Commercial Lead

The Home Office has one of the most challenging and critical jobs in Whitehall: to keep Britain safe and secure. We operate at the heart of the Government's agenda, leading on immigration and passports, drugs policy, crime policy, counter-extremism and counterterrorism and work to ensure visible, responsive, and accountable policing in the UK. The challenges the Department faces are significant and can change rapidly in the global environment in which we operate, making this one of the most exciting and stimulating Government Departments in which to work.
The Commercial Directorate manages the conduit between the Home Office and those supplier markets that help us provide key services to the public. It provides strategic commercial services such as market intelligence, procurement and contract management activities and its principal aims are to deliver efficiency savings, support the strategic agendas of our client groups by procuring the right products and services in a timely manner and dynamically managing contracts and suppliers, whilst delivering activities in a transparent and compliant manner.
This is an exciting opportunity to join Home Office Commercial with roles across Missions, Migration and Borders Professional Services, Digital Data and Technology, Grants, and the new Estates teams., In these roles, you will be a true leader, driving development, innovation and creating a cohesive, positive mind-set to deliver great commercial outcomes with real accountability and collaboration with business and project teams. Your key focus will be planning and executing the Category Strategies for goods and services compliant with regulations and governance in support of business strategies.
The successful candidates can expect themselves to be working across a varied portfolio leading procurement and strategy development and be involved working as part of a wider commercial team leading procurement activity to deliver the business objectives.
All roles will involve the opportunity to lead individuals or a small team of other commercial professionals. You will develop and maintain positive relationships with a broad range of internal and external stakeholders and encourage collaborative relationships as appropriate. Your professional expertise and judgement will be relied upon and valued by senior colleagues.
Locations
The successful candidate(s) will be able to agree a contractual workplace from those locations listed in this advert. When selecting your location listed in this job advert please be aware that this will be your contractual base location with a requirement to spend a minimum of 60% of your working time in this organisational workplace. Your time spent on official duties at workplace locations other than your contractual office such as supplier, customer or partner locations required to perform your role is included in the 60% attendance. This requirement will however take into consideration any reasonable adjustments agreed upon appointment for people with a disability, flexibilities agreed for those with specific caring responsibilities, or other similar temporary flexibilities.

Person specification
Procurement:
+ Work with business stakeholders and engage the market to refine requirements and procure critical goods and services which support Home Office priorities, playing a fundamental role in the security and economic prosperity of the UK.
+ Create, maintain, and deliver Category Strategies and Procurement Strategies working collaboratively with Commercial teams and stakeholders developing a deep understanding of all supply markets, category, and business context.
+ Lead and support your team, function, and customers to implement the commercial change program, paying attention to the evolving future pipeline, ensuring it is regularly refreshed and agreed with business teams.
Contract Management:
+ Work with the business to manage Contracts and Supplier Relationships.
+ Create, maintain, and deliver Contract Management Plans working collaboratively with Commercial teams and stakeholders.
+ Lead or support teams in the implementation and embedding of robust Contract Management, aligned to the Government Commercial Organisation (GCO) “Contract Management Guide,” with initial focus on those designated critical contracts.
+ Deliver Home Office Contract Management processes, procedures, and training, in line with the GCO Standards.
+ Act as an assessor of business-critical contracts to ensure compliance, mitigate risk, and maximize value.
+ Analysis and resolution of contractual issues, negotiation, and exercising judgement to making effective decisions.
Leadership:
+ Develop strong strategic relationships with a range of internal and external stakeholders to maximize opportunities to collaborate, achieve efficiencies, improve capability, and promote the procurement profession.
+ Lead or support the development or create opportunities to improve commercial leverage and drive best practice across all areas of Home Office.
+ Provide consistent and clear commercial advice and guidance to internal and external stakeholders and be a key point of contact to the department.
+ Ensure the Department is compliant with all relevant Government, EU and Departmental policies, regulations, and legislation.
+ Develop a commercially focused culture within the team and work to develop relationships with key stakeholders to improve commercial understanding across the business.
+ Proactively support the professional development of all team members, taking responsibility for the ongoing performance and development of self and staff, plus the team's performance.
+ Provide leadership direction, standards, and advice to the wider Commercial department, contributing to the culture of meeting the highest commercial standards and continuous learning and improvement.

Technical skills
We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:
+ Manages Complexity - Be able to demonstrate/evidence balancing the conflicting demands across multiple projects and tasks, including how to prioritise and ensure each task is treated appropriately
+ Commercial Focus - Evidence of working on complex commercial projects involving novel and non-standard commercial & contractual mechanisms, with the ability to identify improvements that deliver greater commercial outcomes
+ Builds Relationships - Evidence of developing and managing effective relationships with stakeholders at all levels in a complex and strategic commercial environment, through effective communication, gravitas, and personal impact
+ Coaching Manager - Demonstrate effective communication both orally and in writing and evidence of being a caring and empathetic manager. Evidence of leading by example, listening to others and confidence at delegating to their team
+ Contract and Supply Management - Evidence of leading on contracts of high value/complexity/reputational risk, ensuring security of supply throughout & demonstrating a focus in managing costs and driving the best value out of contracts, If you are invited to attend a virtual ADC, but for any reason are unable to meet the date outlined then please get in touch with the team at commercialresourcinghub@cabinetoffice.gov.uk as soon as possible. The ADC is booked and paid for in advance by departments, therefore it is only in certain circumstances we are able to accommodate alternative dates.
Details of schemes available are attached in the advert.
For full details of our process, and a likely timeline, please read the explanation provided in the attached candidate pack.
Throughout our selection process, we will make decisions about your capability to do the job, based on evidence you provide against the essential criteria for the role which are detailed in the attached Candidate Pack.
Your application will be reviewed by a panel and should you be successful at sift we will invite you to attend a Virtual commercial Assessment and Development Centre (VADC). The panel will review results of the VADC and determine which candidates will go through to a subsequent final panel interview.
IMPORTANT: If you do not receive an acknowledgement of your application within 2 working days please contact: commercialresourcinghub@cabinetoffice.gov.uk
Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security
Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.
Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).See our vetting charter (opens in a new window).
People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements
This job is broadly open to the following groups:
+ UK nationals
+ nationals of the Republic of Ireland
+ nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
+ nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
+ nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
+ individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
+ Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service
Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service
The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.
We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).
The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.
The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Diversity and Inclusion
The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

Apply and further information
This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans (opens in a new window) initiative.
The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).
Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Please be advised that the Virtual ADC is taking place on 3rd February 2024 and will require a full day's attendance.

As a valued employee of the Government Commercial Organisation (GCO), you will have access to all the benefits the centre has to offer; including flexible working, generous benefits, Career Coaches, Mentors, L&D, a Commercial College, active talent management and, most importantly, access to commercial projects that will far exceed the scale and complexity on offer elsewhere in the UK. For existing Civil Servants:
For full details of the impact on any move across the civil service on your existing terms and conditions, please read the candidate pack. Please note that any move across the Civil Service may have implications on your ability to continue to claim childcare vouchers.