Senior Delivery Manager

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

What you’ll do

The Service Transformation team aims to help the public sector improve services across government that people depend on every day. By leveraging the power of digital and data, we can transform how citizens interact with the government, making services faster, simpler, and fairer. We focus on helping and ensuring the public sector is designing services around the needs of users, whether they are individuals or businesses, saving people time and money, often when they’re needed most.

Job description

Former DSIT recruitment campaigns are continuing as usual, but candidates should be aware that following the Government’s announcement on the changes to some civil service departments, roles will be subject to the machinery of government moves and will ultimately be in one of the new departments. We will provide more information if you are selected for a role. This work remains of high importance to the civil service, and we thank you for your continued interest.

As a Senior Delivery Manager, you’ll:

Delivery & execution

• lead and support one or more multidisciplinary agile teams to design and deliver user-centred digital products or services
• plan, track, and manage delivery using agile methods (e.g. Scrum, Kanban, or hybrid approaches) and digital tools (e.g. Jira, Mural, etc.)
• ensure work is prioritised, visible, and flowing efficiently through the delivery pipeline
• monitor progress against delivery goals, milestones, and outcomes, adapting plans as needed

Team enablement

• facilitate agile ceremonies (e.g. sprint planning, stand-ups, retrospectives, reviews)
• foster a collaborative, inclusive, and high‑performing team culture
• work closely with Product Managers, Designers, User Researchers and Service Owners, and other roles as required
• protect teams from unnecessary disruption and help resolve blockers and dependencies
• coach teams and stakeholders on agile values, behaviours, and best practices

Stakeholder management

• act as a key point of contact between delivery teams and stakeholders where applicable
• communicate progress, risks, and issues clearly and transparently
• manage expectations and support decision-making by presenting data‑driven insights

Managing risks, dependencies and finances

• identify, manage, and escalate delivery risks and dependencies
• support forecasting, budgeting and supplier management, where applicable
• ensure delivery activity aligns with organisational governance and assurance standards

Continuous improvement

• use metrics (e.g. flow, throughput, predictability) to improve delivery performance
• encourage experimentation, learning, and iterative improvement
• contribute to the organisation’s wider delivery capability and community of practice

Person specification

We’re interested in people who

• have experience using agile practices to ensure the iterative and timely delivery of products and services in complex environments that serve real user needs
• communicates and influences confidently across user centred design, technical and non-technical stakeholders at all levels
• have experience leading successful high functioning multidisciplinary delivery teams and have strong organisational skills and experience identifying and rectifying any issues within your team
• experience leading significant pieces of work independently and can facilitate inclusive workshops and events with concrete outputs
• has experience planning beyond product delivery and delivering engaging virtual and in-person events
• experience identifying and challenging organisational processes of increasing complexity, taking the initiative to improve processes or tackle high-profile issues and actively tackle impediments, risks and blockers, communicating and escalating where necessary
• are passionate about delivering high quality, modern, user centred digital products and services across the public sector, including central and local government

Benefits

There are many benefits of working at GDS, including:

• flexible hybrid working with flexi-time and the option to work part-time or condensed hours
• a Civil Service Pension with an average employer contribution of 28.97%
• 25 days of annual leave, increasing by a day each year up to a maximum of 30 days
• an extra day off for the King’s birthday
• an in-year bonus scheme to recognise high performance
• career progression and coaching, including a training budget for personal development
• a focus on wellbeing with access to an employee assistance programme
• job satisfaction from making government services easier to use and more inclusive for people across the UK
• advances on pay, including for travel season tickets
• death in service benefits
• cycle to work scheme and facilities
• access to an employee discounts scheme
• 10 learning days per year
• volunteering opportunities (5 special leave days per year)
• access to a suite of learning activities through Civil Service learning
• access to children's holiday play schemes across different locations in central London

Any move to Government Digital Service from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax Free Childcare. Determine your eligibility at https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk

Office attendance

The Department operates a discretionary hybrid working policy, which provides for a combination of working hours from your place of work and from your home in the UK. The current expectation for staff is to attend the office or non-home based location for 40-60% of the time over the accounting period.

DSIT does not normally offer full home working (i.e. working at home); but we do offer a variety of flexible working options (including occasionally working from home).

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

The standard selection process for roles at GDS consists of:

• a simple application screening process - We only ask for a CV and 2 application questions
• a 60 minute video interview over Microsoft Teams

Depending on how many applications we get, there might also be an extra stage before the video interview, for example a phone interview or a technical exercise.

In the event we receive a high volume of applications, we will conduct the initial sift against the lead criteria which is:

Tell us about a time when you helped a team become better positioned to deliver its goals. This could include securing funding or resources, improving operating models or governance, managing competing demand, building stakeholder support, or establishing more effective ways of working. What was your role and what impact did your work have?

In the Civil Service, we use Success Profiles to evaluate your skills and ability. This gives us the best possible chance of finding the right person for the job, increases performance and improves diversity and inclusivity. We’ll be assessing your technical abilities, skills, experience and behaviours that are relevant to this role.

For this role we’ll be assessing you against the following Civil Service Behaviours :

• working together
• changing and improving
• seeing the bigger picture
• delivering at pace

We’ll also be assessing your experience and specialist technical skills against the following skills defined in the Government Digital and Data Capability Framework for the Senior Delivery Manager role:

• Agile and lean practices
• Maintaining delivery momentum
• Making a process work
• Communicating between the technical and non-technical

• Want to know more about who Government Digital and Data are? Click Here
• Recruitment Timeline
• Sift completion: week commencing 14/09/2026
• Panel interviews: week commencing 21/09/2026

Candidates that do not pass the interview but have demonstrated an acceptable standard may be considered for similar roles at a lower grade.

A reserve list will be held for a period of 12 months, from which further appointments can be made.

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 and the Civil Service D&I Strategy .

Sponsorship

DSIT cannot offer Visa sponsorship to candidates through this campaign. DSIT holds a Visa sponsorship licence but this can only be used for certain roles and this campaign does not qualify.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a basic (or equivalent) criminal record check.

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 serv