Role information
- Job Title: Director Corporate Strategy
- Position type: Permanent
- Hours: 37 per week
- Grade and Salary Range:
- Location Oxford
- Service Area / Directorate: Corporate Strategy
- Responsible To: Chief Executive
- No. of employees: Up to 40
- Budget (£): TBC
- Assets: TBC
- Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974: Exempt
- Additional Screening: N/A
- Candidate Screening: Enhanced DBS Certificate
- Political Restriction: This post is politically sensitive
Role purpose
Provide leadership and responsibility for corporate strategy and policy development, facilitating corporate external affairs and corporate level partnerships and communications and campaigns.
Lead on external affairs and managing strategic partnerships at City, County, regional and national level and liaison with government to influence and deliver against the councils’ priorities. Lead the Environmental Sustainability Team, helping to develop the city council’s strategic leadership of the zero carbon agenda and build networks and influence and secure funding for projects.
Role responsibilities and main duties
- To provide leadership, direction and delivery of the work of the Policy and Partnership and Communications Team and the Environmental Sustainability Team
- To support the City Council’s role and reputation as an essential partner in city and countywide partnerships convening and driving partnerships that tackle challenges facing the city and realising opportunities
- To support the council’s ability to influence key strategic developments in relation to polices and plans across district councils, the county council, NHS, Police, universities and other keystakeholders to secure the best outcomes for Oxford’s citizens
- Develop and oversee coherent approach to corporate stakeholder engagement for the council
- To be the main source of advice for senior elected members and senior officers of the council on the management of the council’s reputation, brand and media presence.
- To deliver campaigns that contribute towards achieving the council’s objectives and ensure that the City Council’s voice influences the development of the wider policy agenda (national, regional, local).
- Responsible for corporate policy development and the policy review processes
- Oversight of the Safeguarding Policies and Procedures and their effective implementation
- Responsible for the Council’s Public involvement and consultation functions
- To play a lead role in the development and delivery of strategies and programmes on environmental sustainability, driving a cross-council approach
- To enable the Council to achieve its ambition of being a leading authority in the area of Environmental Sustainability, developing capacity to support strong networks, influential campaigns, and securing grant funding and delivery of projects and programmes
- To be a member of the Council’s Corporate Management Team with collective responsibility for the managerial leadership of the Council. To contribute to corporate programme boards which develop strategy and policy, implement programmes and projects and monitor performance
- To be responsible for the financial and operational performance of the service, ensuring services and projects are delivered and compliant within the Council’s constitution and quality standards, budgetary control, and according to relevant legislation and Council policies
- To ensure adequate staff resources are in place and budgeted for, including working to ensure appropriate capitalisation of staff resource where appropriate and securing external funds to support posts
- To stimulate and manage change to ensure a culture of continuous review and improvement is embedded within the service to embrace fresh thinking and innovation
- To deploy effective decision making skills - demonstrating the ability to think strategically and tactically how the implications of the overall outcome/s will affect their overall goal/strategy and how to secure successful implementation and management of risk
- To apply political awareness to leadership and service delivery, use initiative to recognise emerging problems and pro-actively demonstrate strong leadership skills in influencing and problem solving techniques to reach solutions
- To take the lead by demonstrating personal responsibility and modelling expected leadership behaviour, values and competencies that reflect the council’s culture and ambition
The duties and responsibilities set out in this role profile are indicative of the role. They are however, subject to change and you will be required from time to time to undertake other duties commensurate with your grade.
Our commitment to Safeguarding
Oxford City Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and adults at risk and requires all staff and volunteers to demonstrate this commitment in every aspect of their work.
Who we are looking for
Candidates will be shortlisted on the basis of demonstrating that they fulfil the following criteria in their application form and should include clear examples of how they meet these criteria.
Each of the criteria below will be measured through, the application form (A), interview (I), test/exercise (T) or documentation (D).
Essential Criteria
- Educated to degree level or equivalent experience (A, D)
- Comprehensive experience and a demonstrable track record of strategic policy development and implementation of change (A, I)
- Strong understanding of Communications, policies and partnerships (A, I)
- Knowledge of the Environmental agenda and key challenges (I)
- Extensive track record of driving forward service improvements (A, I, D)
- Significant experience of working with Members (A, I)
- Experience of effective budget management in line with service improvements (A, I, D)
- Ability to lead, manage and develop individuals and team to promote high performance and innovation in support of excellent service delivery (A, I)
- Excellent verbal and written communication, including report writing (I, T)
- Demonstrating the ability to negotiate and influence at all levels to promote a positive reputation for the council and service (I, T)
- Leads and manage conflicting and competing priorities effectively, keeping team performance on track, using innovative approaches to deliver solutions (I)
- Partnership working – experience of working in and managing collaborating partnerships to deliver large scale projects (A, I)
- Demonstrating a high level of understanding and commitment to diversity and community cohesion (A, I)
Desirable Criteria
- Relevant professional qualification A, D)
- Demonstrates understanding of the public sector ethos (I)
- Knowledge of safeguarding and or children’s services (A, I, T)
Notes to candidates
In addition to the above criteria, Oxford City Council has developed and embedded a suite of values and behaviours. Full details of these can be found on the Our values and behaviours page. Please familiarise yourself with these values and behaviours. If you are invited for interview you will be asked questions based on them.
