bridge
• Email : OSD.DST@hse.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : HR.Resourcing-Team@hse.gov.uk

Further information

If you believe that Civil Service Commission principles of selection for appointment on merit on the basis of Fair and Open competition have not been met, you can raise a complaint by emailing: HR.Resourcing-Team@hse.gov.uk or by writing to HSE at the following address:
HR Resourcing Team, 2.3 Redgrave Court, Merton Road, Bootle, Merseyside, L20 7HS. If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from the Department, you can contact Civil Service commissioners:
https://civilservicecommission.independent.gov.uk/code/civilservicecode…

Attachments

HSE Terms and Conditions - CSJ Advert Annex Opens in new window (pdf, 116kB)