Senior Service Designer

Job summary

The Government Digital Service (GDS) is the digital centre of government. We are responsible for setting, leading and delivering the vision for a modern digital government.

Our priorities are to drive a modern digital government, by:

1. joining up public sector services
2. harnessing the power of AI for the public good
3. strengthening and extending our digital and data public infrastructure
4. elevating leadership and investing in talent
5. funding for outcomes and procuring for growth and innovation
6. committing to transparency and driving accountability

We are home to the Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (I.AI), the world-leading GOV.UK and at the forefront of coordinating the UK’s geospatial strategy and activity. We lead the Government Digital and Data function and champion the work of digital teams across government.

The Government Digital Service is where talent translates into impact. From your first day, you’ll be working with some of the world’s most highly-skilled digital professionals, all contributing their knowledge to make change on a national scale.

As a designer at GDS you’ll work in multidisciplinary teams, alongside researchers and developers, to deliver world-class, user centred public services.

You’ll help identify and fix some of the toughest problems in public infrastructure and you will be focusing on design of services at scale. You’ll help the government transform the way it delivers services, so that they’re more efficient, simpler, faster and easier to use.

If you’d like to work with us, you’ll become part of a fantastic service design in government community, where we share ideas and challenges with 1000s of designers across the public sector. This is a chance to work on services that matter, at a huge scale, with people who value design.

Job description

We are recruiting for four Senior Service Designer roles.

Two roles (exclusively in Bristol or Manchester) will join the ‘GOV.UK and Publishing’ programme. One of those roles will involve you working with our content designer colleagues to improve the content publishing process. The other role will be working with the GOV.UK design system team to explore how we might cater for a more multichannel future.

Two roles (exclusively in Manchester) will join the Product and Services programme to work in context of the GOV.UK App.

As a Senior Service Designer you’ll:

• lead and coordinate design work in your team, supporting other designers where necessary
• work effectively in a multidisciplinary, agile environment, adapting quickly to changes in requirements, priorities or user needs
• use research and analytics to understand users needs, identify service failures and test different designs
• design collaboratively and in the open, engaging your whole team with the design process and adapting it if necessary
• champion accessibility and inclusion, consider the impact of new technologies and ensure that designs meet legal requirements
• collaborate with designers in other teams and departments, reviewing each other's work and developing shared patterns

Person specification

We’re interested in people who can demonstrate the following skills in their applications:

• experience in designing services and holistic solutions for users in complex environments
• experience of working and negotiating important design decisions with senior stakeholders (internal and external)
• experience in facilitating and engaging with people in a variety of ways (e.g. workshops, co-design activities or documentation)
• experience in making effective decisions with qualitative user research and quantitative data
• an understanding of how to design inclusive, equitable, accessible and sustainable services
• experience of working in an agile, multidisciplinary and collaborative environment
• experience of guiding, supporting and mentoring others.

These skills are based on the ‘Government Digital and Data (GDaD) Profession Capability Framework’ and the relevant ‘Civil Service Behaviours' for this role.

Please read the ‘things you need to know’ section of this job description to understand what the interview and selection process looks like.

Benefits

There are many benefits of working at GDS, including:

• flexible hybrid working with flexi-time and the option to work part-time or condensed hours
• a Civil Service Pension with an average employer contribution of 28.97%
• 25 days of annual leave, increasing by a day each year up to a maximum of 30 days
• an extra day off for the King’s birthday
• an in-year bonus scheme to recognise high performance
• career progression and coaching, including a training budget for personal development
• a focus on wellbeing with access to an employee assistance programme
• job satisfaction from making government services easier to use and more inclusive for people across the UK
• advances on pay, including for travel season tickets
• death in service benefits
• cycle to work scheme and facilities
• access to an employee discounts scheme
• 10 learning days per year
• volunteering opportunities (5 special leave days per year)
• access to a suite of learning activities through Civil Service learning

Any move to Government Digital Service 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

Office attendance
The Department operates a discretionary hybrid working policy, which provides for a combination of working hours from your place of work and from your home in the UK. The current expectation for staff is to attend the office or non-home based location for 40-60% of the time over the accounting period.
DSIT does not normally offer full home working (i.e. working at home); but we do offer a variety of flexible working options (including occasionally working from home).

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

The standard selection process for roles at GDS consists of:

• an initial sift of applications
• if you make it through the sift, you will be invited to a 20 minute screening call where you present a response to a short task sent to you 40 minutes ahead of the call (cumulatively requiring 60 minutes of the candidate’s time on the day)
• if successful, the final stage is a 60 minute remote interview where you take us through 1 or 2 pieces of work from your portfolio and we will ask a series of behavioural questions.

How to apply

If this role is a good fit for you, you must submit all 3 of these for your application to be considered.

1. a cover letter with a 500 word cap, to tell us about you and why you think you are suitable for this role, addressing the points in the “person specification” section above.
2. a CV to show us your work history
3. aportfolioto show some examples of your design work. If it's available online, you can add the URL in your cover letter or CV, or email it as a PDF directly to GDSrecruitment@dsit.gov.uk (referencing your application number). Don't forget to share the password if applicable.

Successful candidates will be matched to the most relevant team based on your skills, experience, and preference. Please note that the ‘Product and Services’ (GOV.UK App) roles are exclusively based in Manchester.

Depending on how many applications we get, there might also be an extra stage before the video interview, for example a phone interview or a technical exercise.

In the event we receive a high volume of applications, we will conduct the initial sift against the lead criteria which is: experience in facilitating and engaging with people in a variety of ways (e.g. workshops, co-design activities or documentation)

In the Civil Service, we use Success Profiles to evaluate your skills and ability. This gives us the best possible chance of finding the right person for the job, increases performance and improves diversity and inclusivity. We’ll be assessing your technical abilities, skills, experience and behaviours that are relevant to this role.

For this role we’ll be assessing you against the following Civil Service Behaviours:

• Seeing the big picture
• Changing and improving
• Communicating and influencing
• Working together
• Leadership
• Making effective decisions

For this role we’ll be assessing you against all of the ‘Government Digital and Data (GDaD) Profession Capability Framework’ skills for Senior Service Designer:

• Design communication
• Designing for everyone
• Designing strategically
• Designing together
• Evidence-based design
• Iterative design
• Leading design

Want to know more about who Government Digital and Data are? Click Here

Recruitment Timeline

Sift completion: 1st September

Phone screening: W/C 8th September

Panel interviews: W/C 14th September

Candidates that do not pass the interview but have demonstrated an acceptable standard may be considered for similar roles at a lower grade.

A reserve list will be held for a period of 12 months, from which further appointments can be made.

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan and the Civil Service D&I Strategy.

Careers event to learn more about the role and application process

We plan to run a careers event for anyone who is thinking about applying to an interaction or service design role to attend, to learn more about the roles and how the application and interview process works.

This event will be held on Tuesday 18th August 2026 at 1700 -1800. Please email GDSrecruitment@dsit.gov.uk to let them know if you would like to attend and the team will send you a link to a video call to join.

Please note that this role requires SC clearance, which would normally need 5 years’ UK residency in the past 5 years. This is not an absolute requirement, but supplementary checks may be needed where individuals have not lived in the UK for that period. This may mean your security clearance (and therefore your appointment) will take longer or, in some cases, not be possible.

For meaningful checks to be carried out, you will need to have lived in the UK for a sufficient period of time, to enable appropriate checks to be carried out and produce a result which provides the required level of assurance. Whilst a lack of UK residency in itself is not necessarily a bar to a security clearance, and expectation of UK residency may range from 3 to 5 years. Failure to meet the residency requirements needed for the role may result in the withdrawal of provisional jobs offers.

Sponsorship

DSIT cannot offer Visa sponsorship to candidates through this campaign. DSIT holds a Visa sponsorship licence but this can only be used for certain roles and this campaign does not qualify.

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

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a basic (or equivalent) 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.The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).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 : gdsrecruitment@dsit.gov.uk
• Email : gdsrecruitment@dsit.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : gdsrecruitment@dsit.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, you should contact gds-complaints@dsit.gov.uk in the first instance.

If you are not satisfied with the response you receive you can contact the Civil Service Commission by email: info@csc.gov.uk Or in writing: Civil Service Commission, Room G/8 1 Horse Guards Road, London, SW1A 2HQ.