Head of Governance & Management System - BPL in London

Barclays is collaborating with professional recruiters to connect them with exceptional professionals for this role. The Head of Governance & Management System sits at the heart of the business, energising leadership focus, alignment and accountability. This role supports the CEO in preparing for leadership meetings so discussions are focused, high quality and outcome‑driven. It accelerates decision making and delivery on priorities that matter most, providing disciplined business oversight and control and supporting decision making and execution pace on behalf of the Chief of Staff and CEO. The role acts as the central integrator across strategy, execution, governance and stakeholder management. It ensures that commitments are translated into clear decisions, delivered outcomes and tracked against OKRs. The office strengthens the management system and operating rhythm of the enterprise, raises the quality and sequencing of forums and data, and surfaces risks, dependencies and trade‑offs early. Through trusted authority, commercial judgement and structured follow‑through, the Chief of Staff office enables the CEO and leadership team to operate proactively, consistently and with confidence in a complex, high‑change environment.

Purpose of the role

To enable CEO and leadership effectiveness by running a high‑quality CEO office and management system that brings clarity, structure and pace to priorities, decisions and follow‑through across the business.

Accountabilities

• Own the end‑to‑end CEO office operating model, continuously improving it as the organisation scales.
• Run an optimised management system (calendar of forums, agenda standards, decision rights, information sequence) to drive pace, clarity and accountability, ensuring decisions are well informed, supported by options and recommendations and made on time.
• Lead the secretariat function for key leadership and board‑level forums: agendas, papers quality control, minutes and decisions, action tracking and audit trail.
• Establish and maintain a single source of truth for CEO/ELT decisions, actions, priorities and dependencies; ensure follow‑through and escalation where required.
• Coordinate across functions to ensure risks, issues and decisions are surfaced early, triaged correctly and resolved at the right level.
• Manage sensitive, high‑trust CEO office matters with discretion, judgement and control discipline.
• Deliver a high‑quality, service‑led CEO office, providing senior leadership ready materials that enable the CEO and ELT to operate effectively and support the management of critical stakeholders.

Essential Skills / Basic Qualifications

• Experience supporting Board and Board Committees (or equivalent regulated governance forums).
• Experience in payment acquiring, fintech, digital banking or platform‑led businesses.
• Experience standing up a new office/PMO/governance function (operating model, roles, templates, playbooks).
• Familiarity with performance management and MI design (KPIs/OKRs, balanced scorecards, dashboards).
• Experience leading a small team and managing through influence across a matrix.
• Significant experience running a senior executive office, secretariat, governance or COO‑style function in a complex organisation.
• Strong capability operating management systems (forums, cadence, packs, action/decision tracking, escalation paths).
• Proven ability to produce and quality‑control board/ExCo‑ready papers, agendas, minutes and decision logs with high accuracy.
• Outstanding organisation, prioritisation and follow‑through including action discipline, risk/issue tracking.
• Excellent stakeholder management with confidence operating with CEO/ELT‑level counterparts; able to challenge appropriately.
• High standards of judgement, confidentiality and discretion.
• Strong written communication: crisp synthesis, clear narrative, decision‑focused documents.

Director Expectations

• Manage a business function, providing significant input to function‑wide strategic initiatives.
• Contribute to and influence policy and procedures for the function and plan, manage and consult on multiple complex and critical strategic projects.
• Manage the direction of a large team or sub‑function, leading people managers and embedding a performance culture aligned to the values of the business.
• Act as a deep technical expert and thought leader, identifying new ways of working and collaborating cross‑functionally; provide coaching to less‑experienced specialists.
• Provide expert advice to senior functional management and committees to influence decisions made outside of own function.
• Manage, coordinate and enable resourcing, budgeting and policy creation for a significant sub‑function.
• Escalate breaches of policies or procedures appropriately.
• Foster and guide compliance, ensuring relevant regulations are observed and processes are in place to facilitate adherence.
• Focus on the external environment, regulators or advocacy groups to monitor and influence on behalf of Barclays where appropriate.
• Demonstrate extensive knowledge of how the function integrates with the business division and contributes to overall business objectives.
• Maintain comprehensive knowledge of industry theories and practices within own discipline and up‑to‑date sector knowledge, with insight into external market developments.
• Use interpretative thinking and advanced analytical skills to solve problems and design solutions in often complex or sensitive situations.
• Exercise management authority to make significant decisions and certain strategic recommendations within own area.
• Negotiate and influence stakeholders at a senior level both internally and externally.
• Act as principal contact point for key clients and counterparts in other functions or business divisions.
• Serve as a spokesperson for the function and business division.