85697 - Central Secretariat Officer

Location:
National – hybrid working. Some travel to Nottingham, Birmingham, or London may be required.

For nationally advertised campaigns, candidates will be appointed to their nearest Justice Collaboration Centre or Justice Satellite Office. This will be discussed and agreed with the successful candidate(s) on the completion of pre-employment checks.

Contract Type:

Permanent, Full time – flexible working may be available but applicants must be able to work Tuesdays-Thursdays

Overview

The Office of the Public Guardian (OPG) 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 (MoJ), set up in 2007 following the introduction of the Mental Capacity Act of 2005.

OPG is responsible for registering lasting powers of attorney (LPA) and enduring powers of attorney (EPA) and supervising deputies who are appointed by the Court of Protection.

Power of Attorney Services (POAS) processes incoming power of attorney applications on behalf of the Public Guardian, within agreed targets and performance indicators. POAS comes under the Operations directorate of the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG.)

OPG is a fantastic place to work offering a range of development opportunities.  The OPG has signed up to the ‘Time to Change’ pledge which supports mental health in the workplace, as well as recently receiving a health and wellbeing charter accreditation as we are committed to developing a supportive and inclusive environment that reflects the diverse community we serve.

OPG is currently going through an extensive period of organisational change. This will be delivered by our transformation programme – “OPG 2025”. The ambitious plan is about changing the way we provide services. It will help us meet the growing needs of our users, partners and our stakeholders. It will make sure our users experience a better level of support. Overall, it will help us to respond to the changing needs of society. This is so we can better support adults at risk and create high-quality services that are accessible and affordable.

OPG is aiming to have a Digital Power of Attorney in place that meets our customer and stakeholder needs. We aim to have a multiskilled, flexible workforce, working within office/home based locations to meet civil service environment.

Our Birmingham office is located centrally within walking distance to Birmingham New Street and Snow Hill train stations as well as the Mailbox and Broad Street.

Job Description, Duties and Responsibilities -

The successful candidate will work as part of the OPG Central Secretariat Team based in Birmingham  (although the successful candidate can be based anywhere nationally). This will give the successful candidate the opportunity to work at the very heart of the OPG – working closely with the Public Guardian, Deputy Directors, Non-Executive Directors and others across OPG to ensure that all the meetings under our governance framework (such as OPG Board, Executive Committee and many others) take place with good quality papers, are clearly minuted and decisions and actions recorded. It will give the candidate a good overview of all the work that takes place within the Agency and the decisions and discussions that take place to ensure that is delivered – providing a great service for our customers and ensuring OPG is a great place to work. This is also an exciting time to join the team whilst it identifies and embeds improvements to its processes.

Responsibilities include:

•  Taking responsibility for a number of the meetings under the governance framework – ensuring papers are cleared by relevant DD and where necessary the Public Guardian and circulated in a timely manner to meeting members.
• Ensuring that meetings are minuted to a high standard within the agreed deadlines (currently 10 working days)
• Ensuring that all draft actions are circulated to action owners within the agreed deadlines (currently 2 working days)
• Ensuring that all actions and decisions from the meetings and attendees are recorded on the relevant logs and actions are chased within agreed deadlines
• Production of high-quality chairs briefs for meetings
• Any other responsibilities within the team as necessary that are commensurate with the grade of the role
• Communicating and engaging effectively with a range of people, including the Public Guardian, Deputy Directors, others in the senior leadership team and Non-Executive Directors, including monitoring and managing correspondence that arrives in the team mailbox. This will include responding to enquiries promptly and courteously by email, over MS Teams, or in person, referring to the relevant secretariat lead where appropriate. 
• Provide cover for other members of the team in their absence and assist with their workloads as necessary.  
• Identify, discuss and action own professional performance and training and development needs. 

This job description, duties, and responsibilities is not exclusive or exhaustive. It is intended as an outline indication of the areas of responsibility and may be amended in light of the changing needs of the organisation.

Skills & Qualifications

Essential:

• High standard of written English – in order to take minutes of meetings (Lead criteria)
• Ability to multi-task – juggling time and priorities will be essential for this role - and manage own time effectively (Lead criteria)
• Excellent organisational and administrative skills with a close eye for detail
• Stakeholder management skills/relationship building and the ability to work with senior people; 
• Be self-motivated, highly organised and equipped to enable effective working across the team;
• Have strong interpersonal and influencing skills, including the ability to act confidently on their own initiative;
• Good oral communication skills
• Proficiency with Microsoft Word

Desirable

• Evidence of working with senior leaders of staff

• Experience handling sensitive and/or confidential data
• Experience of arranging meetings and supporting events and taking minutes

Application process

This recruitment will follow the Civil Service Success Profile process. Further information on success profiles can be found here: -https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/success-profiles

To apply for this post, you will be asked to complete the following as part of the online application:   

•  A CV setting out your career history, with key responsibilities and achievements. Provide employment history that relates to the essential criteria, and that any gaps in employment history within the last 2 years are explained. The CV should not exceed more than 2 x A4 pages.
• A Personal Statement of up to 750 words explaining how you consider your personal skills, qualities and experience provide evidence of your suitability for the role in reference to the essential criteria.

Interview Process

If you are successful at sift, you will be invited to an interview which will be assessed against the Success Profile criteria. At interview candidates should expect behaviour, experience, and strength-based questions. 

The Civil Service behaviours assessed at interview include the following:

• Delivering at Pace (Level 2) – Lead criteria
• Communicating and Influencing (Level 2)
• Managing a Quality Service (Level 2)
• Working Together (Level 2)

The candidate should also expect strength-based questions at interview.

You will be required to sit a practical written test if invited for interview. Further information including guidance will be provided before your interview.

In the rare case where individuals have exact matching scores, the order of merit will be determined based on the behaviour scores at interview in the following order: 

1. Behaviour – Delivering at Pace
2. Behaviour – Communicating and influencing
3. Behaviour – Working Together
4. Behaviour – Managing a Quality Service

If candidate scores are still exact, the merit order will then be determined on the sift score for the personal statement.

All interviews will be held remotely via MS Teams.

On this occasion, we cannot agree requests for interview reschedules.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview.

Reasonable Adjustments:

At OPG we are committed to ensuring our workplace remains diverse and inclusive place to work. We want to help you demonstrate your full potential whatever type of assessment is used. If you require any reasonable adjustments for any aspect of the selection process, do not hesitate to get in contact with us.

For further information on benefits of working for OPG, such as our Flexible Working Policy and a FAQ, please check the candidate information pack attached to this advert.

If your application for this role is unsuccessful, we may offer you an alternative role at the same or lower grade should one be available.