Senior Technical Officer – Global Health Security

Job summary

UKHSA is seeking a Senior Technical Officer to join the Global Health Security (GHS) team within the Global Health Protection Directorate. This is an exciting opportunity to strengthen health security by helping ensure UKHSA's global-facing activity is coherent, evidence-led and translated into action supporting UK readiness and decision-making.

The GHS team is a strategic and technical hub, improving coordination, prioritisation and delivery across UKHSA's all-hazards global health security portfolio. The successful candidate will support cross-agency planning and coordination, governance and reporting, and help translate lessons, insights and evidence from international engagement into practical outcomes supporting UK health security.

Working with technical experts, policy colleagues and partners across government, the post holder will develop high-quality briefings, papers and evidence-based products. They will engage international stakeholders, including multilateral organisations and priority bilateral partners, supporting delivery aligned with UKHSA's global and domestic priorities.

This fast-paced, varied role requires strong stakeholder, programme and project management skills and the ability to work across organisational boundaries. The successful candidate will drive practical outcomes and improve how UKHSA plans, delivers, monitors and learns from global health security activities. Occasional national and international travel may be required.

Working for your Organisation

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 description

• The Senior Technical Officer will join the Global Health Security team within UKHSA's Global Health Protection Directorate. The team strengthens UK health security by ensuring UKHSA's global-facing work is coherent, evidence-led and supports UK readiness and decision-making. As a strategic and technical function, it supports coordination, prioritisation and delivery across UKHSA's global health security activities.
• The post holder will support planning, coordination and monitoring across the Global Health Security programme, maintaining delivery plans, tracking milestones, managing actions, risks and dependencies, and communicating progress to stakeholders. The role requires a structured approach to programme and project management.
• A core aspect of the role is developing effective relationships across UKHSA, wider government and external partners. The successful candidate will work with senior stakeholders, supporting collaborative delivery and shared objectives across organisational boundaries.
• The role combines coordination with direct technical contribution. The post holder will lead or support high-priority technical work with subject matter experts, developing and quality assuring evidence-based briefings, summaries, reports and papers supporting decision-making and UKHSA's global health security objectives.
• The successful candidate will support governance and senior meetings, including convening meetings, coordinating contributions, preparing papers and records, and tracking actions to completion. The role requires excellent communication skills and the ability to present complex information clearly to senior audiences.
• The post holder will engage with international stakeholders, including multilateral organisations and priority bilateral partners, supporting coherent UKHSA engagement, capturing insights and translating these into practical actions supporting UK priorities. They will work with global strategy and partnership teams to align activity with UKHSA's global and domestic objectives.
• The role includes supporting consistent approaches to delivery, monitoring and reporting, maintaining templates, trackers and tools for programme management, information sharing and organisational learning. The post holder will support continuous improvement, strengthening ways of working and applying lessons learned.
• This fast-paced role requires managing competing priorities, responding to emerging issues and changing deadlines while maintaining quality and professionalism. The post holder may support time-limited projects or surge activities across the Directorate and wider agency. Success will be demonstrated through high-quality outputs, strong stakeholder relationships and improvements in how UKHSA plans, delivers, monitors and learns from its global-facing work. Occasional national and international travel may be required.

Main duties of the job

• As a Senior Technical Officer, you will support delivery of UKHSA's Global Health Security portfolio, coordinating and monitoring programmes and projects and managing plans, milestones, actions, risks and dependencies to keep delivery on track.
• You will build effective relationships across UKHSA, wider government and external organisations, working with senior stakeholders on shared priorities. The role combines programme coordination with direct technical contribution, leading or supporting high-priority work with internal and external subject matter experts.
• You will produce and quality assure evidence-based outputs, including briefings, summaries, papers and other products for internal and external audiences, and support governance and senior meetings by commissioning contributions, preparing papers and records, and ensuring actions are completed.
• Working with international counterparts, multilateral organisations and priority bilateral partners, you will support coherent UKHSA engagement, capture and communicate insights and translate them into practical next steps, working with global strategy and partnership teams to align with organisational priorities.
• You will promote consistent ways of working, organisational learning and improvement, responding effectively to changing priorities and emerging demands while maintaining high standards of quality and stakeholder engagement.

Please note this list is not exhaustive.

Person specification

Essential Criteria:

• Educated to a minimum of Bachelor’s degree level or equivalent experience within a health science subject (human health, animal health or environmental health), international development or another relevant field.
• Demonstrable experience of developing and maintaining effective stakeholder relationships and working collaboratively with others to achieve shared goals, including with senior colleagues and partners
• Significant project or programme management experience, including planning, tracking delivery to milestones and managing actions, risks and dependencies.
• Experience, appreciation and understanding of the public health, wider health or public sector and awareness and interest in international and global health issues
• Ability to work effectively within a team, respecting others and learning from their contributions, with a strong commitment to equality, equity and inclusive ways of working (including cultural sensitivity and self-awareness).
• Excellent interpersonal, presentation and communication skills (oral and written), including drafting clear briefings and written product, and quality-assuring contributions from others for senior audiences.
• High level of IT literacy in MS Office software packages

Desirable Criteria:

• Understanding of UK government departments and intergovernmental organisations involved in global health activities
• Demonstrable global health or international health project delivery experience including working with government departments and international partners at all levels
• Demonstrable experience supporting senior governance processes, including commissioning inputs, drafting high-quality papers/records for senior decision makers, and tracking actions through to completion.
• Experience working in a matrix environment, coordinating delivery across multiple teams without direct line management authority.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £46,310, UK Health Security Agency contributes

£13,416 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme.

Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

This vacancy will be assessed using a competency-based framework which will assess your qualifications, knowledge and experience and / or skills and abilities outlined in the essential criteria.

Stage 1: Application & Sift

Competency Based

You will be required to complete an application form. You will be assessed on the listed 7 essential criteria, and this will be in the form of a: 

• Application form (Employer/ Activity history’ section on the application) 
• 750 word supporting statement.

This should outline how you consider your skills, experience and knowledge provide evidence of your suitability for the role, with reference to the essential criteria.

You will receive a joint score for your application form and statement. (The application form is the kind of information you would put into your C.V –please be advised you will not be able to upload your CV. Please complete the application form in as much detail as possible). Please do not email us your CV.

Healthjobs UK has a word limit of 1500, but your supporting statement must be no more than 750 words. We will not consider any words over 750 words.

Longlisting:

In the event of a large number of applications, we will longlist into 3 piles of:

• 1. Meets all essential criteria
• 2. Meets some essential criteria
• 3. Meets no essential criteria

If used, the pile(s) ‘Meets all essential criteria’ will proceed to shortlisting.

Shortlisting:

In the event of a large number of applications we will conduct an initial sift, on the lead criteria of:

• Significant project or programme management experience, including planning, tracking delivery to milestones and managing actions, risks and dependencies.
• Demonstrable experience of developing and maintaining effective stakeholder relationships and working collaboratively with others to achieve shared goals, including with senior colleagues and partners.
• Excellent interpersonal, presentation and communication skills (oral and written), including drafting clear briefings and written product, and quality-assuring contributions from others for senior audiences.

Desirable criteria may be used in the event of a large number of applications/large amount of successful candidates.

If you are successful at this stage, you will progress to interview & assessment.

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