Regional Head, Export Finance Managers – Midlands, Southwest England and Wales

Job summary

The role of the Regional Head is to lead and inspire the regional EFM team and work closely with the other Regional Heads, and the Head of Division to deliver the UKEF Business Plan. The region encompasses the Midlands, Southwest and Wales.

As one of three Regional Heads covering the UK, the post holder will be required to lead the strategic development of the region, plan and manage localised marketing objectives and be a recognised figurehead for stakeholder engagement. Regional Heads are the primary link between the EFM team and Business Group/UKEF leadership, focussed on growth, delivery and customer satisfaction. The post holder will have autonomy to deliver regional objectives, whilst also ensuring close working collaboration across the regional teams as a single national function.

Whilst this role is home based, it will require regular travel across the full extent of the geographic patch advertised, covering the Midlands, the Southwest and Wales, in addition to regular travel into UKEF's office in London. Applicants should therefore be willing to travel independently from a home base as frequently as required to fulfil the specifics of the role.

Job description

The main activities of the role will focus on:

1. Team Leadership - setting and delivery of agreed objectives for EFM teams and involvement in projects and strategy work in the wider UKEF business. Working with other Regional Heads and the Head of Division to ensure the team is structured and resourced to maximise delivery.
2. Regional Business Management - having an understanding of the region and awareness of the opportunities and challenges faced of local businesses looking to fulfil their export ambitions. Growing UKEF’s presence in the region, driving continued improvement and best practice to ensure that we deliver on our Business Plan objectives
3. Stakeholder Engagement - developing, maintaining and supporting key stakeholder relationships (both internally and externally) to increase awareness, customers supported and value within the region

More broadly, activities will include, but are not limited to:

Team Leadership

• Team leadership / management, being a role model for regional UKEF business development. Note: We will not expect Regional Heads to routinely lead on deals.
• Ensuring the regional team has the tools, training, knowledge and capability to deliver agreed goals and promote agility to meet the changing market and business needs.
• Carrying out regular formal and informal performance reviews with direct reports and identify and implement training requirements to allow colleagues to develop their potential.
• Striving to create a positive team culture and promote UKEF as a great place to work.
• Ensuring the team has the capability and confidence to support customers throughout the application journey, working closely with internal underwriting and credit teams and external finance providers to facilitate successful outcomes where appropriate.
• Identifying opportunities to improve our ways of working, and alongside the other Regional Heads and Head of Division, drive continuous improvement

Regional Business Management

• Providing leadership for the delivery of performance goals and wider UKEF Business Plan.
• Developing a clear understanding of the regional business environment and the associated potential for export support, providing focus to where our support will have the biggest impact.
• Operating with integrity and competence to mitigate risk and ensure that we maintain the confidence of our stakeholders.
• Supporting the vision to ensure that we operate as a customer focussed organisation in all that we do.
• Ensuring the regional team works collaboratively across Government, supporting key regional initiatives (e.g. Department of Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, Devolved Administrations etc)
• Monitoring regional activity, customer engagement and pipeline metrics through Salesforce and Power BI, ensuring consistent implementation of contact strategies, customer engagement plans and performance management processes across the EFM network.
• Being accountable for the integrity and accuracy of performance metrics within our customer relationship management system (Salesforce / Power BI).
• Developing a regional marketing plan, with national coordination (in conjunction with the Marketing Division & Business Development Manager).
• Planning and managing the best use of regional resources, e.g. location, regional split, sector specialisms and team structure recommendations.
• Ensuring collaboration with other Regional Heads to promote standardised tools and best practice across the national EFM team.
• Supporting delivery of Government economic and industrial priorities by identifying regional sector opportunities and ensuring focus on areas where UKEF support can have maximum impact.
• Promoting inclusive access to UKEF support by encouraging engagement with underserved businesses and helping to broaden awareness across underrepresented communities.

Engagement

• Being an ambassador for UKEF and raising awareness of products and services, delivered through presentations and meetings.
• Acting as a senior strategic relationship lead for key regional stakeholders, ensuring engagement activity aligns with national stakeholder management objectives.
• Developing and maintaining primary banking, broker and other key stakeholder relationships at management levels and ensuring that more localised relationships are being actively managed by the EFMs.
• Fostering effective relationships across the wider government support landscape, ensuring exporters are signposted to the most appropriate support and opportunities available.

This list is not exhaustive, and you may be required to carry out additional duties according to business needs.

Person specification

Essential

Qualifications

• Graduate level qualification or significant demonstrable relevant professional experience. (A)
• Evidence of continuing professional development. (A)

Knowledge

• An understanding of current international trade practice. (A, I)
• An understanding of the types of finance used by a company (A, I)
• An understanding of Trade Finance and Credit Insurance products (A, I)

Skills/Ability

• Ability to present information clearly and concisely to a variety of stakeholders at all levels, through written communications and speaking events. (A, I, P)
• Effective influencing skills throughout all levels of an organisation. (A, I)
• Relationship Management skills (A, I)
• Business Development skills to maximise UKEF product use. (A, I)
• Ability to understand and interpret company accounts and associated information to assist credit analysis (A).

Experience

• Experience of leading a team or a significant project (A,I)
• Experience of developing and maintaining relationships with high level stakeholders such as Company Directors/owners and Senior Bankers (A, I)
• Experience working with trading businesses of all sizes and developing business opportunities by building relationships and trust. (A, I)
• Experience of delivering effective presentations to large audiences and responding to questions from the audience (A, I)

Other requirements

• Able to fulfil the transport requirements of the role, including a full driving licence and work outside traditional office hours as required. (A)

Qualifications

oGraduate level qualification or significant demonstrable relevant professional experience. (A)
oEvidence of continuing professional development. (A)

Behaviours

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

• Managing a Quality Service
• Leadership
• Communicating and Influencing

Technical skills

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

• Presentation - - linked to the behaviour Seeing the Big Picture on a topic agreed by UKEF and provided to relevant candidates
• Case Study - linked to Line Manager Standard - People Focus

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £72,500, UK Export Finance contributes £21,003 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
• 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

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

We are assessing candidates using Success Profiles and Line Management Standards (see Appendix 1) and across the whole process we will assess your Experience, Technical and Behaviours and Line Manager Standards as highlighted below.

The application must be completed by 23.55 on the day of the closing date for it to be accepted.

Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

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 for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Please ensure that you read through the Candidate Information Pack attached to this advert, before applying.

All applications will be sifted against our essential criteria outlined in the personal specification.

• Qualifications:
  • Graduate level qualification or significant demonstrable relevant professional experience. (A)
  • Evidence of continuing professional development. (A)
• Statement of suitability - you should fully articulate in 750 words how you meet the essential criteria outlined in the person specification within the Information Pack.

For the initial sift your application will be evaluated against:

1. Experience - Application and Statement of Suitability

In the event of a high volume of applications, an initial sift will be carried out on the below essential criteria:

• Ability to present information clearly and concisely to a variety of stakeholders at all levels, through written communications and speaking events (A, I, P)
• Experience of leading a team or a significant project (A,I)
• Experience working with trading businesses of all sizes and developing business opportunities by building relationships and trust (A, I)

If you are successful following the sift stage, you will be invited to an initial interview, via MS Teams; this will include the following assessment:

1. Behaviours/Experience- a formal panel interview where you will be interviewed across all three behaviours highlighted in Appendix 1.
2. Technical - you will be assessed across your technical expertise and acumen, in relation to the essential criteria
   1. Presentation - a topic agreed by UKEF and provided to relevant candidates
3. Line Management Standards
   1. Case Study - linked to People Focus

Details of interview panel members will be e-mailed to all successful candidates who are invited for interview.

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 : UKEF Resourcing Team
• Email : Recruitment2@ukexportfinance.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : Recruitment2@ukexportfinance.gov.uk

Further information

Should you have a complaint or wish to raise any concerns regarding the recruitment process, please e-mail your complaint to the Head of Pay and Resourcing (UKEF) at Recruitment2@ukexportfinance.gov.uk and include “Complaint” in the subject heading. Should you remain dissatisfied following UKEF’s investigation then you can refer your complaint to the Commission - http://civilservicecommission.independent.gov.uk/making-complaint.

Attachments

Candidate Information Pack - Regional Head Opens in new window (pdf, 4388kB)