Head of Strategy and Transformation

Page Executive; Birmingham; Hybrid; Confidential; Full time

Job summary

A leading government agency seeks a Head of Strategy & Transformation to spearhead digital and data initiatives. This pivotal role involves shaping the agency's vision, driving change, and ensuring impactful outcomes for stakeholders. The ideal candidate will lead strategic innovation, aligning with government standards and enhancing delivery for the community.

Benefits

Employer pension contribution of 28.97%

Learning and development tailored to your role

Flexible working options

Generous annual leave

Inclusive workplace culture

Qualifications

• Significant experience in digital, data, or technology strategy.
• Track record of delivering organizational change.
• Strong technical knowledge of digital platforms and data governance.

Responsibilities

• Lead the digital and data transformation agenda across GPA.
• Provide expert advice and strategic direction.
• Drive cultural and organisational change.

Skills

Strategic Thinking

Stakeholder Engagement

Change Management

Innovation

Education

Degree-level education

Job description

• Hybrid working practices in place.
• The opportunity to drive and execute the delivery of Digital and Data Strategies

About Our Client

The role can be based in the following office locations:

Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Leeds, Manchester, Nottingham or Swindon.

Hybrid working practices are in place.

The Government Property Agency is the largest property holder in government, with more than £2.1 billion in property assets and over 55% of the government's office estate.

We are transforming the way the Civil Service works by creating great places to work, leading the largest commercial office programme in the UK, working towards halving carbon emissions from government offices, and achieving greater value for taxpayers. We are seeking innovative, solutions-focused individuals to join our team.

Representing the best covenant in the UK - His Majesty's Government, we are leading transformational programmes such as the Government Hubs Programme, Whitehall Campus Programme and Net Zero Programme, as well as delivering modern, cost-effective real estate service solutions.

Innovation and progress are at the heart of our behaviours. We foster a culture of lifelong learning, where curiosity and self-improvement are encouraged. We're dedicated to becoming a leading, inclusive employer both in the external market and throughout the Civil Service. Our strong emphasis on Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) is not just about driving inclusion across our organisation; it is also about ensuring our services meet the needs of government departments and the civil servants who use our spaces.

Join our dynamic and diverse team that leads with purpose, improving sustainability, nurturing social value, driving inclusivity and flexibility, and kick-starting economic growth. We are driven by purpose, and you can be part of it too: where you make a meaningful impact, where you influence, where your voice really matters, where you help to shape our future direction.

The Chief Digital & Information Office is on a mission to create a transformed, more efficient, digitally enabled organisation that provides better outcomes for everyone by 2028. This role has the opportunity to help spearhead our Digital & Data strategies and ongoing transformation.

To date, Digital & Data have had a significant role to play in supporting the GPA's 2030 vision of a transformed, shared, sustainable and value for money government estate, rapidly moving the organisation from a start-up to a scale-up organisation.

Going forward, as part of the Government Spending Review process, we have a pivotal opportunity to influence and shape our future, to focus on prioritised areas to better respond to our clients, customers and GPA teams. Taking a paradigm shift towards developing services that are even more fit for purpose to support the next stage in GPA's evolution, scale and innovate our services to be more efficient and effective over a longer period, supporting innovation and growth.

This is a pivotal leadership role at the heart of the Government Property Agency's digital and data transformation journey.

As Head of Strategy & Transformation, you will work closely with the Chief Digital and Information Officer (CDIO) to support the delivery of Digital & Data strategies and help drive a cohesive vision, embedding a data-driven culture, and leading the change required to modernise services, improve decision-making, and support the GPA's mission to deliver smarter, better, greener estate. In parallel, the role will stay connected to Government-wide Digital, Data & AI strategies to ensure strategic alignment.

This is a high-impact role requiring strategic thinking, technical expertise, strong stakeholder engagement, and change leadership. Acting as a senior advisor on digital and data items, providing strategic direction for digital transformation programmes and data maturity improvement across the GPA.

Job Description

The Head of Strategy & Transformation plays a critical leadership role in helping shape and drive the GPA's digital and data vision alongside peers in the team. This individual will be responsible for leading the strategic direction and transformation agenda across the agency, bringing together people, data, technology, and processes to ensure digital capabilities and data-driven insights are effectively harnessed to deliver better outcomes for GPA and its stakeholders.

From a digital & data perspective, this role will lead our innovation work-stream and work with the business, business analysts and other resources to help develop innovative solutions as necessary to continue to improve the delivery of GPA outcomes and improve client, customer and GPA experiences. Therefore, specifically to the business plan, this role will also help lead on areas of digital innovation and end-to-end processes, reviewing business plan objectives and working with owners to unlock opportunities to transform, automate or optimise the delivery. This could be enabling specific functionality in one of our digital services, such as AI, it could be looking at other services, such as predictive analytics or machine learning, improving the use of existing systems, or it could be helping to better embed change.

Key Responsibilities:

Strategic Leadership

• Support the CDIO with the implementation of GPA's Digital and Data Strategies, ensuring a cohesive and structured approach.
• Ensure digital & data delivery objectives align with the strategies and strategic goals.
• Provide strategic direction for the digital & data transformation programmes.
• Provide expert advice to senior leaders and ensure alignment with wider government Digital, Data & AI strategies.

Change Leadership

• Lead the end-to-end digital and data transformation agenda, driving cultural and organisational change across GPA.
• Establish seamless change assessments which regularly capture digital & data outputs which can be aligned to GPA strategic goals, Digital & Data Strategic goals, benefits and business outcomes.
• Establish and champion a strategic change road-map to enable digital and data maturity.
• Identify, initiate, and embed change initiatives across the business, ensuring readiness, engagement, and sustainable impact.
• Work closely with Corporate Performance, communications and other functions to develop and deliver change management strategies that support transformation goals.

Digital Transformation

• Drive the design and delivery of digital services and solutions that enhance operational performance and the Client and Customer experience.
• Support the Head of Corporate Systems to introduce scalable, secure, and user-centred technologies, in line with GPA principles and more broadly with GDS & CO.
• Lead the innovation work-stream, pilots and horizon-scanning to keep GPA at the forefront of digital capability.

Data Strategy & Governance

• Support the Head of Bi & Data with delivering the Information, Data & AI Strategy.
• Support with data governance, quality, and architecture standards.
• Oversee the implementation of standards and frameworks to enable data-driven decision-making.
• Ensure compliance with data legislation and risk mitigation protocols.

Stakeholder Engagement

• Act as a trusted partner to senior stakeholders within GPA, the Cabinet Office, and other departments.
• Lead change management initiatives to support the adoption of new digital and data practices across the agency.
• Build and maintain strong networks across the Civil Service digital and data community.
• Represent GPA at cross-government digital and data forums.

Leadership & Capability Building

• Support with developing a high-performing multidisciplinary team of digital & data professionals.
• Cultivate a collaborative, agile, and inclusive working environment.
• Promote a culture of innovation, collaboration, and continuous learning within the team and the wider organisation.

The Successful Applicant

Experience & Technical Skills

Essential criteria:

• Substantial experience in digital, data, or technology strategy and transformation leadership roles.
• Demonstrable track record of delivering large-scale organisational and cultural change.
• Deep understanding of change management principles and methodologies.
• Strong technical knowledge of digital platforms, data governance, and innovation in public service delivery.
• Experience managing cross-functional teams in a complex stakeholder environment.
• Excellent communication, negotiation, and influencing skills with senior stakeholders.

Desirable criteria:

• Experience working within central government or arms-length bodies.
• Familiarity with Government Digital Service (GDS) standards and frameworks.
• Understanding of the property, estates, or facilities management sectors.

Qualifications and Accreditation

• Degree-level education is desirable but not essential.
• A degree in a relevant field such as Digital Transformation, Computer Science, or Information Systems is desirable but not essential.

Professional Certifications (Desirable):

• Change Management: APMG Change Management, or equivalent.
• Project/Programme Management: PRINCE2, MSP, AgilePM, or equivalent.
• Digital/Technology Leadership: Digital Leadership Programme (OLP), TOGAF (for enterprise architecture), or similar.
• Data Management & Governance: DAMA Certified Data Management Professional(CDMP), BCS Data Management, or equivalent.

Agile and Service Design Expertise (Desirable):

• Agile Scrum Master/Product Owner certification.
• Knowledge of Government Digital Service (GDS) standards and service assessment criteria.

Cybersecurity/Data Protection Knowledge (Desirable):

• Awareness of GDPR, Cyber Essentials, and data privacy standards.
• Relevant training or qualifications (e.g. BCS Data Protection).

Behaviours

At the interview, we'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Changing and Improving
• Working Together
• Leadership
• Seeing the Big Picture

Technical skills

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

• Customer Perspective
• Commercial Acumen
• Property Market Knowledge
• Innovation

Interview

Interview questions will be a blend of Behaviour, Experience, Strength and Technical (core skill) questions.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

• Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.
• Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed.
• The level of security needed is SC level. Once offered, you will then undertake SC-level clearance process checks.

Nationality requirements
This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals.
• Nationals of the Republic of Ireland.
• Nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK.
• Nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• Individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020.
• Turkish nationals and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service.

We encourage applications from people from all backgrounds and aim to have a workforce that represents the communities and wider society that we serve. We pride ourselves on being an employer of choice. We champion diversity, inclusion and well-being and aim to create a sense of belonging in a workplace where everyone feels valued. The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities.

As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

What's on Offer

The role will pay up to £85,000 + Benefits, including an employer pension contribution of 28.97% where you will be a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension Scheme.

• Learning and development tailored to your role.
• An environment with flexible working options - hybrid working practices in place.
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity.
• Generous annual leave.