Purpose of Job

The Office of the Public Guardian protects people in England and Wales who may not have the mental capacity to make certain decisions for themselves, such as about their health and finance. We are an Executive Agency of the Ministry of Justice, set up in 2007 following the introduction of the Mental Capacity Act of 2005. Our organisation has seen rapid growth due to the demand for our services and we now have a workforce of approximately 1,500. It is essential that OPG’s current and future decision-making is built on robust evidence and analysis, and this postholder will lead the multi-disciplinary team that will provide this.

The Insight, Analysis & Performance Team delivers the OPG’s research, analysis of data and corporate performance monitoring and reporting. A Senior Research Manager is required to lead, direct and grow an established team of researchers responsible for generating strategic, yet actionable insights to inform the design and implementation of OPG’s exciting transformation programme (OPG 2025).

You will be responsible for the delivery of qualitative and quantitative primary research projects and to draw conclusions from this work and disseminate vital customer insights across the organisation. This actionable insight and strategic interpretation of our customer and stakeholder data and information will be used to ensure that the customer voice is heard throughout the organisation and used to inform strategic thinking at OPG Board level.

You will be expected to use social science from within and outside of government to provide a quality evidence base to support policy discussions. Working alongside a wide range of stakeholders will be essential to validate research findings and to ensure that customers receive the highest levels of service.

Strong analytical and stakeholder engagement skills are a must, as well as a familiarity with designing and applying relevant research and evaluation methods, and an interest and ability in undertaking ‘in-house’ analysis.

You will lead the team to apply social and market research along with other qualitative methods to deliver user research. This includes advising where research needs to be supplemented by other approaches. You will be experienced in leading research that considers ‘needs not wants’ as well as understanding the observed behaviours of users.

There will be an element of line management required and we would especially welcome candidates who have a background in developing the capability of a team and building professional networks. Candidates will need to be experts on taking data and research and providing this insight that is tailored to internal users, focusing on the pertinent aspects that they need to know.

You will also be working with a range of subject matter experts and technical specialists across a range of projects to ensure that evidence is used to inform decision making. You will be comfortable working in a multi-methodological environment collaborating with senior colleagues from social research and analytics backgrounds (e.g. data scientists and analysts).

Duties and Responsibilities

1. Senior Research Manager

• Co-ordinate and gather customer insight on an organisation-wide level, with close alignment to analytical services, complaints, communications and change management teams in particular
• Manage and co-ordinate the investigation of customer ‘pain-points’, utilising a range of tools including key driver analysis to determine causality
• Investigating the links between customer and business outcomes and ensuring that these are established, measured and tracked
• Utilise critical thinking and SWOT analysis to scrutinise existing services and identify opportunities for policy makers
• Present research recommendations to executive board and senior leadership team to encourage organisational change
• Disseminating key findings of insight and research programmes across the organisation and wider Department/Government in the timeliest way, ensuring that the information is widely understood, actionable and ensures all areas of the business are customer centric
• Adopting a professional interest in developments in the field of research to improve the department’s research capability. Introducing new tools and methodology to continually improve the quality of research delivered in the team
• Create a reliable evidence base for strategic decision making
• Assist in the commissioning and managing of major insight programmes
• Ensuring that all insight, research and evaluation projects fits and informs organisational business strategy, future operating model and any new products and services.
• Communicating insight and research findings outside the organisation where appropriate, to partners and related organisations and collaborating where applicable on joint insight work
• Create an inclusive and productive relationship with MoJ Analytical Services and other customer insight depts. within MoJ and across government.
• To become familiar and compliant with all OPG corporate governance policies.
• Undertake any other duties commensurate with the skill set of this post and grade.
• It is envisaged the successful candidate will become a member of the appropriate research professions in government.
• It is envisaged you will have opportunities for professional development in post through both professional communities.

2. Team working & Line management

• Leadership of a team of research managers, considering commissions from across the business and steering the investigative lens of the team
• Contributing to the leadership of the organisation, through active participation in the senior leadership team, contributing to the corporate goals of OPG.

3. Equality and Diversity

• Ensure the staff and work environment is managed in a positive and non-discriminatory way.
• Positively promote and implement diversity and equality of opportunity in all areas of work.

4. Health and Safety

• To comply with OPG’s commitment to health and safety policies in respect of IT equipment.
• Take reasonable care for own health and safety and for the safety of others and abide by OPG Health and Safety procedure.
• Promote awareness and understanding of legal requirements and the impacts of failure to comply.

Skills

Essential Skills

• Comprehensive knowledge and experience in scoping and managing a range of research projects utilising qualitative, quantitative and evaluation techniques
• An ability to engage with a wide range of internal and external stakeholders, including analytical and policy colleagues at all levels, contractors, and other external experts
• Experience of synthesising and summarising internally and externally gathered insight into cohesive briefings on a range of key topics to inform policy and strategic decisions
• Experience of conducting statistical analysis including SPSS. Good Excel skills and comfortable working with/manipulating big data
• Experience of commissioning research from external providers
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills with the ability to present complex messages to a range of audiences
• Presenting evidence in a range of formats including data visualisation for effective storytelling with data

Essential Knowledge and Experience

It is essential that the candidate has the following skills and experience (which will be assessed at both sift and interview stages)

4+ years conducting social/market/user research

Experience of managing and leading a team of researchers delivering a wide range of user research projects or work

Experience leading user researchers to choose and use the appropriate research methodologies to generate specific insights into user behaviour and needs

Experience of making decisions on information assurance, ethics and relevant safeguarding issues in a user research context

Experience of planning and managing research resource (i.e. people / financial) allocation

In-depth understanding of user-centred design principles and tools

Experience of defining, commissioning and delivering public-facing user testing and research.

Desirable Skills

Relevant academic qualification (e.g. degree that involved social research or other related methods – examples Psychology, Sociology, Anthropology, Criminology, Human Computer Interaction, Human Geography etc).

Application process

This vacancy is being advertised using Success Profiles. Candidates are expected to provide a CV (2 pages of A4 maximum) plus a personal statement of no more than 750 words, setting out how your personal skills, qualities and experience provide evidence of your suitability for the role.

An additional assessment of social research skills may be made on the day of interview – this will be discussed with candidates successful at the sift and invited for interview.

Strengths based analysis

If you are successful at sift, you will be invited to an interview which will follow the Success Profile process. At interview candidates should expect strength based questions and questions relating to the Civil Service behaviours below.

Seeing the bigger picture

• Seeing the Big Picture.
• Making Effective Decisions
• Working Together
• Communicating and Influencing