Talent Lead

Job Description
Job summary
In UKHSA, we're here to prepare for, prevent and respond to health threats, save lives and protect livelihoods. Our vision is exciting. Through our scientific and operational experience, we aim to protect every person, community, business and public service from infectious diseases and environmental hazards, helping to create a safe and prosperous society.
How we do this is equally important. Our values are key to how we operate. In everything we do, we are impactful, insightful, and inclusive.
Our aim is to create a workplace where all colleagues feel proud and supported, enabling all of us to make a meaningful impact on the health security both in the UK and around the world, while realising our full potential to learn, grow, and innovate. By fostering a culture of continuous improvement and providing the necessary support and resources, together we can lead our organisation towards a successful future.
The Talent Lead is an influential and business critical role that will help shape and influence the strategic direction of how we retain and develop talent across UKHSA, our 6,000+ people.The Talent Lead will support the Head of Talent and Inclusion in driving a strategic direction that appreciates the value of our deep experts, broad generalists and those looking to elevate their careers. The successful candidate will help grow internal talent to meet our future skills needs.
Main duties of the job
The successful candidate will:
- Be customer focused and passionate about talent development. They will know how to harness the power of Cross Government Schemes and internal programmes, to build a culture that values and recognises the benefits of talent management.
- Drive the launch of our new innovative 'Own Your Talent' approach across UKHSA, gaining senior leadership buy-in and working closely with enablers such as the HR Systems team, to ensure a data driven approach that provides the business and strategic workforce teams intelligence for planning.
- Establish and embed a comprehensive Talent offer, maximising the use of Cross Government Talent Schemes such as Beyond Boundaries, Future and Senior Leaders Schemes and the Civil Service Fast Stream, whilst leading Accelerate, our in-house flagship talent programme.
- Work with Heads of Profession, Performance Management, Talent Acquisition and the Capability Team to bring together an eco-system that works as one, enabling a customer centric approach that supports our overall employee value proposition, contributing towards making the UKHSA a great place to work, and a high performing agency.
- Form part of the Culture, Talent and Capability senior leadership team, establishing and maintaining great collaboration across the Heads of Profession, and other key stakeholders across UKHSA and wider relevant Civil Service networks and broader industry.
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About us
We pride ourselves as being an employer of choice, where Everyone Matters promoting equality of opportunity to actively encourage applications from everyone, including groups currently underrepresented in our workforce.
UKHSA ethos is to be an inclusive organisation for all our staff and stakeholders. To create, nurture and sustain an inclusive culture, where differences drive innovative solutions to meet the needs of our workforce and wider communities. We do this through celebrating and protecting differences by removing barriers and promoting equity and equality of opportunity for all.
Please visit our careers site for more information https://gov.uk/ukhsa/careers
Job responsibilities
Continued from above
- Actively support the development of a Culture, Talent and Capability Centre of Expertise supporting the whole of UKHSA and beyond
- Be future focussed, innovative and proactive in adopting technological advancements, external best practice and opportunities to make improvements and efficiencies in ways of working that benefit the UKHSA and its people.
The Talent Lead is an exciting and business critical role which helps to shape and nurture colleagues at all levels to be their best in order that we can deliver a truly effective health protection and security system.
You will be knowledgeable on the latest talent theories and thinking, and act with a continuous improvement mind-set to ensure that we are developing new and innovative methods for talent management.
You will be a highly capable, flexible, driven individual who is able to see the bigger picture as well as having a high level of energy and attention to detail. You will role model the UKHSA values in your leadership style and operate with a curious mind.You will:
- Ensure high standards and expectations of the impact you and the team have on the organisation
- Deliver at pace and with clarity, understanding, responding to and challenging the differing cultures across the groups within UKHSA
- Have the ability to develop lasting stakeholder relationships with strong influencing and negotiation skills
- Understand the development challenges and opportunities across the Agency related to all our professions, including those related to the talent development of under-represented groups and the nuances of leading in an complex, science-led, often operational and sometimes high-risk environment.
You will need to be mindful of, and collaborate on the development of culture, people experience, talent and inclusion within the talent offer. Main Activities / Responsibilities
The job holder will be required to undertake the following duties and responsibilities:
- As part of the Culture, Talent and Development senior leadership team lead and collaborate on creation and delivery of a robust and stretching plan that spans the whole of UKHSA and aims to identify and develop our talent, enable data collection and workforce planning discussions.
- Launch and embed the Own Your Talent approach to talent management that has been developed and will be delivered in-house. You will work closely with key stakeholders such as Internal Communication and Engagement colleagues, to embed a culture of talent conversations, enabling a high performing workforce and strategic workforce planning culture.
- Lead on harnessing the power of Cross Government talent schemes such as Beyond Boundaries, Crossing Thresholds, Future and Seniors Leaders Scheme, tracking progress while also maximising the diversity and experience of candidates.
- Oversight of the UKHSA cohorts on the award-winning Civil Service Fast Stream. This includes the annual bidding process and building a rewarding scheme experience for cohort participants and their managers.
- Broaden and grow Accelerate, our in-house flagship talent programme, aimed at ensuring a diverse pipeline of talent through the organisation. Managing the cohort leads, who are responsible for hands on delivery of the end-to-end programme and working with senior stakeholders including Executive Board Members.
- Delivery of a wide-reaching, innovative, impactful and engaging talent portfolio that is responsive to the needs of the Agency. Appreciating the diverse needs of our customer base, delivering specific initiatives that equip individuals with appropriate skills and facilitate continuous talent development.
- Bringing a customer-centric and commercial ethos to the team, ensuring that the user experience meets expectations and needs, is technology enabled, data driven and drives a continuous talent culture whilst also understanding contract and supplier management.
- Maintaining successful stakeholder relationships with a range of customers at all levels through consistent, honest and thorough communications.
- Horizon scanning and forecasting talent trends and needs so that our offer is continually improving and is responsive to the needs of the organisation and wider society. Exploring and making the case for future technology and tools.
- Ability to clearly present robust recommendations and advice to leaders and colleagues at all levels with confidence and conviction surrounding talent.
- Other duties as appropriate and required for the role.
Essential Criteria
- Experience or strong understanding of developing and embedding talent management strategies.
- Experience of design and delivery of high quality, impactful, strategic workforce related initiatives end-to-end at scale and pace, ensuring value for money and demonstrable return on investment.
- Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, with ability to deliver and influence sometimes complex and technical concepts in an accessible way at all levels, demonstrating professional credibility and an evidence-based customer-focused approach
- Experience of working in a flexible, agile environment.
- Strong project management skills, with the ability to manage multiple priorities and deliver outcomes to deadlines.
- Highly proficient user of technology to enhance ways of working within a medium/large organisation.
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