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Job summary

Who are JNCC?

Established in 1991, we’re the UK’s statutory advisor on issues affecting the natural environment across the UK and internationally. Our primary role is advising all four Governments of the UK. We also work with private sector organisations to support decision making on the sustainable use of marine waters and natural resources around the UK. JNCC is led by the Joint Committee, which brings together members from the nature conservation bodies for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and independent members appointed by the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs under an independent Chair. Support is provided to the Committee by approx. 300 people who bring together scientific and technical expertise, extensive knowledge of policy at global, European and national levels, and skills in working with other organisations. Staff are based in two main offices in Peterborough and Aberdeen.

Why JNCC?

We’re small enough (c.300 staff) that your voice is heard by everyone including the CEO, but big enough that we have all the skills, resources and people you’ll need to get the job done. All our staff are passionate about conservation and making a difference to the world we live in. We have a very flexible, inclusive and welcoming organisational culture. Our Executive Management provides employees with the freedom and tools you will need, and our friendly team will assist you in your role.

JNCC is committed to maintaining employee health and wellbeing, whether it is physically, emotionally, financially or socially, and offers a range of benefits to support employees in this. Such benefits include the option to join the Civil Service Pension Scheme, professional and personal development opportunities as well as an exciting job in a unique environment.

Job description

Post background:

As our Learning and Development Specialist, you will play a key role in delivering JNCC’s learning and development offer, helping to design, coordinate and promote a wide range of development opportunities for staff and managers. Working with colleagues across the organisation and external suppliers, you will identify learning needs, support leadership and management development, oversee learning-related procurement, and manage initiatives such as coaching, mentoring and shadowing. The role also includes delivering in-house training, monitoring participation and evaluation data, and helping to ensure fair and inclusive access to development opportunities.

You will join a small, friendly and supportive HR team where collaboration, continuous improvement and learning are central to how we work. We value sharing knowledge, supporting one another and creating opportunities for everyone to grow. The team meets in person each month, providing opportunities to build relationships, learn from colleagues and take part in development activities.

Alongside your core responsibilities, you will contribute to a range of wider HR projects and initiatives that support our people agenda. This may include developing learning resources, supporting employee engagement activities, reviewing people policies, analysing workforce data, improving HR processes and helping to deliver our People Strategy. These opportunities will allow you to broaden your experience, develop new skills and make a meaningful contribution to both the employee experience and JNCC’s organisational priorities.

As part of our commitment to professional development, there may also be opportunities for us to support you in achieving a CIPD qualification or undertaking other work-related learning.

Person specification

Post Duties:

The key responsibilities of the role are outlined below. However, this is an overview of the role and is not exhaustive.

Procurement and Delivery of L&D activity

• Support the Senior HR Manager in delivering agreed training to meet corporate development priorities, where necessary identifying external providers / resources to meet development needs.

• Support the development and delivery of our talent, leadership and management offer through working with senior stakeholders and external suppliers to identify learning needs and shaping learning interventions to address these, which may include delivery of in-house training sessions.

• Support and lead bitesize learning sessions for managers and team Leaders to develop core management skills and the rollout of HR policies.

• Lead on learning related procurement, including preparing necessary documents such as quote or tender specifications, JNCC or Government Commercial Services Frameworks procurement forms, sending invites for quotes and contract tenders and managing and reviewing responses to quotes and tenders.

• Support the Senior HR Manager by monitoring and updating budget expenditure and flagging variances.

• Manage the Coaching, Mentoring and Shadowing (CoMeSh) scheme

Learner and Stakeholder Support

• Act as a first point of contact for routine learning and development enquiries and requests, providing clear and timely information and ensuring correct processes are followed.

• Attend cross-government Learning Framework calls, providing feedback on actions or updates

• Represent HR on relevant organisational forums to support agreed equity and inclusion related HR and L&D actions.

Communications, Evaluation and Continuous Improvement

• Promote and communicate L&D opportunities through a range of channels, including all staff meetings, newsletters, sharing updates with CPD Champions on monthly calls or via email, targeted emails and Teams channels.

• Support fair and consistent access to learning opportunities, escalating issues or risks where appropriate and monitoring equality of access to training opportunities.

• Collect and collate learning feedback and evaluation data to evaluate impact and identify trends to continuously improve delivery.

• Monitor completion and compliance with mandatory training requirements.

Wider HR Support

• Support other HR activities or project work as required.

Behaviours

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

• Managing a Quality Service
• Making Effective Decisions
• Seeing the Big Picture

Technical skills

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

• CIPD Level 5 or equivalent experience, with demonstrable HR and/or L&D knowledge gained through roles, projects or wider organisational responsibilities. Experience delivering training is essential; Civil Service or similar experience is desirable.
• Highly competent in using Microsoft 365 tools. In particular Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams and use of collaborative tools for training, such as Whiteboards and experience of maintaining accurate records using digital systems.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills and be able to clearly and confidently present information, conveying complex issues clearly and succinctly, tailored to the audience.
• Excellent administration and organisational skills, with excellent attention to detail, a proven ability to work independently and manage multiple tasks with varying deadlines and priorities in a busy work environment.
• Experience of procuring training from external providers and managing finance processes, ideally within the Civil Service or a similar environment. Experience monitoring budgets and maintaining accurate financial records, trackers or spreadsheets.
• A strong commitment to Diversity, Inclusion and Equity, with experience of designing inclusive processes or activities and using participation and feedback data to identify and remove barriers to engagement.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £33,130, Joint Nature Conservation Committee contributes £9,597 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).Equality and diversity

JNCC is committed to creating an environment where everyone feels valued and respected and see this as a good place to work. JNCC has a responsibility to ensure that we have an inclusive culture where discrimination, harassment, bullying and prejudice will not be tolerated. Our selection process is determined on fair and open competition and regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership.

Continuous professional development (CPD)

Employees are encouraged to keep developing skills and professional knowledge.
JNCC has made available, and encourages employees to use, on average, five working days per annum for CPD activities with access to related funding

Leave entitlement

JNCC annual leave allowance is 25 days per annum. After five years’ service, leave entitlement increases to 30 days per annum.
In addition to annual leave, JNCC offers 12 public and privilege days per annum, three of which are explicitly reserved for office closure between Christmas and New Year.

Work/life balance

JNCC supports flexible working hours and practices to help employees strike a good balance between work life and personal life.

Our policies are family-friendly and include flexi-time, flexible working patterns, compressed hours and dispersed working. JNCC also offers paid maternity, paternity, adoption and shared parental leave, over and above the minimum statutory entitlements. Some work/life balance benefits are available following a minimum length of service.

Any move 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/

Civil Service Pension

Employees will have the opportunity to join Civil Service pension arrangements, which include a valuable range of benefits. JNCC makes a significant contribution to the cost of employee pensions.

Employee Assistance Programme

JNCC provides employees with a free and confidential support service which gives unlimited access to information, advice and emotional support to help employees prepare for and manage all of life's ups and downs, events and challenges.

Trade Union

JNCC has entered into a partnership agreement with its recognised Trade Unions: Prospect and PCS, which employees are able to join and be involved with.

Salary sacrifice schemes

Employee Discount Scheme

Civil Service Sports Club

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.

Please use the STARR technique when responding to each of the behaviour and technical questions:

• Situation – Set the scene and provide context.
• Task – Explain your role and responsibilities in the situation.
• Action – Describe the specific steps you took.
• Result – Outline the outcome and achievements.
• Reflection – Explain what you learned from the experience and how it has contributed to your development.

Please note: Should you be successful in progressing to the second stage of the recruitment process, you will be required to deliver a short 3-minute presentation on an HR-related topic. Further details will be provided in advance of the interview.

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

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a 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.

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 : Recruitment Team
• Email : recruitment@jncc.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : recruitment@jncc.gov.uk

Further information

Selection for appointment to the Civil Service is on merit, on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission’s Recruitment Principles. In accordance with the Civil Service Commissioners’ Recruitment Principles, our recruitment and selection processes are underpinned by the requirement of appointment on the basis of merit by fair and open competition. 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 recruitment@jncc.gov.uk in the first instance.

Attachments

2026041 LD Specialist H grade Post Job Description Opens in new window (pdf, 204kB)