Senior Service Designer

Overview

This role is available across our London, Bristol and Manchester locations. 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.

We are designing and building GOV.UK One Login, a simple, safe, and secure way for people to prove who they are and access government services. We’re also designing and building GOV.UK Wallet, an app for people to save government-issued documents to their phone, so they can show them to prove things when useful. GOV.UK One Login and GOV.UK Wallet are being made for everyone, to be accessible, inclusive, safe, and easy to use. We’re an ambitious team at the heart of government, full of talented and passionate people. If you’d like to join us in this work, we’d love to hear from you.

Responsibilities

As a designer at GDS you’ll work in multidisciplinary teams, alongside researchers and developers, to deliver world-class, user centred public services that meet the Government Design Principles. You’ll help identify and fix some of the toughest problems in public infrastructure and you will be focusing on the design of services at scale. You’ll help the government transform the way it delivers services, so that they’re more efficient, simpler, faster and easier to use. You'll be part of a fantastic design community in government, where we share ideas and challenges with thousands of designers across the public sector. This is a chance to work on services that matter, at a huge scale, with people who value design.

Senior Service Designer role

We are recruiting for a Senior Service Designer. You will be working with skilled teams to design, prototype and build multi-channel cross government public services that change lives. These skills must be demonstrated in your cover letter and portfolio. As a Senior Service Designer you’ll:

• lead and coordinate design work in your team, supporting other designers where necessary
• work effectively in a multidisciplinary, agile environment, adapting quickly to changes in requirements, priorities or user needs
• use research and analytics to understand users needs, identify service failures and test different designs
• design collaboratively and in the open, engaging your whole team with the design process and adapting it if necessary
• champion accessibility and inclusion, consider the impact of new technologies and ensure that designs meet legal requirements
• collaborate with designers in other teams and departments, reviewing each other's work and developing shared patterns

Person specification

We’re interested in people who have:

• experience in designing services for users in complex environments and for digital and apps
• experience in making effective decisions with user research data
• experience of working with senior stakeholders and ability to negotiate important design decisions
• experience of engaging with people in a variety of ways (e.g., workshops or co-design activities)
• an understanding of the importance of inclusive, equitable, accessible and sustainable public services
• experience of working in an agile, multidisciplinary and collaborative environment
• experience of guiding, supporting and mentoring others

Please note that this role requires SC clearance, which would normally need 5 years’ UK residency in the past 5 years. This is not an absolute requirement, but supplementary checks may be needed where individuals have not lived in the UK for that period. This may mean your security clearance (and therefore your appointment) will take longer or, in some cases, not be possible. 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.