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Strategic Design Lead

Employer
Citizens Advice
Location
London
Salary
£55,908 plus + £3,520 London allowance p.a.
Closing date
28 May 2019

Fixed Term Contract for 2 years

The role

We’re looking for a Strategic Design Lead to lead our approach to designing and embedding improved end-to-end services that support the network of 280 local Citizens Advice in England and Wales. You will drive a design-led approach to developing support services that are user-centred, meet organisational objectives, and align with Citizens Advice’s strategic ambitions.

You will

  • be an experienced design practitioner, expert in service design, with a solid understanding of other disciplines such as user research, UX, content design, and visual design
  • work with multi-disciplinary teams, senior leaders and the business to solve complex organisational-level problems that meet our strategic objectives
  • be comfortable working across the spectrum of macro to micro - from helping senior leaders to shape the organisation’s strategic objectives, to supporting design activities across a number of workstreams, down to ‘rolling up your sleeves’ and leading or independently contributing to the design of a particular product or service
  • frame, define and lead on solving complex or undefined problems, supporting teams to conceptualise, design, prototype, and deliver services
  • use agile approaches such as Lean UX, design sprints or ‘lean startup’ to rapidly build, test, learn and iterate in both a digital and non-digital context
  • understand the need to work within constraints (such as time, budget, capability, and technology) and adapt accordingly
  • regularly work with staff and volunteers across the national business and the wider network
  • facilitate workshops and presentations at all levels of the business, including with the Executive Team and Trustee Board
  • engage staff, senior leaders and users in order to build trust and buy-in to design-oriented approaches, many of which will feel different and new to people across the organisation
  • be curious and keen to develop you and the team professionally, both within design and beyond your field.

Building better services requires us to transform the way we work. Our approach to transformation draws upon design concepts that are familiar at the product and service level - such as user research, rapid prototyping, build-test-learn, and agile multi-disciplinary delivery teams - and extends them to strategic organisation design and change.

The programme team will look to you for leadership, coaching and advice on all aspects of design across multiple workstreams. You will play a central role in leading, developing and embedding this approach in the programme and across the business, grounded in Citizens Advice’s wider strategic context.

This is a new, senior role, part of a multidisciplinary transformation programme that encompasses multiple workstreams. You will be expected to line manage a small number of staff including user researchers and service designers.

More detail on the role is available in the Job Pack, available on our website.

Working at Citizens Advice

Do you want to work for an organisation that makes a difference, every single day, to people from all walks of life? The people that turn to Citizens Advice need help overcoming an obstacle in their lives – from debt to evictions to trouble at work – and you can be key to them getting the support they need in the quickest, easiest, and most effective way.

Last year, Citizens Advice helped 2.6 million people face-to-face, by phone, email and webchat, and we received 25 million visits to our digital advice content. We solve 7 in 10 clients' problems, and 4 in 5 tell us that advice improved their lives.

At national Citizens Advice, we provide advice direct to clients through our digital content, and we support a network of 280 local Citizens Advice across England and Wales - each an independent charity. Our services are provided by 23,000 trained volunteers and 7,000 paid staff.

Our advice changes lives, and it generates significant social value. In 2017/18, our advice saved the public purse £435 million, generated £2.7 billion in financial outcomes for clients, and £2.6 billion in wider economic and social benefits such as wellbeing, participation and productivity. You can read more about our impact here.

We are looking for people to help us improve and transform our organisation. We can offer you the opportunity to make a genuine impact and create lasting change within an organisation that makes a difference in the lives of millions of people every year.

Overview

Our support to the network of local Citizens Advice covers a wide range of functions and includes operational and governance support, advice content, IT infrastructure, client management systems, quality assurance, and training. This area of our business has an annual budget of over £10 million and more than 160 FTE across multiple teams.

You’ll be an integral part of a high profile, strategically important programme of change; working in a multi-disciplinary, cross functional team, leading the design of services across multiple workstreams.

The programme team is responsible for working with the business to transform the way we support the local Citizens Advice network. The team requires skills in strategy development, business analysis, service design, user research, process transformation and agile delivery.

Closing date: 11.59pm Tuesday 28 May

Interviews: First round interviews are expected to be held on 10 and 11 June 2019.

Second round interviews are expected to be held on 18 June.

Candidates successful for first round interviews will be asked to make a short presentation in response to a case study that will be provided in advance.

Important: Candidates must submit a CV of no more than 2 pages, and a 1 page cover letter that tells us:

  1. Why you are a good fit for this role at Citizens Advice, and
  2. How your design expertise can help us to deliver effective strategic change.

To apply, please visit our website.

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