Director Tax, Customs and Compliance Academy (TCCA) in Bristol

Location: Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Croydon, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Nottingham, Portsmouth, Stratford.

The Director of the Tax, Customs and Compliance Academy (TCCA) is critical in achieving HMRC's strategic objectives and reinvigorating the tax profession. This is a rare opportunity for an experienced senior leader to make a lasting impact at scale. As Director of TCCA, a circa 2,500 strong academy, you will be at the forefront of HMRC’s transformation and the academy’s evolution. This role is central to the department’s ambition to modernise the tax and customs system and close the tax gap.

Your remit spans the whole of HMRC, supporting over 15,000 tax professionals and engaging colleagues across all disciplines to set and deliver an ambitious strategy for HMRC’s tax profession. The TCCA is the single gateway for all tax, customs and compliance learning.

You will:

• Play a key role in HMRC’s senior leadership team, influencing the direction of one of the UK’s most important public institutions through setting the Tax Professionalism strategy and ensuring its delivery to meet HMRC’s strategic objectives.
• Shape and deliver the Academy’s vision to reinvigorate the tax profession in HMRC, leading a large multidisciplinary organisation at scale.
• Align learning and talent programmes with HMRC’s strategic priorities to ensure that we have the skills, knowledge, and mindset to deliver on the organisation’s ambitious goals of delivering excellent customer service and closing the tax gap.
• Create and agree career routes for tax professionals in Policy, service, legal, technical and compliance roles so we have deep specialists and leaders in tax who can progress to the most senior levels of the Department and Civil Service.
• Ensure tax professional careers and talent are actively managed to build strength in depth, with the right numbers of experts across the department to deliver departmental priorities and equip us for the future.
• Build strong partnerships across the tax profession nationally and internationally, ensuring HMRC remains at the cutting edge of tax administration.

This is a critical, high-profile leadership role accountable for delivering on the strategic objectives for the tax profession and building tax, customs, and compliance capability to close the tax gap and modernise HMRC.

While TCCA is co-sponsored by the Head of the Tax Profession and Director General, CCG, the role works across the enterprise and in close partnership with HR and Executive Committee to support in building the tax capability required to support HMRC’s functions in policy, tax legal, change and service.

Strategic Leadership & Governance

• Lead development and implementation of HMRC’s capability strategy for the tax profession and TCCA, aligning them to the organisation’s strategic objectives and transformation roadmap.
• Act as a visible and influential leader, running HMRC’s Senior Tax Professionalism Board and providing strategic advice to the Head of Tax Profession, CCG Director General, and Director of Learning and Talent.

Capability Development & Learning Transformation

• Drive design and delivery of scalable, tailored, sustainable learning and capability solutions, including the Civil Compliance Foundation Learning (CCFL), Tax Specialist Programme (TSP) and a ‘Tax for All’ learning offer.
• Champion modern, blended approaches to learning—experience, exposure, education—leveraging technology and professionalisation of learning roles.
• Lead the development of career pathways, standards and learning frameworks for tax professionals across HMRC (policy, service, legal, technical and compliance) ensuring alignment with job roles and business needs to cultivate a pipeline of tax talent for future leadership roles.

Enterprise Collaboration and Influence

• Build strong partnerships across HMRC’s business groups, with the other capability academies, HR and professions to co-create and deliver joined-up HMRC capability solutions.
• Influence HMRC-wide resource and funding decisions to prioritise strategic capability outcomes and cross-academy working.
• Foster a culture of continuous learning and professional growth, ensuring capability keeps pace with external developments and emerging risks.

Mobilisation into Delivery

• Lead the mobilisation and ongoing development of TCCA, including organisational design, workforce transition, and sustained operational delivery.
• Build and maintain a clear view of the tax professional cadre, including mapping existing numbers and skills against requirements to deliver current and future objectives.

Professional Stewardship & Future Readiness

• Ensure HMRC’s tax, customs and compliance capability keeps pace with external developments, regulatory changes and emerging risks.
• Lead the development and delivery of a holistic plan for the Tax Profession to meet HMRC’s compliance capability Spending Review commitments and support wider government economic aims.

Person specification

The successful applicant will demonstrate relevant experience and effective delivery of the following essential criteria.

• Professional Qualification: A professional qualification in tax, accounting or a related discipline (such as TSP, CTA, ACA/ACCA or equivalent) and/or senior leadership or people-profession qualifications (for example, CIPD or an MBA) are highly desirable.
• Strategic Leadership: Proven experience as a strategic senior business leader in a large and complex organisation, who can lead across organisational boundaries, professional disciplines, and work collaboratively across a complex organisation to set and achieve ambitious strategic objectives.
• Transformational Capability Building: Proven track record in managing change in a large and complex organisation that results in an enduring culture of higher professional standards at multiple levels.
• Complex, High Profile Delivery: Experience of successfully delivering business critical operations at scale, managing risks and issues and improving service delivery to meet challenging targets at pace.
• Stakeholder & Influencing Skills: Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills, with a track record of influencing at the most senior level and building strong relationships internally and externally to drive strategic plans, develop strong partnerships and improve performance.
• Inclusive People Leadership: An experienced and inclusive leader with evidence of successfully fostering innovation, developing talent, and effectively leading large, diverse teams, whilst building engagement and driving results.