Expression of Interest: Senior Advisor

This advert is for current internal applicants only. External applications will be closed

Grade B - £42,044 (National) or £47,900 (London – for London office based or homebased workers within the boundary of the M25) – There is also an additional homeworking allowance of £600 per annum for those working from home.

Contracted Hours: Full time 37 hours per week

Contract Type: Secondment opportunity until 31 October 2026. This is a backfill opportunity to provide cover during a period of absence of the current postholder.

Applicants must obtain written confirmation from their line manager, granting permission to be released from their current role, before applying for this opportunity.

Location: Homebased

Closing date: Sunday 13 September 2026 at 11.59pm

This opportunity is open to existing colleagues within the Finance, Commercial and Workforce Performance (FCWP) Directorate only. Applications from outside the directorate will not be considered.

Make a difference
Every role at CQC contributes to our mission. If you’re looking for a new role in Finance, Commercial, Workforce and Performance (FCWP) that gives a true sense of meaning and purpose, then you’ve found it!

As a Senior Advisor, you’ll help ensure the directorate operates effectively so CQC can continue improving health and social care services for people across England.

Picture this
Supporting senior leaders, coordinating key priorities and helping teams work effectively, you'll play an important role in making sure the directorate delivers its goals and responds to changing business needs. You'll be at the centre of planning, problem-solving and continuous improvement across the directorate.

As a Senior Advisor in the FCWP Directorate, you might:

• Get the chance to lead a directorate-wide programme of activity, coordinating work across teams to drive improvement and deliver priority outcomes.
• Support senior leaders to identify risks, develop practical solutions and strengthen how the directorate plans for future priorities.

The role
You'll work closely with others to deliver shared outcomes. In this role, you'll:

• Support senior leadership: Provide advice, guidance and day-to-day support to senior leaders and managers to help the directorate deliver its objectives.
• Coordinate governance and planning: Support governance processes, prepare key information and help plan future priorities, resources and activities across the directorate.
• Lead and develop people and processes: Manage and support colleagues, ensure policies and procedures are followed, and help improve ways of working across the team.

Show us
We will be looking for specific skills, knowledge and experience in your application form:

• Experience supporting managers or senior leaders by understanding business needs and helping deliver practical solutions or improvements.
• Experience managing projects or coordinating multiple pieces of work, balancing competing priorities and delivering outcomes to agreed timescales.
• Experience using performance information, financial data or risk information to inform decisions, monitor progress and support service improvement.

Compliance
This is a secondment opportunity. Please read the recruitment and selection policy section on secondments. You must discuss your application with your line manager before applying.

Next steps
If you apply, you’ll need to create a profile and complete an online application form. Your application will be completely anonymous. Please see our information for applicants for more details on the process. We contact every applicant to let them know the outcome of their application, so you will hear from us whether or not you are shortlisted.

You can read the full details of the role in the Job Description

If you’d like an informal chat about the role contact – Evan Haselwood, Director of Finance, Commercial, Workplace & Performance: evan.haselwood@cqc.org.uk. For general enquiries, please email recruitment@cqc.org.uk.

Equity for all

We know job descriptions can feel intimidating. Research shows they can cause some people to doubt whether they’re a good fit. This happens more often to people from underrepresented groups (e.g. ethnic minority backgrounds). If this role interests you, we encourage you to apply. Your unique perspective, skills, and experience could be exactly what we need.

We want every candidate to feel supported and able to do their best. If you need adjustments to our process, we’ll work with you to remove any barriers. Visit our accessibility page for more on this. If you’d like to chat, please contact recruitment@cqc.org.uk. Please note, if you have previously informed us of adjustments you need for interview or within your role these are not carried over and must be discussed for each individual application you make.

We promote a workplace where fairness, respect and inclusion are a priority. Diverse teams make our work better, help us deliver our mission and make our culture stronger. See our ED&I page for more about this.

We welcome applications from everyone, and colleagues can find support and community among our many employee networks. This includes people of any:

• Age
• Sex
• Gender identity or expression
• Sexual orientation
• Religion or belief
• Ethnicity
• Disability

Values and vision
We are guided by our core values, which shape our work and our culture.
Excellence – being a high-performing organisation.
Caring – treating everyone with dignity and respect.
Integrity – doing the right thing.
Teamwork – learning from each other to be the best we can.
We are a disability confident employer and a carer confident employer.

A Note on AI
AI tools can be great for research and refining ideas, but we want to learn about you. If you use AI or Chatbots to help you with your application, keep these points in mind:

• AI can support research, structuring and refining your writing, but your application must reflect your real skills and experience.
• Spell-checking and condensing word counts are great ways to use AI effectively.
• Do not copy and paste AI generated answers. These will not help you stand out; remember we want to hear about your skills and experience.
• Providing false and insincere examples goes against our core values of honesty and integrity and may lead to your application being withdrawn or termination of your employment.