Delivery Manager in London

About Nesta

Nesta is a research and innovation foundation that designs, tests and scales solutions for the biggest challenges of our time. Driven by a vision to improve the lives of millions of people, our focus up to 2030 is on three missions: breaking the link between family background and life chances, halving obesity and cutting household carbon emissions. We work with partners across the public, private and third sectors to develop high-potential solutions and test them as they evolve, drawing on deep expertise in qualitative and quantitative research, data science, behavioural science and design. Once confident in the effectiveness of a solution, we are relentless in the pursuit of scale. We create and make the case for ambitious national policy proposals, develop consumer-facing products and services, spin out and support commercial ventures and harness the power of the arts to shape national narratives. We extend our impact through two specialised units that help others to solve complex problems and achieve their missions. BIT applies a deep understanding of human behaviour to help clients achieve their goals. Challenge Works designs and runs challenge prizes to spark innovation in science, technology and society. Together, we are building a powerful ecosystem for innovation that delivers proven solutions to create lasting, positive change.

This role supports an exciting new initiative that Nesta is setting up to deliver work that improves and secures the UK’s resilience and agency in an age of AI. Our work on Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) is a key part of this programme. DPI means the shared digital building blocks that many services can be built on, such as identity, payments and consented data sharing. Our first DPI programme is DPI for Health, which works with national policy stakeholders, industry partners and regional test sites across the UK.

Your responsibilities:

• Deliver the workstreams: Plan and run delivery for your workstreams. Hold the milestones, track progress against them, and keep the team clear on next steps. Coordinate project teams made up of Nesta staff and external partners and specialists. Find risks and blockers early, and either fix them or escalate them with a recommendation. Own problems end to end.
• Manage partners and contracts: Hold scopes of work with external delivery partners and test site organisations. Agree what is being delivered, by when. Define milestones, check the work against the scope, and manage invoicing. Manage delivery against time and budget.
• Run the rhythms and routines: Lead the project and workstream routines that keep the team aligned: planning, stand-ups, reviews and retrospectives. Support the Head of Delivery with running routines for the programme team and across the wider directorate. Keep clear and simple project reporting.
• Support the team: Help colleagues plan and run convening work, such as government and industry roundtables, workshops and public deliberative sessions. Help build team culture. Build relationships across the team and plan moments of connection.

We are a new team, and we are testing tech and AI-first ways of working as we go. While it is not essential that you have previous experience in AI-enabled ways of working, we are looking for someone who is excited by and curious about working in this way.

The person:

• Essential: Hands-on delivery management experience on large or complex projects, in a structured framework of some kind. Ability to prioritise and schedule work against competing demands and workstreams, with a strong grasp of risks, dependencies and resourcing. Experience managing external partners or suppliers. Strong communication and people skills for diverse stakeholder groups. Low ego and a bias towards action. Interest and enthusiasm for the specific focus of our programme - agency and resilience of the UK in an age of AI and digital public infrastructure (DPI). Comfort with technology and automation and an eye for continuous improvement opportunities. Diligence in managing knowledge for the team.
• Desirable: Experience supporting workshops, roundtables or public engagement sessions. Experience in multi-disciplinary teams that mix researchers, engineers, designers and policy specialists. Experience delivering in a consortium with external partners.

What we offer:

• Salary: £50,700-£67,800, plus an array of benefits, including private medical insurance, dental insurance, the ability to buy and sell annual leave, eyecare vouchers and more.
• Location: Blackfriars, London, with hybrid working and a minimum of two days in the office.
• Term: Permanent.
• Hours: This is a full-time role, but we offer a range of flexible working arrangements and encourage our people to take advantage of them.

At Nesta, we believe that a diverse workforce leads to an organisation that is more innovative, more creative and gets better results. We want our workforce to represent the diversity of the people and communities we serve. We also want our workplace to be one where different experiences, expertise and perspectives are valued, and where everyone is encouraged to grow and develop.