Head of Digital Capability & Onboarding

Government Recruitment Service; North East; On-site; GBP 70,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job summary

A government agency in the UK is seeking a senior leader for its Digital & Data Hub to scale up digital recruitment and enhance workforce capabilities. The role includes strategic oversight of recruitment processes, onboarding support, and alignment with governmental efficiency targets. Ideal candidates will have strong leadership skills and experience in digital recruitment. Competitive benefits include a generous pension scheme and flexible working arrangements.

Benefits

Employer pension contribution of 28.97%

25 days annual leave plus bank holidays

Flexible working options

Qualifications

• Proven experience in leading digital recruitment initiatives.
• Strong understanding of workforce planning and capability support.
• Ability to influence at senior levels and manage complexity.

Responsibilities

• Lead digital recruitment campaigns and manage onboarding processes.
• Ensure alignment with government contractor reduction targets.
• Oversee digital workforce metrics and report key data.

Skills

Strategic leadership

Stakeholder management

Digital recruitment expertise

Job description

Overview

DVSA is investing in the digital workforce we need to meet future challenges—building a more sustainable, skilled, and in-house capability that reduces our reliance on external contractors. As part of this work, we’ve created the Digital & Data Hub: a central team that brings together recruitment, onboarding, workforce planning, and governance to support the growth of a modern digital profession within the agency.

We’re now looking for a senior leader to head up the Hub. This role will focus on scaling up our recruitment of digital professionals, embedding consistent onboarding and capability support, and helping DVSA meet its ambitious workforce targets in line with government expectations.

You’ll work with colleagues across digital, data, HR, and commercial teams—providing direction, solving delivery challenges, and building the processes that support long-term workforce growth. This is a role for someone who can navigate complexity, influence at senior levels, and lead a team to deliver tangible outcomes that strengthen our internal capability.

If you’re energised by solving workforce challenges at scale and want to shape the conditions that help digital professionals succeed—we’d love to hear from you.

Joining our department comes with many benefits, including:

• Employer pension contribution of 28.97% of your salary. Read more about Civil Service Pensions here
• 25 days annual leave, increasing by 1 day each year of service (up to a maximum of 30 days annual leave), plus 8 bank holidays a privilege day for the King’s birthday
• Flexible working options where we encourage a great work-life balance.

Read more in the Benefits section below!

Find out more about what it's like working at DVSA: Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency - Department for Transport Careers

Role and Responsibilities

The Head of Digital & Data Hub leads DVSA’s strategic approach to digital recruitment, onboarding, and workforce capability. You will be responsible for designing and running the processes that ensure DVSA can attract, develop, and retain the digital talent it needs—while also contributing to the government’s wider contractor reduction and efficiency targets.

This is a leadership role with both operational and strategic scope, sitting at the heart of the agency’s drive to build a more skilled, sustainable digital workforce.

• Digital Workforce Growth: Lead end-to-end recruitment campaigns across digital and data professions, ensuring roles are advertised, assessed, and onboarded in a consistent, timely, and inclusive way.
• Onboarding & Capability Support: Oversee the onboarding journey for all digital professionals, including apprenticeships, and develop mechanisms that support retention, development, and career progression.
• Contractor Reduction & Efficiency Alignment: Drive activity to convert and reduce external contractor roles where appropriate, aligning to Civil Service and Spring Budget targets for efficiency and workforce sustainability.
• Governance & Reporting: Ensure the Hub maintains accurate oversight of digital workforce metrics—including headcount, vacancies, contractor usage, and diversity indicators—and reports effectively to DVSA and central government stakeholders.
• Cross-functional Collaboration: Work closely with HR, finance, commercial, and digital leadership to coordinate workforce activity, unblock delivery risks, and provide senior-level assurance on progress.

For further information on the role, please read the attached role profile. Please note that the role profile is for information purposes only - whilst all elements are relevant to the role, they may not all be assessed during the recruitment process. This job advert will detail exactly what will be assessed during the recruitment process.