Performance Manager

Historic England; United Kingdom; Hybrid; GBP 55,000 - 75,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Defined benefit pension

28 days holiday

Free site entry to English Heritage

Development opportunities

Job summary

Historic England is seeking a Performance Manager to lead its corporate performance framework, ensuring performance is clearly defined, robustly monitored and effectively communicated.

You will lead the development of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and the Balanced Scorecard, providing insight and challenge to senior stakeholders and delivering high-quality performance reporting to the Executive Team, Historic England Commission, the BFC and the DCMS.

Qualifications

• Experience leading corporate performance frameworks or performance reporting functions.
• Demonstrable experience developing and managing KPIs.
• Analytical and data interpretation skills.
• Ability to influence and challenge senior stakeholders.
• Experience producing strategic reports and communicating complex information clearly.
• Experience driving improvement, innovation or best practice.

Responsibilities

• Provide leadership of Historic England’s corporate performance framework.
• Lead the development of KPIs and the Balanced Scorecard.
• Provide insight and challenge to senior stakeholders.
• Deliver high quality performance reporting to the Executive Team, Historic England Commission, the Business and Finance Committee and the DCMS.
• Strengthen data led decision-making.
• Curate insight, not just data, contributing to strategic discussions.

Skills

KPI development

Performance framework

Analytical thinking

Stakeholder influence

Strategic reporting

Data-driven decisions

Job description

Historic England is the public organisation that brings new life to heritage to build a better future for every place and everyone.

Historic England has a fantastic opportunity for you to join us as our Performance Manager.

This is a full time, permanent contract position.

The location of this role is national, inclusive with hybrid working. You will be based in one of our following offices and from home - Newcastle, York, Manchester, Birmingham, Swindon, Bristol, Portsmouth (Fort Cumberland) and Cambridge.

We offer a wide benefits package including a competitive defined benefit pension scheme to which we make 28.97% employer contributions, a generous 28 days holiday, corporate discounts, free entry into English Heritage sites across the country and development opportunities to ensure you achieve your goals.

To view our full range of benefits please follow the link here.

What you will be doing

As our Performance Manager, you will be responsible for providing leadership of Historic England’s (HE) corporate performance framework, ensuring that performance is clearly defined, robustly monitored and effectively communicated.

You will lead the development of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and the Balanced Scorecard, providing insight and challenge to senior stakeholders. You will be responsible for high quality performance reporting to the Executive Team (ET), Historic England Commission, including the Business and Finance Committee (BFC), and the organisation’s sponsoring department, the DCMS, strengthening data led decision-making. Your role is to curate insight, not just data, and you will contribute directly to strategic discussions.

Who we are looking for

• Experience leading corporate performance frameworks or performance reporting functions
• Demonstrable experience developing and managing KPIs
• Analytical and data interpretation skills
• Ability to influence and challenge senior stakeholders
• Experience producing strategic reports and communicating complex information clearly
• Experience driving improvement, innovation or best practice

Please note your application will be scored and assessed against the above criteria.

We are an equal opportunity employer which values diversity and inclusion. If you have a disability or neurodiversity, we would be happy to discuss reasonable adjustments to the job with you.

Having won the Gold Award from MIND for workplace wellbeing in seven consecutive years, we also recognise the importance of a healthy work-life balance.

We are an inclusive employer and believe that flexible working options are for everyone. We want to make sure our working arrangements don’t prevent anyone from joining us because of their personal circumstances. We also want to provide you with the best balance in your home and work life that we can.

We are open to considering options including job sharing, part-time working, compressed hours working and different working locations, including hybrid working. Please visit our jobs pages or contact us to find out more.

Why work for Historic England

We are committed to promoting equality of opportunity for everyone. Diversity helps us to perform better and attract more people to support our work. We welcome and encourage job applications from people of all backgrounds.

We particularly encourage applications from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic candidates and candidates with disabilities as they are underrepresented within Historic England at this level.

Historic England wants all of our candidates to shine in the recruitment process. Please tell us what we can do to make sure you can show us your very best self. You can contact us by email at [e-mail] if you have any recruitment queries.

At Historic England we use a hiring system called Applied. Applied is a behavioural science-backed recruitment platform that reduces bias, improves quality of hire and increases diversity. We do not use CV application for the majority of our hiring processes. You will answer a selection of questions that allow our hiring teams to test your skills and suitability for the role.

At Historic England, we value the expertise and individuality each candidate brings and want to hear about this in your own words. If you require the use or AI tools or other resources to support your application, we ask that all information is factually accurate, original, and reflects your own experience. To best represent yourself, we encourage you to write in your own words and use AI-generated content only as inspiration—not as direct input.

Provisional interview dates: 1st, 02nd, 06th October 2026.

Please follow the link for a full copy of the Job Description –