Innovate UK Hiring for Programme Manager – Further Education Innovation Fund Job at Remote , UK Full Time

Job Purpose:

The role of the Programme Manager for the Further Education Innovation Fund (FEIF) is critical in developing and implementing support from Innovate UK to boost business innovation activity through piloting interventions which demonstrate effective partnerships with further education colleges. Reporting to the Head of Innovation Talent & Skills you will ensure the successful implementation of a pilot of a further education innovation fund through understanding the needs of further education colleges and their funding as well as the needs of businesses seeking to increase their innovation activity. You will build strong relationships across Innovate UK the innovation ecosystem to ensure the FEIF pilot is designed as a complementary offer which builds on existing business support and funding. Your priority will be in creating a mechanism which is accepted by further education colleges and has the potential to boost the adoption and diffusion of cutting-edge innovation.

You will work with colleagues across Innovate UK in creating this pilot, ensuring partners including BEIS and DfE contribute to the design and operational considerations. Building and maintaining trusted relationships with college leaders and partner organisations such as the Gatsby Foundation, Association of Colleges, IUK KTN and IUK EDGE, you will ensure that all stakeholder considerations are considered within the design.

This role focuses on the design of a funded approach to business innovation activity through the mechanism of further education colleges. A comprehensive understanding of approaches to maximise impact of funding will be necessary to ensure the opportunity to secure sustained support for the approach is incorporated in design principles.
You will be the face of the funding opportunity and Innovate UK’s relationship with further education colleges in supporting the adoption and diffusion by businesses of innovation.

Key Responsibilities and Accountabilities:

• Lead the end to end delivery of complex, full lifecycle programmes from planning through requirements and delivery, working closely with operational teams.
• Act as the day-to-day agent on behalf of the team ensuring successful delivery across the breadth of the programme and its project dossier.
• Stakeholder management across a complex and diverse stakeholder network, including regular, appropriate and timely communications throughout the programme, highlighting the need for senior level support.
• Liaise with the different functions in the operational and competitions teams at Innovate UK to secure timely and efficient delivery of FEIF programme responsibilities.
• Resource Management: Identifies resource requirements and direct planning, scheduling, resourcing and estimating for complex and large-scale programmes.
• Ensure dependencies are actively managed, act as an arbiter and enforcer and resolve issues between the various elements of the programme.
• Oversee risk and issue management. Ensures mitigations are in place and resolved through negotiated agreement escalating to Risk Owner as appropriate.
• Develop and support programme governance and provide effective co-ordination of the project portfolio
• Portfolio management including analysis of funding patterns, both within our programme and external programmes that could provide input to future programme design.
• Ownership of associated documents including strategies, business case, delivery plan and programme plans.
• Managing the delivery budget and spend profile, gaining sign off from stakeholders including Finance and Programme Boards as required.
• Generation of accurate, relevant and timely reporting to enable progress to be tracked, including the provision of concise commentary targeted to meet stakeholder needs.
• Provide secretariat to the Programme’s associated Boards, their meetings as and when required.

This is not an exhaustive list and you might be encouraged to undertake any other duties across the wider directorate, commensurate with the Band and level of responsibility of this post, for which the post holder has the key experience and/or training.

Person Specification:

Qualifications:

Essential –

• Educated to degree-level in a relevant discipline or relevant equivalent experience

Desirable –

• Postgraduate and professional qualifications advantageous (Prince 2/APM/APMG practitioner)

Experience:

Essential –

• Excellent programme planning and delivery skills, delivered consistently.
• Experience of programme management, working in a complex multi-organisation environment with varying cultures.
• Clear-track record of working within the constraints of time, cost and quality.
• Experience of working on a range of programmes concurrently.
• Experience of building rapid and robust relationships with stakeholders.
• Experience of successfully managing multiple stakeholders from a variety of organisations who have conflicting demands and priorities.

Desirable –

• Understanding of the Innovate UK competition processes and pre- and post-award steps .
• Basic understanding of the language and requirements for the different types of competitions and funding models at Innovate UK.
• Understanding of the UK political/business environment and the science/government policy landscape as well as the UK research base and UKRI’s role within this.
• Understanding of the structure of local government as well as its constituent agencies and brands, in England and the Devolved Administrations, that deliver business innovation support.

Skills:

• High degree of organisational ability and attention to detail, delivered consistently including managing data and maintaining audit trails.
• Ability to manage and prioritise a workload in order to meet tight deadlines.
• Highly developed analytical and problem-solving skills, including the ability to quickly understand new and complex issues and to apply solutions.
• IT competency.
• Excellent interpersonal and team working skills.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Strong stakeholder management skills.
• The ability to respond calmly under pressure and to make impartial and well-considered judgments in complex situations as and when required.
• Highly flexible, capable of identifying the right approach to the challenge in hand and translating that approach into effective delivery.
• Ideally the successful applicant will have been exposed to many different project management approaches.

Competencies:

All team members demonstrate compatibility with and capability against our Core Competencies such as:

Thinking and Problem Solving – Stakeholder management – Communication skills – Influencing – Self-awareness/Self-management – Strategic awareness – Working with others– Project management

Travel Requirements:

Field-based: There will a requirement to travel, mostly national, and there is some flexibility in this. Innovate UK staff make extensive use of telepresence tools for meetings to minimise unnecessary travel.

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an average employer contribution of 27%

Job contact :

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Email :
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Recruitment team :

Email :
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