3,807 Jobs

Job summary

We are looking for an enthusiastic, organised and self-motivated team player who has experience working in a Risk or Assurance environment and enjoys working collaboratively whilst offering helpful challenge to support our organisation in effectively managing, mitigating and improving Risk Management and Assurance.

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.

The UKSA Board and its Audit and Risk Assurance Committee are highly engaged with the organisation’s risk profile and seek assurance that our strategic risks are being managed appropriately within the defined risk appetite. The Risk and Assurance team support the UKSA in ensuring that we have an effective and connected Risk and Assurance framework that is core to the provision of assurance to the Board, Audit and Risk Assurance Committee and Executive, over the management of strategic risks.

Job description

Your previous experience working in similar environments will ensure you can hit the ground running, with the support of the Risk and Assurance team and risk profession around you.

The risk profession will support you by providing learning and development opportunities, career pathways, tools and resources to help develop your skills and progress your career.

You will bring together expertise in risk, assurance and governance, and will work collaboratively with the Strategic Risk and Assurance managers, risk and control owners, and risk and assurance leads in the business to ensure that we can derive quality outcomes from the risk management process.

This Deputy Strategic Risk and Assurance Manager role will see you supporting the organisation in building its ‘second line’ ensuring that appropriate mechanisms are in place or are developed around strategic risk controls and associated assurance activities.

You will support the Strategic Risk and Assurance managers by working with stakeholders of all levels across the organisation to identify, monitor and manage risk, utilising data to analyse risk appetite, raise awareness, flag early warning of upcoming risks, and support and engage risk owners with their risk portfolio. Alongside this you will be responsible for undertaking assurance reviews which will test the effectiveness of controls and flag areas for future analysis.

You will work with colleagues to create and maintain informative and impactful assurance maps which can be used to adapt and improve assurance activities for our key strategic risks and beyond. You will support the Strategic Risk and Assurance managers by collaborating with risk and assurance colleagues across the organisation and reviewing risk tool data to gain insights into the outcomes of assurance activities to support judgements around the management of our strategic risks.

Role Responsibilities

You will:

• Collaborate closely with colleagues across the business to drive consistency and efficiency, championing the risk and assurance framework, processes and Risk and Assurance culture.
• Work with colleagues to support the development, monitoring and reporting of quality MI and key risk metrics to help support judgements around the management of our strategic risks.
• Take a pragmatic approach with risk and control owners and Risk & Assurance leads to ensure that directorate/operational risks are managed effectively, and proportionate levels of assurance are provided.
• Develop expertise in specific areas of strategic risk, working with the Strategic Risk and Assurance Managers to oversee several strategic risks and supporting them in preparing content for risk and assurance reporting, including deep dives for key governance forums, such as the UKSA Board, Audit and Risk Assurance Committee and the Executive Committee.
• Undertake assurance reviews with an eye for detail and a questioning nature to ensure you get to the root cause of issues or can uncover previously unknown concerns.
• Play an active role in collaborating with risk and assurance leads across the organisation to ensure an understanding of key risks in business areas and programmes to provide a ‘golden thread’ insight for the management of our strategic risks and reviewing key risk tool data.
• Support the provision of risk, assurance and fraud training for key stakeholders across the organisation.
• Monitoring the Risk and Assurance Team inbox, ensuring queries are responded to at pace and in line with the Risk and Assurance Team’s ways of working and framework.
• Ensure Risk and Assurance Wiki pages and hub are kept up to date with relevant information, including eLearning packages for Risk and Assurance.
• Support the ongoing utilisation of the Corporate Risk Tool, providing colleagues with guidance on use of the tool, facilitating access and working on continued maturity and improvements to the tool.

Person specification

Essential criteria

• An excellent communicator, both in writing and verbally in times of challenge, tailoring explanations to a range of audiences at all levels of the organisation.
• Previous experience working within a Risk and/or Assurance function, ideally with an understanding of managing fraud risks.
• Be able to understand and prioritise large amounts of risk data to identify themes/challenges for reporting across the governance structure.
• Self-motivated, taking an active interest in expanding knowledge of areas relating to the role and seek opportunities for improvement through continuous learning.
• Be an advocate for risk and assurance within an organisation, championing corporate approaches and the benefits of using risk management software.
• Experience using Microsoft Office packages and Power Platforms (or similar), with an ability to learn new systems and ways of working, and a working knowledge of using artificial intelligence to improve processes and enhance efficiency.

Behaviours

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

• Seeing the Big Picture
• Delivering at Pace
• Communicating and Influencing
• Working Together

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £41,985, Office for National Statistics contributes £12,163 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).

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.

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.

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

To work at the ONS, candidates must meet both UK right to work and security clearance requirements (where applicable).

If you are unsure whether you meet the appropriate right to work or security clearance eligibility criteria, please refer to the guidance on Gov.uk or contact the recruitment email provided in the advert before applying. Failure to meet these requirements will result in your application being rejected and employment offers being withdrawn.

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, CV, skills, experience, 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, the maximum word count allowed is 1250, which should not be exceeded. 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.

When a high volume of applications are received, the sift pass mark may be adjusted. Candidates will be invited to interview based on their merit order, with those achieving the highest scores being prioritised. Applicants who score below the adjusted pass mark but still pass will be placed on hold and may be invited to interview at a later date.

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.

You will be required to provide a 5-minute presentation at interview. The presentation topic will be emailed to candidates who have passed the initial online application stage, 1 week prior to interview. This presentation will assess candidates against the Success Profiles Behaviour "Seeing the Big Picture."

Interviews will be held online 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

The Sift will be conducted from 6th August.

Interviews will be conducted week commencing 24th August.

Dates are subject to change.

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 : Tim Hughes
• Email : scs.recruitment@ons.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : scs.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 v1-00 Opens in new window (pdf, 83kB)Role1_Standard_Requirements Opens in new window (pdf, 76kB)