Assistant Economist

Companies House; Cardiff; On-site; GBP 35,000 - 55,000; Full time

Job summary

An established industry player is seeking an Assistant Economist to join their dynamic Economics team. This pivotal role involves providing economic analysis to support high-profile projects and influencing decisions across the organization. With the recent enactment of significant legislation, the team is at the forefront of ensuring effective implementation while delivering value for money. The role offers excellent leadership experience and the chance to engage with senior stakeholders, making it ideal for those aspiring to progress in their economic careers. Join a forward-thinking team dedicated to tackling economic challenges and driving impactful change.

Qualifications

• Must be a member of the GES or have a degree in economics.
• Experience in producing economic analysis or modelling is essential.

Responsibilities

• Provide economic analysis to support key decision-making.
• Lead projects and present findings to senior stakeholders.
• Ensure value for money in economic assessments.

Skills

Economic Analysis

Stakeholder Engagement

Communication Skills

Cost-Benefit Analysis

Leadership

Attention to Detail

Education

First or Upper Second-Class Honours Degree in Economics

Postgraduate Degree in Economics

Job description

We are looking for an Assistant Economist to join our growing Economics team at Companies House.

The purpose of the role is to provide economic analysis to support Companies House’s most important and high-profile work and play a pivotal leadership role within our projects. They will support and influence decision-making across the entire organisation, including those made by senior colleagues, delivering real impact through analysis, with a strong focus on value for money. This is a fast-paced, high-profile role, leading on the delivery of economic analysis to support Companies House’s most important and high-profile work.

This is a great time to join Companies House. In October 2023, the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (now Act) achieved Royal Assent, one of the most significant moments in Companies House’s history. The powers within the Act enable Companies House to play a much greater role in disrupting economic crime and preventing abuse of the register, while supporting economic growth and ease of doing business in the UK. Companies House is in the process of implementing the full suite of reforms, and the Economics team is at the forefront of ensuring this is done in a way that provides value for money and achieves the policy intent. Link - [Changes to UK company law: a big moment for Companies House – Companies House (blog.gov.uk)].

In this role, the individual will be expected to be the lead representative from the Economics team for their assigned projects. While they will be able to draw on the experience from other members of the economics team for advice on analytical problems, they will be expected to work independently and with the project team to build an understanding of specific project detail. Therefore the ability to work closely with a range of stakeholders is vital, to be able to understand the background, provide advice and ensure that it is possible to undertake targeted and accurate analysis to help support decision making. There is also the opportunity to present analysis to senior stakeholders, including to our Executive Board, supporting them to make key decision on high profile projects. As a result, this role provides excellent leadership experience and exposure across the organisation, including to senior colleagues and would be well-suited for individuals with ambitions to progress to a Grade 7 economist role in future.

Job description

As an Assistant Economist, you will ensure value for money is considered at the heart of Companies House’s most high profile work, and empower key stakeholders to make evidence based decisions. To achieve this, you will be expected to:

• Proactively identify and work with the relevant stakeholders to understanding the background. This often involves getting to the heart of complex topics, including policy/legislative requirements and technological processes.
• Clarify and challenge the underlying project/policy rationale, ensuring consideration of economics principles to establish if there is a strong case for intervention.
• Draw on your economics knowledge to provide support and advice to our customers to ensure analysis has appropriate focus on value for money and societal impacts, such as the impact of legislation on businesses.
• Identify critical evidence gaps and outlining the need for robust assumptions required for modelling, and working with the project to allow them to gather stronger evidence.
• Produce cost-benefit analysis and contribute to writing economic chapters for high-value business cases, for scrutiny by relevant governance boards within Companies House and the Department for Business and Trade.
• Utilise a range of methodologies to quantify key non-financial costs and benefits in line with HM Treasury analytical guidance, to provide evidence of impact. Examples include estimating operational efficiencies, the cost to businesses imposed as a result of needing to comply with new requirements, or user benefits such as time savings due to introducing more user-friendly processes.
• Undertake quality assurance of modelling and analysis in line with HM Treasury best practice.
• Present analytical findings to key stakeholders within Companies House and the Department for Business and Trade, ensuring key messages are understood by a range of stakeholders, particularly non-economists, to ensure analysis effectively supports decision making.

About the team

Economics is a relatively new function within Companies House (established three years ago). This role sits within a small team of four economists (including this role), and will report to one of the two Grade 7 Principal Economists within the team, who in turn report to the Grade 6 Head of Economics. The economics team forms part of the wider Finance and Commercial directorate at Companies House, reflecting our strong focus on ensuring expenditure provides value for money.

The team’s positioning provides a great opportunity to work alongside specialist cost estimators within Finance, and a range of Commercial professionals. The team have strong links with analysts from the Department for Business and Trade, and other analytical professions across Companies House (statisticians, social researchers, and data scientists in particular).

Person specification

We are looking for the following which will be assessed at sift and interview.

As part of the process we will assess against the Government Economic Service (GES) technical framework. The technical framework sets out the high-level technical standards, knowledge and skills required to be a GES Member.

Qualifications and Membership

To apply, you must either be a member of the Government Economic Service (GES) or have a first or upper second-class honours degree in economics (or international equivalent), or a postgraduate degree in economics. If it is a joint degree, at least 50% of the course modules must be in economics. You must also have studied both macroeconomics and microeconomics.

If you are not already in a GES role we may ask for evidence of your qualifications to support entry into the profession.

Experience

We’re looking for an Assistant Economist who has:

• Experience of producing economic analysis or modelling.
• Experience of working with a diverse range of stakeholders.
• Excellent communication skills and experience of conveying complex analysis, ensuring findings are articulated and explained clearly to audiences of all backgrounds, particularly non-economists.
• Experience of working on analytical/economics publications or projects.
• The ability to work independently and take responsibility to provide high-quality advice and analysis to our customers, role-modelling commitment to high standards across Companies House.
• Experience of building strong relationships with customers, empowering them to make effective decisions by providing analytical insight and analysis.
• A good understanding of core economic principles and be able to apply this knowledge to Companies House projects.
• The ability to demonstrate and develop leadership, particularly, being able to provide challenge where appropriate to ensure the focus of analysis is meaningful and ensures value for money considerations form a key part of the evidence to support decisions.
• Good attention to detail in order to analyse complex information and data.

Behaviours

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Making Effective Decisions
• Leadership
• Working Together

Technical skills

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

• GES - Application of Knowledge
• GES - Analysis of Data
• GES - Effective Communication

Next steps

Click 'Apply Now' to be taken to our main advert Civil Service Jobs where you can see more details regarding the role, the incredible benefits we have to offer and what it's like to work in Companies House.

If you have any questions about the role or process, please reach out to [e-mail].

This role closes on 5th May 2025 (at 23:55).