HEAD OF GOVERNANCE,RISK AND ASSURANCE

HEAD OF GOVERNANCE, RISK AND ASSURANCE

Provides strategic leadership for Governance, Risk & Assurance, ensuring controls, compliance & accountability.

Supports informed decision-making, continuous learning from audits & inspections & maintains public trust & inspection readiness.

• Risk Management
• Own and maintain the force-wide risk management framework, ensuring risks are identified, assessed, escalated and managed consistently.
• Maintain strategic risk registers and ensure alignment between operational, departmental and strategic risk.
• Support senior leaders in understanding risk appetite and tolerance and their implications for decision-making.
• 2 Governance and Assurance

Design and maintain effective governance and assurance arrangements, including boards, reporting mechanisms and decision records.

• Oversee assurance mapping, ensuring a clear line of sight between risk, control and mitigation.
• Coordinate internal and external assurance activity to avoid duplication and assurance gaps.
• 3 Inspection, Audit and Compliance
• Act as the force lead for HMICFRS inspection coordination, evidence management and action tracking.
• Oversee responses to inspection findings, recommendations and causes of concern.
• Maintain a single, authoritative repository for audit and inspection actions, ensuring accountability and follow through.
• 4 Organisational Learning
• Ensure learning from inspections, audits, serious incidents and reviews is captured, analysed and embedded.
• Promote a culture of openness, learning and improvement rather than blame or compliance only behaviours.
• 5 Advisory and Professional Leadership
• Provide authoritative advice to the Director, Chief Officer Group and senior leaders on risk exposure, assurance gaps and governance maturity.
• Challenge constructively where governance or risk management is ineffective or inconsistent.

6 Undertake other duties appropriate to the grade and character of work as may be reasonably required, including specific duties of a similar or lesser graded post.

Key Results Areas

Force‑wide Risk Management Effectiveness 2.

Robust Governance and Assurance Frameworks 3.

Inspection, Audit and Regulatory Readiness 4.

Organisational Learning and Continuous Improvement 5.

Independent Professional Advice and Assurance to Senior Leaders 6.

Assurance Culture and Capability 7.

Confidence, Legitimacy and Public Trust

Graduate qualification (or demonstrable equivalent professional experience) in a relevant discipline.

• Relevant professional qualification or accreditation in risk management, governance, audit or assurance.
• Experience of working with or alongside HMICFRS, OPCCs or public audit bodies.
• KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS &

EXPERIENCE: Experience

• Significant experience in a senior governance, risk, assurance, inspection or compliance role, within policing or a similarly complex, regulated public sector organisation.
• Proven experience of working directly with senior leaders, providing professional advice and challenge on risk exposure, assurance confidence and organisational readiness.
• Demonstrable experience of inspection, audit or regulatory environments, including coordinating responses, managing recommendations and embedding sustainable organisational learning.
• Experience of operating with a high degree of autonomy and discretion, exercising independent judgement while working within broad strategic direction.
• Experience of partnership working with external oversight bodies, regulators or auditors, building trusted professional relationships based on credibility and transparency.

Skills

• Advanced analytical and critical thinking skills, enabling the identification of systemic risk, assurance gaps and root causes across complex organisational boundaries.
• Highly developed influencing and communication skills, with the ability to: o Challenge senior leaders constructively o Communicate complex Governance, Risk and Assurance issues clearly o Persuade others to act without relying on line management authority
• Strong professional judgement and independence, enabling proportionate escalation of Governance, Risk and Assurance concerns, even where issues are sensitive or contested.
• Ability to design, implement and maintain force wide frameworks, including risk registers, assurance models, inspection coordination and action tracking.
• Credible leadership skills, enabling the role holder to promote a learning focused, improvement led assurance culture rather than one focused solely on compliance.
• Knowledge
• Comprehensive knowledge of governance, risk management and assurance frameworks within policing or a comparable public sector environment, including statutory obligations, inspection regimes and accountability arrangements.
• Strong understanding of the UK policing landscape, including the roles of Chief Constables, PCCs/OPCCs, HMICFRS, internal and external audit, and their respective assurance and scrutiny functions.
• Working knowledge of inspection and regulatory methodologies, including HMICFRS PEEL assessments, audit standards and assurance mapping, and how these translate into organisational improvement.
• Understanding of public sector decision making, risk appetite and legitimacy, including the balance between operational delivery, governance control and public confidence.

Competencies – CVF Mapping 1.

• We Are Emotionally Aware
• Maintains composure and resilience under pressure.
• Demonstrates empathy and awareness of operational and workforce impacts.
• Leads with emotional intelligence during periods of change and scrutiny. 2.
• We Take Ownership
• Takes responsibility for identifying and escalating risk and governance concerns promptly.
• Holds others to account for addressing assurance actions and recommendations.
• Maintains professional independence, even under pressure. 3.
• We Collaborate
• Works effectively across Commands, functions and with external partners.
• Builds trusted relationships with auditors, inspectors and oversight bodies.

Enables shared ownership of risk management while retaining clarity of accountability. 4.

• We Support and Inspire
• Provides clarity and confidence to leaders on Governance, Risk and Assurance expectations.
• Supports a culture of learning, openness and continuous improvement.
• Communicates complex assurance issues clearly and proportionately. 5.
• We Analyse Critically
• Applies analytical and professional judgement to identify assurance gaps, risk trends and systemic weaknesses.
• Distinguishes between symptoms and root causes, challenging unsupported narrative or optimism bias.
• Uses evidence to inform and influence senior decision making. 6.
• We are innovative and open minded
• Continuously reviews and improves assurance approaches, drawing on good practice from across policing and the wider public sector.
• Encourages reflective practice and learning-focused assurance rather than procedural compliance