Compliance Assurance & Performance Team Leader in Somerset

You will lead and manage the team that delivers compliance administration, data processing, performance reporting, evidence management, contractor liaison and business support across the Property Compliance and Building Safety Service. You will set priorities, allocate work, establish standards, monitor capacity and performance, and ensure the team completes its duties accurately and within agreed timescales.

You will retain strategic oversight and accountability for the quality and effectiveness of the function rather than routinely carrying out the team’s day-to-day processing tasks. You will provide constructive challenge, resolve escalated issues and give the Head of Building Safety and Property Compliance confidence that compliance information, evidence, reporting and governance controls are reliable.

You will:

To lead Compliance Assurance and Performance function, managing the colleagues responsible for compliance coordination, data management, evidence control, performance reporting and business support across Property Compliance and Building Safety. The role ensures that accurate, timely and reliable compliance data, reports, dashboards and supporting evidence are maintained and provided as required for operational delivery, senior oversight, governance, audit, regulatory and stakeholder requirements. This includes overseeing the quality, consistency and control of records and evidence across statutory and landlord compliance areas such as gas and heating safety, EICRs, asbestos surveys, fire alarm testing, fire risk assessment actions, water hygiene, lifts, emergency lighting and fire door evidence. Operational and technical managers retain accountability for compliance delivery, technical decisions and contract performance; this role provides the people leadership, data assurance, reporting controls, escalation and continuous improvement needed to give confidence that the service is well controlled and audit ready.

What Will I Have to Do?

People Leadership and Work Management

• Lead, motivate and develop the team, setting clear objectives, expected standards and measurable outcomes.
• Translate the service plan, compliance calendar and emerging priorities into balanced team workloads and delivery plans.
• Allocate work, monitor progress and quality, manage competing deadlines and intervene where delivery is at risk.
• Hold effective one-to-ones, team meetings and performance reviews; manage attendance, conduct, capability and development in line with organisational requirements.
• Build team resilience through induction, documented procedures, cross-training, succession planning and appropriate cover for critical activities.
• Promote accountability, customer focus, professional curiosity, collaborative working and constructive challenge.

Oversight of Compliance Coordination and Administration

• Ensure the team maintains accurate records and evidence across relevant statutory and other property compliance programmes.
• Oversee team arrangements for receiving, checking, recording and filing certificates, inspection reports and supporting documentation.
• Ensure servicing dates, overdue cases, remedial actions, access issues and missing information are identified, assigned and progressed.
• Set standards for contractor liaison, requests for quotations, purchase orders, works orders, invoice processing and contract-meeting support undertaken by the team.
• Ensure shared mailboxes, incoming document areas, portals and routine workflows are monitored, triaged and actioned to agreed service standards.
• Resolve or escalate issues that cannot be addressed by team members, including persistent contractor, system, evidence or workload concerns.

Compliance Assurance and Governance

• Own and continually improve the service’s Compliance Assurance Framework, annual assurance plan and reporting schedule.
• Set the quality assurance programmes for team outputs, including sample checks, reconciliations, thematic reviews and verification of closure evidence.
• Provide independent oversight of compliance performance, control effectiveness and delivery confidence, escalating significant risks and weaknesses.
• Coordinate audit, inspection and regulatory responses, ensuring submissions are complete, accurate, consistent and supported by evidence.
• Oversee governance actions, recommendations, decisions and risk information, ensuring ownership, due dates, escalation and verified closure.
• Support clear and balanced reporting to the Head of Building Safety and Property Compliance, senior leaders, Board and Committees.

Data Governance, Performance and Insight

• Own and maintain the service’s compliance data control framework, including data standards, definitions, ownership routes, validation controls and reporting rules, ensuring the team applies them consistently.
• Oversee validation, cleansing and reconciliation of property, asset, contractor and compliance records, including the resolution of exceptions.
• Establish and maintain a single version of truth for compliance data, ensuring operational leads understand their ownership of source information and that unresolved data weaknesses are escalated where they affect reporting confidence or compliance assurance.
• Ensure weekly, monthly and other periodic compliance reports and dashboards are accurate, timely and reconciled to source information.
• Analyse trends, exceptions, overdue activity and recurring failures, providing insight and recommendations to operational leads and the Head of Building Safety and Property Compliance.
• Maintain an effective KPI framework and data quality measures, with clear ownership, calculation methodology, source-system controls, assurance checks and evidence requirements.
• Work with ICT, system owners and providers to improve data capture, integration, reporting and control arrangements.

Evidence, Document Control and Audit Readiness

• Set minimum evidence, filing, naming, version-control, approval, retention and audit-trail standards.
• Ensure the team maintains complete, accessible and auditable records and follows up missing or inadequate evidence.
• Monitor the completeness of certification, inspection records, remedial evidence and management approvals.
• Coordinate evidence requests and ensure the service remains prepared for internal audit, external audit and regulatory scrutiny.
• Gather, validate and provide accurate compliance data, evidence and chronology information to support complaints, disrepair cases, Ombudsman enquiries, member enquiries, internal audit, external audit, regulatory requests and other formal information requirements.
• Challenge unsupported reporting positions or weak closure evidence and require correction before formal sign-off.

Business Support, Systems and Improvement

• Lead the team’s business support arrangements, including meeting coordination, reports, correspondence, trackers, workflow administration and customer or colleague enquiries.
• Set service standards and management information for volumes, backlogs, timeliness, quality and unresolved exceptions.
• Act as the business lead for relevant assurance, reporting and information-management systems.
• Identify and implement proportionate improvements, automation and standardisation that reduce duplication and improve control.
• Ensure procedures and desk instructions remain current and that changes to legislation, policy, programmes or systems are translated into team practice.
• Manage delegated resources and commissioned support, where applicable, in accordance with organisational controls.

Role Boundaries and Accountability

The postholder manages the people who undertake the operational coordination, administration, updating, checking and reporting activities within this function. The postholder is accountable for direction, capacity, standards, quality assurance, escalation and continuous improvement, and may provide hands-on support where necessary for resilience, training, urgent service continuity, periods of absence or peaks in workload.

Technical compliance leads, contract managers and other responsible managers retain accountability for statutory decisions, technical interpretation, contract performance and delivery within their assigned areas. The Compliance Assurance & Performance Team Leader provides oversight and challenge and ensures that supporting data, evidence, reporting and governance arrangements are effective.

What you will bring:

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

Essential

• Experience of directly managing and developing colleagues in an assurance, compliance, governance, performance, data or business support environment.
• Demonstrable experience of planning team workloads, setting service standards, monitoring quality and addressing underperformance.
• Experience of overseeing data processing, reconciliation, evidence management, reporting and administrative control activities.
• Experience producing or quality-assuring performance and assurance information for senior leaders and governance bodies.
• Experience supporting audits, inspections, assurance reviews or regulatory activity.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with the confidence to challenge inconsistencies and escalate material concerns.
• Excellent written and verbal communication, including clear report writing and presentation of complex information.
• Strong organisational, project and change-management skills and the ability to manage competing priorities.
• High attention to detail and a strong understanding of audit trails, document control and information quality.
• Strong Microsoft 365 and Excel skills and confidence using reporting and line-of-business systems.
• Commitment to customer outcomes, colleague development and continuous improvement.

Desirable

• Experience in social housing, asset management, property compliance or building safety.
• Knowledge of landlord compliance disciplines including fire, gas, electrical, water hygiene, asbestos and lifts.
• Experience of compliance management systems and Power BI or equivalent reporting tools.
• Understanding of the social housing regulatory environment and governance arrangements.
• A relevant qualification in leadership, governance, audit, compliance, risk, performance, data or business improvement.

How Will I Evidence My Success?

• Team priorities, workload and ownership are clear, with backlogs, gaps and emerging pressures actively managed.
• Team members are supported, accountable, appropriately trained and able to provide resilient cover for critical activities.
• Compliance records, certification and evidence are processed accurately and within agreed service standards.
• Data reconciliations, quality checks and exception controls are completed and evidenced, with recurring issues addressed at source.
• Performance and assurance reports are timely, trusted and provide meaningful insight for decision-making.
• Actions, audit recommendations and governance requirements are monitored, escalated and closed with suitable evidence.
• Shared workflows, contractor administration and business support arrangements are controlled and effective.
• Audits, inspections and regulatory information requests are supported by accessible, consistent and reliable evidence.
• Processes, systems and controls improve over time and the Head of Building Safety and Property Compliance has a clear view of delivery confidence and material risks.