Science Director, Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA), Defra in Weybridge

Managing approximately 800 staff across multiple locations, you will act as a visible and credible science leader for the organisation and Science Profession. The Deputy Director for Scientific Services provides strategic leadership for all scientific functions within the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA). This role is accountable for delivering high-quality science that underpins APHA’s mission to protect animal health, plant health, and biosecurity across Great Britain.

As an Executive Board, you provide the collective strategic leadership that drives APHA’s performance, culture, and long-term direction. Together, you ensure the Agency operates with clarity of purpose, aligning its work with APHA’s mission, Defra’s priorities, and the wider objectives of public service. You will play a central role in shaping and sustaining the organisation’s vision, values, and culture, supporting the Chief Executive in leading APHA with integrity, ambition, and a commitment to excellence.

You are collectively responsible for ensuring that APHA is governed effectively. This includes maintaining robust governance arrangements, enabling sound decision making, and ensuring accountability across all areas of the organisation. You oversee the identification and management of strategic and operational risks, ensuring that statutory obligations, regulatory requirements, and internal policies are consistently met.

As stewards of public resources, you provide oversight of financial planning, budgeting, and investment decisions, ensuring that APHA delivers value for money and remains financially sustainable. You scrutinise financial performance and support the Chief Executive in maintaining strong relationships with Defra finance teams and external auditors.

You champion the development of APHA’s people and organisational capability. This includes promoting diversity and inclusion, upholding Civil Service values, and providing strategic oversight of workforce planning, talent development, and succession planning. You monitor organisational health, including staff engagement, wellbeing, and representation, ensuring APHA remains a supportive and high performing place to work.

You represent APHA at the highest levels, engaging with Defra, other government departments, industry bodies, devolved administrations, and international partners. Through this, you help build trust, transparency, and collaboration across the wider Defra group and the sectors APHA serves.

You collectively drive organisational performance, providing constructive challenge to ensure high standards of delivery, continuous improvement, and innovation. You monitor progress against strategic objectives, KPIs, and delivery milestones, identifying where intervention or acceleration is required. You champion a culture of accountability, evidence-based decision making, and results driven leadership, supporting the Chief Executive in embedding performance frameworks that drive excellence across the organisation.

• Scientific leadership: Act as a visible and credible science leader as Head of Profession for Science across APHA, setting direction and ensuring the effective delivery of scientific services across multiple sites and disciplines.
• Emergency response: Provide national leadership to science during disease outbreaks and major incidents, directing the rapid mobilisation of people, resources, and capability to support APHA’s emergency response and wider Defra-led operations.
• Corporate accountability: Contribute to APHA’s Executive Board collective accountabilities, shaping strategic decisions and ensuring alignment with organisational priorities.

• Provide overall strategic leadership to the delivery of all scientific activities within APHA.
• Ensure that appropriate overall capability, including skills and facilities supports the delivery of Science within APHA and that there is appropriate use of resources.
• Provide leadership that builds a positive culture of performance, learning and engagement.
• Exploiting and ensuring commercial and other translational opportunities are captured from R&D projects.
• Provide leadership to shape and personally champion APHA's links with academia and to initiate and foster collaboration with other national and international research institutes.
• Optimising and focusing APHA’s veterinary public health activities and ensuring complementarity with the work of the PHE and other public health bodies.
• To exploit and co-ordinate APHA’s interactions with R&D commissioning and grant awarding official bodies.

• Applying their scientific skills and expertise to ensure effective long-term planning and delivery of relevant Government programmes and policies and with others, to ensure the effective delivery of agreed public health and animal health and welfare strategies and policies across GB.
• Contributing to the corporate planning, decision making and performance management and achievement of priorities of APHA as a member of the Board.
• To work with others within APHA to effectively influence policy in England, Scotland and Wales in light of their professional, operational and delivery expertise.
• Provide leadership to the development of new models of scientific delivery which improve value for money and the customer’s experience.

• Oversee and provide strategic leadership to the capability for the identification and risk assessment of emerging threats and to provide advice to policy makers and the Agency on the management of risk.
• Ensuring that all scientific activity carried out or sponsored by the APHA is designed and delivered within professional, safety and policy requirements, and quality assured.
• Oversee effective and integrated working arrangements with other organisations to deliver services for our customers and influence end user behaviour to support APHA and policy customer objectives.

• Champion efficiency and value for money.
• Providing visible and inspirational leadership to scientists, providing effective coaching and mentoring as necessary.
• Champion a comprehensive professional development programme for scientific and associated technical staff in the agency including career paths and a portfolio of development to build operational policy and leadership skills.
• Creating an environment in which scientific and technical staff can and do contribute effectively and in which different perspectives are heard and channelled towards achieving the Agency’s objectives.
• Lead and build the capability of the new NBC Design Authority, including resourcing, governance, ways of working and engagement with the wider APHA and NBC programme organisations.
• Lead APHA Science profession.
• Line management of circa 1000 scientific staff in APHA science directorates and the professional development of all science and science technical staff within APHA.

• APHA CEO and members of the executive committee, non-executive directors other senior budget holders.
• NBU Programme director & APHA NBC Lead. SRO and other members of the board.
• Government officials and Ministers.
• Senior representatives at a national level of key stakeholder bodies and other government organisations, BEIS.
• International Veterinary Institutes, OIE, EFSA, EU (DG SANCO and DG Research).
• Defra Group Corporate Services.
• Welsh & Scottish Governments, Key UK Universities and research institutes.

It is essential that you hold a biological science qualification, or equivalent vet qualification, to at least degree level. Successful track record of managing and delivering a large complex and multidisciplinary portfolio of science. Experience of managing a large scientific department delivering a broad range of scientific activities, including managing complex estate. Experience of working cooperatively with corporate areas such as estates, finance and HR to drive performance and enhance efficiency. Strong people leadership skills, with the ability to develop, lead and motivate large teams driving a diverse and inclusive working culture, and driving professional development of scientific staff. Extensive experience of providing assurance of scientific quality, working to high standards of health and safety, and preparing a corporate body for external scientific review. Experience of delivering science in the context of informing policy and delivering services. Experience in shaping and leading strategy and organisational change in a science environment. Experience of successfully working with a broad range of senior stakeholders and external partners, demonstrating the communications skills, impact and gravitas to effectively challenge assumptions and influence direction in a complex environment.

Ideally the successful candidate will have led projects in the area of veterinary disease across a range of different pathogens, including oversight of national and international research laboratories with complex estate, high containment laboratories and animal facilities.

It is essential that you hold a biological science qualification, or equivalent vet qualification, to at least degree level.