Chief Security Officer

We are pleased to bring to the market the role of Chief Security Officer at the Met Office.

As our Chief Security Officer, you will lead physical, personnel and cyber security to ensure the Met Office stays safe and thrives in a changing world. Based in Exeter with hybrid working, we are seeking a permanent appointment and will consider applications for full time and compressed hours.

World changing work

As one of the world’s leading weather and climate organisations, the Met Office is a world leading scientific institution with a global reputation for excellence in weather and climate science and services. Our work supports everything from daily life and travel, to defence, agriculture, energy and emergency response.

Your world of expertise

The Chief Security Officer (CSO) is responsible for providing executive leadership and accountability for all aspects of security across the organisation, ensuring the protection of people, assets, information, systems, and operations in an evolving threat environment.

This role has end‑to‑end ownership of Physical Security, Personnel (People) Security, Cyber Security, and Information Security, bringing these together as a single, integrated enterprise security function. The CSO sets security strategy, establishes risk appetite, and ensures that security enables the organisation to operate safely, resiliently and with confidence.

The role will involve all aspects of our operations from supply chain through to delivery of secure and protected products and services to our customers.

Key to this role is ensuring that the organisation has the required security resources and skills to meet its changing needs, helping the Met Office achieve its purpose and strategic goals.

The organisation operates in a complex national and international environment, with increasing physical, cyber and insider threats, heightened regulatory expectations, and growing reliance on digital services and critical infrastructure.

The CSO plays a central role in ensuring the organisation is threat‑informed, risk‑focused and impact‑driven, balancing operational delivery with long term resilience and preparedness.

• Establish and lead a single, coherent security domain spanning physical, people, cyber and information security.
• Provide senior leadership to security teams across physical, personnel, cyber and information security, setting clear expectations for delivery standards, performance and professional practice. Act as a visible leader, setting the tone for security culture and accountability, building strong relationships with senior internal stakeholders across the organisation.
• Define and own enterprise security strategy, policy, standards and risk appetite, acting as the organisation’s senior owner for security risk, including strategic, operational and emerging threats, you will ensure security is embedded as an enabler of organisational objectives, not treated as a standalone compliance activity.
• Provide authoritative advice to the Executive Committee and Board on security risk, resilience and preparedness and ensure robust security arrangements are in place for crisis management, incident response and business resilience.
• Establish proportionate security governance frameworks covering all security disciplines and ensure compliance with relevant statutory, regulatory and government security obligations.
• Oversee assurance activity and engage confidently with auditors, regulators and external reviewers.
• Represent the Met Office in cross Government initiatives, working groups and other governance bodies.

Our work is life-changing, often life-saving and always life-enhancing. The Met Office is accredited as a ‘Great Place to Work UK’ and in addition has achieved a place on both the UK’s ‘Best Workplaces in Tech’ and ‘Best Workplaces for Women’ lists.

As our Chief Security Officer your annual salary and allowances will be circa £82,606. Your total reward package, including the below elements, is potentially worth circa £110,250 annually, which includes:

• Base pay in the range of £74,856 to £82,084
• Discretionary Recruitment & Retention annual allowance of £7,750
• An outstanding Civil Service pension, Met Office contributing 28.97%
• Performance related bonuses
• Annual Leave starting at 27.5 days (plus Bank Holidays) rising to 32.5 days (plus Bank Holidays) after 5 years and option to buy or sell up to 5 days per year of annual leave.
• A relocation package may be available.

Essential Criteria, skills and experience:

We are seeking a permanent appointment for an exceptional leader whose experience aligns with our criteria:

• Experience of providing leadership to Security teams across physical, personnel, cyber and information security and be at, or on track, to Chartered status in a related security profession (or equivalent).
• Proven experience operating at executive and Board level on security risk, resilience and assurance and senior leadership experience across multiple security disciplines, explicitly including physical security, personnel (people) security, cyber security and information security.
• A track record of establishing enterprise-wide security strategy and governance in complex environments.
• Experience leading organisational change and integrating disparate security functions, with strong judgement, credibility and the ability to influence at the highest levels.
• Must have Developed Vetting (DV) or be able to attain a successful DV clearance on appointment.

We understand that great minds don’t always think alike and as an equal opportunities employer we welcome applications from those with all protected characteristics. We recruit on merit, fairness, and open competition in line with the Civil Service Code.

We can only accept applications from those eligible to live and work in the UK – please refer to GOV.UK for information. We require Developed Vetting security clearance for this role – you must already have this or be able to attain a successful DV clearance prior to appointment for which you need to have resided in the UK for at least 3 of the last 5 years to be eligible, 2 of these years must be immediately preceding the point of your application.