Service Design Lead

Help shape Great Britain's energy future. The National Energy System Operator (NESO) is helping to lead Great Britain's transition to a cleaner, more sustainable energy future. As part of this, NESO has been given the role of Regional Energy Strategic Planner (RESP). RESP will support the coordinated development of the energy system and enable long-term investment to be made with greater confidence and ahead of need. RESP takes a whole-system, place-based approach, bringing together regional and national perspectives and coordinating development across multiple energy vectors.

We are looking for an experienced Service Design Lead to lead a team through the next phase of an established service design programme.

The opportunity: A significant amount of work is already underway. Customer groups have been defined, customer needs have been mapped, user journeys are developing, and the service vision and programme are established. The next step is delivery. You will lead the team in delivering the agreed vision and programme over the next six months, ensuring that the needs of RESP's customers remain at the heart of what we build. RESP's customers include local councils and authorities, energy networks, and national and regional governments. They need to understand how changes such as growth in heat pumps, electric vehicles and renewable generation could affect their area, what this means for future energy infrastructure, and what they can do now to plan proactively. Your team will be the customer advocate, ensuring these needs are reflected in the RESP product and customer experience.

What you'll do:

• Develop the product and customer experience
• Lead delivery of the established service design vision and six-month programme.
• Take existing customer needs and the 'should be' experience and work with internal stakeholders to develop the detailed 'would be' customer journey.
• Translate customer needs and journeys into clear implications for the RESP product/tool.
• Work across product, workstream, policy, technical and operational teams to create a coherent end-to-end customer experience.
• Identify gaps, dependencies and risks and ensure customer needs inform product and delivery decisions.

Lead external engagement:

• Deliver the programme of engagement with customers and external stakeholders.
• Test the emerging product and 'would be' journey against real-world needs.
• Identify and mitigate risks early and use external insight to improve the product.
• Understand and manage differences between customer expectations and what RESP can realistically provide.
• Set clear expectations about what RESP will deliver and the value it will provide.
• Ensure external feedback directly informs product development and decision-making.

You will also lead and develop the Service Design team, creating clarity and momentum across the programme and building strong relationships across RESP.

About you: You are an experienced Service Design, Customer Experience or Customer-Centred Product leader who can take an established vision and programme and turn it into successful delivery. You'll bring:

• Experience leading service design or customer-centred product development in a complex environment.
• Experience taking customer needs and high-level service visions through to detailed future-state journeys.
• Experience leading external engagement to test propositions, identify risks and manage expectations.
• Proven ability to translate customer insight into product, service and delivery decisions.
• Strong facilitation, influencing and stakeholder-management skills.
• Experience leading teams and managing multiple workstreams, priorities and dependencies.
• The confidence to challenge where customer needs are not being adequately addressed.
• A pragmatic, collaborative approach and the ability to create clarity and momentum in an evolving environment.

Experience of the GB energy sector, NESO, local government, energy networks or the wider net-zero transition would be desirable.

What success looks like: After six months, you will have led the team in delivering the established programme, including:

• Developing the 'should be' customer experience into an actionable 'would be' journey.
• Ensuring customer needs directly inform the RESP product/tool.
• Testing the emerging proposition through external engagement.
• Identifying and mitigating customer and delivery risks.
• Establishing clear and realistic expectations with customers and stakeholders.
• Ensuring product and workstream teams understand the customer experience they are collectively responsible for delivering.

Ultimately, you will help ensure RESP builds something that works for its customers - enabling organisations to better understand future energy needs, plan proactively and make more confident decisions about the infrastructure required for their areas.

Contract and working arrangements: This is a 6-month rolling opportunity, reflecting the delivery phase of the RESP service design programme. The role is predominantly remote, with approximately two days per month spent in person with colleagues and stakeholders. Locations are likely to include Cardiff, Bristol, London, Warwick or Birmingham. Locations may change depending on programme and business needs, so you will need to be flexible and comfortable travelling across Great Britain when required. All reasonable business travel costs will be covered by NESO. We welcome full-time and part-time applicants and are committed to flexible working arrangements.

Our commitment to inclusion: At NESO, we believe potential comes in many forms. You do not need to meet every requirement to apply, and we welcome people with diverse experiences and backgrounds. We are committed to a fair and inclusive recruitment process where everyone has the opportunity to demonstrate their talents and help us build a workforce that represents the communities we serve.