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Job summary

Thank you for your interest in the Head of Environment and Safety Centre role at National Armaments Director group.

We are excited to invite talented and driven individuals to apply for a pivotal leadership role within the NAD Group’s Engineering function. This multi-faceted position is vital to delivering our objectives, overseeing operational management of our Environment and Safety Centre, and acting as a MoD Engineering Authority including Quality aspects responsible for setting technical standards and tools to meet risk, complexity, and operational demands.

We are seeking a senior leader who can influence at the highest levels, energise our engineering workforce, and lead the transformative changes needed to support our delivery teams. We strongly value diversity of thought and background, and encourage applications from candidates of all experiences to help us bring fresh perspectives and innovative approaches.

If you are passionate, innovative, and ready to make a significant impact on Defence outputs, this is an exceptional opportunity to join a truly outstanding organisation. We look forward to receiving your application and hopefully welcoming you to the NAD Group.

Job description

As Head of the Environment & Safety Centre, you will play a vital leadership role in driving excellence across multiple critical areas:

• Provide strong leadership to ensure outstanding Safety, Environment, Quality and Engineering outcomes that support the NAD Group’s mission and objectives.
• Lead the Engineering Authority by setting clear, cross-government strategies and standards that ensure consistent, high-quality delivery. You will develop and enhance functional capabilities—covering leadership, skills, resources, and infrastructure—working closely with government professionals to define the right competencies, induction, and training requirements.
• Act as the MOD’s National Quality Assurance Authority, delegated by the National Armaments Director under NATO’s STANAG 4107. You will define and uphold quality policy requirements across the department and oversee Defence Quality Assurance Field Force activities to monitor industry compliance supporting Defence capabilities and NATO acquisitions.
• Influence and collaborate with industry partners, NATO members, regulators, and MoD Head Office to foster alignment and unlock opportunities for greater cooperation across nations.
• Provide expert advice and insight to the Senior Leadership Group, supporting MoD compliance and delivery as a trusted subject matter expert.
• Serve as the custodian of the NAD Group’s Unified Safety and Environmental Management System (SEMS), ensuring it remains fully aligned with regulatory requirements and best practices. Exploit intelligence with interventions to safeguard the environmental and safety performance across the span of the organisation.
• Champion continuous improvement initiatives across Health, Safety & Environmental Protection (HS&EP), Engineering, and Quality Assurance to enhance efficiency and effectiveness.
• Ensure rigorous compliance with all relevant regulations, policies, processes, and standards to protect the organisation and its people.
• Hold the authority to ‘red card’ any activity deemed unsafe or non-compliant, ensuring swift and appropriate engagement with responsible decision-makers to maintain the highest standards of safety and integrity.

Person specification

To be successful with your application, you’ll need to be able to demonstrate the following essential criteria (please reference this in your supporting statement):

• Significant experience of working in a highly regulated, high hazard and safety-oriented environment.

• Wide knowledge of defence related safety and environmental regulation and legislation.

• Evidence of refined stakeholder engagement that will elicit the confidence of Senior Leadership across the entire UK Defence Enterprise.

• A visible leader, with a proactive commitment to diversity and inclusion and demonstrable experience of creating and maintaining a psychologically safe and inclusive environment.

• Demonstrable evidence of confidently leading people, challenging cultures and leading change.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £87,300, Ministry of Defence contributes £25,290 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 is an external competition and we welcome applications from candidates in both the public or private sector. To apply for this post, you will need to submit the following documents, via the link above by 23:55 on 19 July 2026.​

• A CV setting out your career history, with key responsibilities and achievements. Please ensure you have provided reasons for any gaps.​​
• A Supporting Statement of no more than 1500 words (font Arial, size 12), outlining how you consider your personal skills, leadership attributes, qualities and experience match the essential criteria listed above.​ Applications that exceed the word limit will not be considered. For assistance with Supporting Statements or if you experience any technical issues with submitting your application, please do reach out to the recruitment team prior to the closing deadline. Late submissions will not be considered. ​

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.This role has a minimum assignment duration of 4 years. An assignment duration is the period of time a Senior Civil Servant is expected to remain in the same post to enable them to deliver on the agreed key business outcomes. The assignment duration also supports your career through building your depth of expertise.

As part of accepting this role you will be agreeing to the expected assignment duration set out above. This will not result in a contractual change to your terms and conditions. Please note this is an expectation only, it is not something which is written into your terms and conditions or indeed which the employing organisation or you are bound by. It will depend on your personal circumstances at a particular time and business needs, for example, would not preclude any absence like family friendly leave. It is nonetheless an important expectation, which is why we ask you to confirm you agree to the assignment duration set out above.

Security

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is developed vetting (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

Open to UK nationals only.

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 : SCS Recruitment Team
• Email : DESHR-SCSRecruitment@mod.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : DESHR-SCSRecruitment@mod.gov.uk

Further information

In the unlikely event that you feel that your application has not been treated in accordance with the Commission’s Recruitment Principles and you wish to make a complaint you should, in the first instance, contact DESHR-WSC-PMOCOMPLAINTS@mod.gov.uk If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from the department you can contact the Office of the Civil
Service Commissioners at info@csc.gov.uk

Attachments

Head of Environment and Safety Centre - candidate pack Opens in new window (pdf, 1171kB)