Lead Economist - GDS - G7

Location

Bristol, London, Manchester

About the job

Job summary

The Government Digital Service (GDS) is the digital centre of government. We are responsible for setting, leading and delivering the vision for a modern digital government.

Our priorities are to drive a modern digital government, by:

joining up public sector services
harnessing the power of AI for the public good
strengthening and extending our digital and data public infrastructure
elevating leadership and investing in talent
funding for outcomes and procuring for growth and innovation
committing to transparency and driving accountability

We are home to the Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (I.AI), the world-leading GOV.UK and at the forefront of coordinating the UK’s geospatial strategy and activity. We lead the Government Digital and Data function and champion the work of digital teams across government.

We’re part of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and employ more than 1,000 people all over the UK, with hubs in Manchester, London and Bristol.

The Government Digital Service is where talent translates into impact. From your first day, you’ll be working with some of the world’s most highly-skilled digital professionals, all contributing their knowledge to make change on a national scale.

Join us for rewarding work that makes a difference across the UK. You'll solve some of the nation’s highest-priority digital challenges, helping millions of people access services they need.

Job description

The role of Lead Economist is based in the Economic Analysis Team, which is part of the Product Strategy, Planning and Portfolio directorate, and comprises teams which own performance analysis, strategic planning, product strategy development, and economics. This team is a trusted partner, enabling evidence-based decision making, assuring delivery and coordinating the development on well-informed plans and business cases so that Product Group is able to effectively and efficiently achieve its strategic priorities.

Reporting to the Head of Portfolio Planning and Performance, as the Lead Economist you will head up a team of central economists which is developing a common set of standards, guidance and products for the various development teams within the Product Group to implement into product management ensure best practice in relation to evaluating and evidencing the value delivered by their products for users and government. The role also includes supporting the delivery of planning projects that can emerge such as business cases for Spending Review bids or departmental pivoting for crisis management (e.g. COVID-19 pandemic or EU Exit preparations).

You will be providing expert and strategic advice to the wider business, assurance to the Government Chief Product Officer and their Leadership Team, and utilising economic analysis and modelling to assess the viability of new ideas or evaluating the benefits realisation for existing products. This includes working on a high value programme forming part of the Government Major Projects Portfolio. 

The right person will join a well-motivated and dynamic multi disciplinary team working to deliver on our commitments and roadmap. If you care about ensuring vulnerable people can access the services they need, protecting citizens and the public purse against fraud, making it easier and quicker for all of us to get personalised government support and improving policy and service development by harnessing the power of data - this is the role for you.

As a Lead Economist in GDS, you will:

Design and Develop a set of core products and formats which meet the bespoke needs of appraising government-developed digital products, and the benefits, disbenefits and evidence bases associated with delivering them.
Produce and own a central, live and authoritative repository forecasted and realised benefits across the entire product suite in Product Group, which currently stands at over 10 different products.  
Act as a central economic “keyholder” for formal business cases produced by product teams, assuring the economic appraisals produced by teams for quality, objectivity and strategic relevance and providing advice to the senior leadership team.
Provide advice to product teams on monitoring and evaluation, such as by using HMT’s Magenta Book, assuring spending proposals for effective monitoring and evaluation plans, and supporting teams with the development of theories of change.
Build and maintain a strong working relationships with key external stakeholders, such HM Treasury and other Public Sector organisations, to ensure the plans and benefits of GDS are communicated well, understood, and supported with robust data

Person specification

We’re interested in people with:

experience in performing high-quality analysis swiftly in a fast moving, high profile environment
Experience managing a team of analysts/economists
experience writing and producing analytical papers/reports for a senior audience
experience in presenting their work and findings to a group of stakeholders, using a range of technologies and methods to do so
experience of planning and prioritising effectively to meet deadlines, able to manage multiple projects/issues to deliver results at pace
Knowledge of the government green book principles and experience in applying them in practice