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Job summary

The Director of Dispute Resolution (DR) leads over 550 colleagues across Great Britain working on over 150,000 individual cases and c.400 collective cases each year. The purpose of the DR Directorate is to be the leading experts and practitioners in workplace dispute resolution making a real difference to our customers and the British economy. The Director is accountable for our performance as Britain’s foremost provider of workplace dispute resolution services. This is a challenging leadership role to deliver a quality service under pressure – we handled a 27% increase in individual dispute casework in 2025-6 with 12.5% more staff while still hitting our performance targets. We expect similar caseload increases this and next year while overall Acas faces diminishing resources in real terms. We are trialing a range of digital and AI-enabled tools to improve productivity and the Director is responsible for modernising our service while maintaining and improving quality of outcomes.

In this role you will also further raise Acas’s profile, influencing and developing our reputation as trusted experts in the field of conflict management, dispute resolution and employment relations. You will lead the successful delivery of the Acas collective dispute resolution services and will advise and support the CEO on key sensitive or high-profile collective disputes. You will work closely with Executive Board colleagues to support wider policy thinking in this field and support the Chair in her work raising Acas’s profile.

This vacancy arises at a time of significant change in workplace rights and employment relations. The Government is implementing the Employment Rights Act 2025 and this role involves frequent dialogue with Whitehall Departments looking at whole system reform across conciliation, employment rights and the Employment Tribunal service.

Job description

You will be experienced and knowledgeable in employment relations, and/or you will have the skills which characterise conflict resolution i.e. able to listen, reason and persuade where needed. You will be confident in consulting and collaborating with trade unions and employer stakeholders, understanding how to create successful outcomes for parties in dispute, and understanding how to guide and support high profile cases. The post holder will be resilient under pressure of high workloads and able to operate under scrutiny. Strong leadership is vital to this role, setting a clear direction and conveying a persuasive vision. You will engage people at all levels in the organisation and build capability and future sustainability.

As a member of the Acas Executive Board (six Directors and the CEO), you will influence Acas’s strategic direction and provide corporate leadership to the whole organisation. You will promote Acas’s reputation and increase its influence through engagement with key stakeholders, representing the organisation in a range of external forums. You will role model Acas behaviors, including the Acas Leadership Way, leading by example in supporting a positive workplace culture, collaboration and innovation.

Main Responsibilities

• Lead the strategic direction, performance and transformation of Acas’s individual dispute resolution services, ensuring the organistion remains the leading authority in workplace dispute resolution. Drive service modernisation, digital innovation and productivity at scale whilst delivering against our 5-year strategy.
• Lead Acas’s Collective Dispute Resolution function shaping individual relationships with key national stakeholders, including employer bodies, trade unions, government departments and others. Ensure Acas is positioned at the centre of emerging industrial relations issues, leveraging insights from collective disputes to inform policy, strengthen organisational influence and enhance our reputation as the trusted authority on workplace conflict resolution.
• Be a Thought Leader in demonstrating that Acas “walks the talk” on good workplace relations and the productivity benefits best practice brings. This will include active participation in the development of Government policy looking at whole system change to Employment Law enforcement and best practice adoption.
• Lead a diverse workforce through change at pace working closely with our Trade Unions and colleagues across Acas
• Promote a culture of inclusion and equal opportunity, enabling colleagues to feel empowered to innovate and grow, whilst promoting constructive feedback and challenge without fear of censure.
• Influence Acas strategic direction and provide corporate leadership as a member of the Acas Executive Board.
• Promote Acas’s reputation, credibility and influence through engagement with key stakeholders and represent the organisation in a range of external fora.
• Report to the Acas Council on DR service delivery.
• Senior Responsible Owner of Ambition 3: Resolve of the Acas 2025-30 strategy including sustaining our record high settlement rates of above 70% for individual and 90% for collective conciliation and reduce the average cost per individual dispute resolution case by 20%.

Person specification

Essential Criteria

• You will provide visible leadership across the organisation, driving operational excellence, continuous improvement, and a culture that empowers teams to innovate and respond to changing user needs.
• Track record of improving productivity and redesigning operational services to deliver increased demand and better outcomes within constrained resources.
• Experience leading large and complex workforces through significant organisational change, ideally within unionised or employee-represented environments.
• Track record of managing workplace conflict, dispute resolution and building sustainable employment relations.
• A proven ability to lead delivery, manage complex issues, and drive forward business outcomes, with a focus on data and insight to increase customer responsiveness.
• Outstanding interpersonal, communication and influencing skills, with an ability to operate credibly at senior executive level and influence complex stakeholder groups across business, government and representative bodies.

Desirable Criteria

• Senior experience in employment relations negotiations.
• Experience of digital service transformation and AI enhancement of services.
• Evidence of operating successfully at board level in an organisation of comparable size to Acas; and of influencing senior stakeholders across Government and/or business and trade union networks.
• Demonstration of strong systems thinking capabilities, with the ability to understand and navigate complex interdependencies across organisational processes, technologies, and stakeholder groups.

Behaviours

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

• Leadership
• Changing and Improving
• Managing a Quality Service
• Communicating and Influencing

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £86,000, Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service contributes £24,914 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).

We’re big believers in rewarding people for the amazing work they do, take a look at some of the fantastic benefits we offer:

• Learning and Development;
• Health and wellbeing;
• Pension scheme;
• Cycle to work scheme;
• Interest free season ticket loans;
• Volunteering opportunities.

Could you ask for any more?

You’ll have access to a Lifestyle website, where you’ll be able to grab savings over a wide range of products from holidays to your weekly shop.

To find out more please check out - Working for Acas

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.

Selection Process

Acas has engaged the services of Berwick Partners (an Odgers company), to whom applications should be sent by the closing date of Monday 31st August. Applications can be submitted online at ACAS-Director of Dispute Resolution

In order to apply, please submit the following:

1. A CV - setting out your career history, highlighting specific responsibilities and achievements that are relevant for this role, including details where budgets and numbers of people managed, relevant achievements in recent posts, together with reasons for any gaps within the last two years.
2. A Statement of Suitability – (maximum 2 sides of A4, 12 point font) setting out how your skills, experience and personal qualities make you suitable for the role. Please provide clear evidence, supported by specific examples, demonstrating how you meet the essential criteria, and where applicable, the desirable criteria outlined in the person specification. Please state which Acas office would be your preferred base.
3. Diversity Monitoring - All candidates are also requested to complete an online Diversity Monitoring system, which will be found at the end of the application process.

Anticipated Timeline:

Advert closing date: Monday 31 August at 23:55

Preliminary Interviews with Berwick Partners: W/C 7 & 14 September

Shortlist decision: W/C 21 September

Leadership assessments: W/C 28 September

In Person Final Interviews: W/C 12 October in the Acas London Stratford office, this will include a short presentation.

Recruitment Principles and Candidate Support

Name-Blind Recruitment

Acas operates a name-blind recruitment process. Candidates are required to remove personal information, including their name and other identifying details, from CVs and supporting statements. Applications will be reviewed against the published criteria only.

Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) and Redeployment Interview Scheme (RIS)

Candidates wishing to be considered under the Disability Confident Scheme or Redeployment Interview Scheme should indicate this during the application process. Eligible candidates will be identified and tracked throughout the recruitment process to ensure the schemes are applied consistently and in accordance with Acas policy.

Reasonable Adjustments

Acas is committed to providing an inclusive recruitment process. Candidates requiring reasonable adjustments at any stage of the process are encouraged to notify the recruitment team and Berwick Partners via scsrecruitment@acas.org.uk and heather.mcquillan@berwickpartners.co.uk. Requests will be recorded, managed and monitored throughout the campaign to ensure appropriate support is provided.

Please review the attached Candidate Pack for further details.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.This role has a minimum assignment duration of 3 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 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.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

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 : Berwick Partners
• Email : Alex.Albone@berwickpartners.co.uk.

Recruitment team

• Email : SCSrecruitment@acas.org.uk

Further information

If you feel your application has not been treated in accordance with the Code and you wish to make a complaint, you should contact us on HRRecruitment@acas.org.uk in the first instance. If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from us, you can contact the Civil Service Commission.

Attachments

Director of Dispute Resolutions Candidate Pack - July 2026 Opens in new window (pdf, 385kB)