Assistant Director, Strategic Governance, Planning and Improvement

Birmingham City Council; Birmingham; On-site; GBP 85,000 - 127,000; Full time

Job summary

Birmingham City Council seeks an Assistant Director for Strategic Governance, Planning and Improvement to lead and innovate in service delivery for children and families. This senior role encapsulates developing governance frameworks, liaising with stakeholders, and ensuring an improvement culture is sustained across the Directorate. The successful applicant will shape strategic direction while meeting statutory duties and driving performance.

Qualifications

• Significant experience in a senior leadership position.
• Proven track record of leading governance and strategic initiatives.
• Expertise in performance culture embedding.

Responsibilities

• Lead the development of the Directorate's continuous improvement framework.
• Ensure governance and risk management practices are effectively delivered.
• Represent the Directorate at senior national and regional levels.

Skills

Leadership

Governance

Stakeholder Engagement

Performance Management

Strategic Planning

Job description

Job Description

#internal

Please note this vacancy is only available to Birmingham City Council employees.

Assistant Director, Strategic Governance, Planning and Improvement

Permanent

Grade B01: £85,004 - £126,484

Consultation grade - subject to formal evaluation under the Pay Equity Review

Working 36.5 hours per week

Birmingham City Council is committed to delivering high-quality services to children, young people, and families. As a major city council, we are shaping the future of local services through strategic governance, continuous improvement, and strong partnerships. We are now seeking a talented and visionary leader to join our team and drive forward the strategic direction, governance, and improvement initiatives for the Directorate of Children and Families.

As the Assistant Director of Strategic Governance, Planning and Improvement you will play a crucial role in leading and shaping the future of services across the Directorate. This senior leadership position offers an exciting opportunity to impact the development of services for children, young people, and families while driving governance, strategic planning, and continuous improvement.

You will be accountable for embedding a culture of improvement and excellence across services, ensuring that we meet statutory duties, service targets, and the Council's priorities. The role also involves leading a high-performing team and collaborating with a wide range of stakeholders to deliver sustainable, efficient services that offer real value for money.
Key Responsibilities:
Strategic Leadership: Take the lead in developing, designing, and implementing the Directorate's continuous improvement framework, ensuring that services are aligned with the Council's vision and priorities. Be accountable for the impact and delivery of the framework across governance, reporting, planning, and improvement functions.

Governance & Risk Management: Ensure the effective delivery of strategic governance and risk management practices. Lead the Directorate's inspection readiness, external audits, quality assurance, Directorate's improvement and transformation initiatives through the development of a project pipeline and the strategic direction of service improvements across all levels.

Stakeholder Engagement: Represent the Directorate at senior national and regional levels, influencing government policy and best practices. Lead collaboration across diverse teams and agencies, including the Children and Young People Partnership Board, to drive integrated working and sustainable change.

Strategic Direction & Partnership Working: Shape and determine the Directorate's strategic direction in collaboration with senior leadership, elected members, and external partners. Ensure strategic plans are outcome-focused and linked to national/local policy and inspections.

Performance Management: Lead efforts to embed a performance culture across the Directorate. Ensure continuous improvement is integrated into the delivery of services, with a focus on positive outcomes for children and families.

Advice and Guidance: Provide expert advice to senior leaders, elected members, and external partners on strategic planning, policy issues, and service delivery. Act as the corporate lead for governance, risk, and improvement.

Continuous Professional Development (CPD): Lead the development of practice frameworks and CPD opportunities for staff, ensuring that learning is systematically embedded in service improvement.

Safeguarding: Promote the safeguarding of children and young people, ensuring alignment with corporate safeguarding policies and the Birmingham Children Safeguarding Partnership's procedures.

Please upload an up-to-date CV and Personal Statement via the attachments part of your application. The Personal Statement should outline how you meet the essential criteria for the role through your personal qualities, skills and experience and include your motivation for applying to the post. Note the Personal Statement should be no more than 1500 words. Unfortunately, we cannot consider any applications without a CV and Personal Statement attached

Birmingham City Council is an accredited Disability Confident Leader employer, and we are committed to employing, retaining and developing all of our people.

We want to ensure your recruitment journey with us is a positive and equitable one, so please let us know if there are any reasonable adjustments, additional support, accessibility needs, or if there is any way in which we can support you through your application.

We welcome applications from people with caring responsibilities and flexible working options will be considered.

Job Description and Person Specification

About Us

We are a disability confident employer and we encourage applicants with disabilities to apply. We also welcome applications from people with caring responsibilities and flexible working options will be considered.

Proof of Right to work in the UK will be required for all applicants in accordance with UK Home Office requirements, before any employment offer can be confirmed. Non-UK applicants (excluding Ireland) may need to apply for a visa from the UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) and may require a Certificate of Sponsorship from Birmingham City Council for a skilled worker visa (if the job is eligible).