Are you calm and decisive when others are looking for leadership? Do you have experience leading emergency planning or resilience responses in complex, multi-agency environments? Are you motivated by public service and protecting communities when it matters most? Brighton & Hove City Council's Corporate Leadership Office plays a central role in supporting the city's leadership, governance and organisational resilience. This role sits within the Emergency Planning Unit and is critical to ensuring the council is prepared for, and able to respond effectively to, major incidents that affect residents, services and partners across the city. You will lead the council's emergency planning and resilience arrangements, ensuring statutory responsibilities are met and providing confident leadership before, during and after emergencies. Interviews to be held: To be confirmed There is full information about the role below and attached but, if you would like to arrange an informal discussion, please contact Louise Peim, Head of Corporate Leadership Office at louise.peim@brighton-hove.gov.uk. About the role This is a senior role with responsibility for emergency planning, resilience and business continuity across the council. You will lead a small specialist team and ensure the organisation maintains a 24/7 response capability, including out-of-hours leadership during incidents. Key aspects of the role include: Leading the council's preparedness for emergencies, including developing, reviewing and maintaining emergency plans and the Community Risk Register. Providing professional advice to senior leaders and coordinating the council's response during major incidents, including working within Gold and Silver command structures. Convening and supporting tactical and strategic response arrangements and ensuring clear decision-making, communication and reporting. Working closely with partners through the Sussex Local Resilience Forum, including emergency services, neighbouring authorities, voluntary organisations and government bodies. Leading training and exercising activity so staff at all levels are confident and prepared. Managing the Emergency Planning & Resilience Team, emergency communications arrangements and the emergency planning budget. Day-to-day work is varied, and during incidents the role requires flexibility, resilience and sound judgement in fast-moving situations. What we're looking for We are looking for someone with significant experience in emergency planning, civil contingencies or major incident response, who understands the role of a local authority within regional and national resilience arrangements. You will bring: Strong knowledge of the Civil Contingencies Act and emergency planning frameworks. Experience working with senior officers, elected members and partner agencies in politically sensitive environments. The ability to make pragmatic, well-judged decisions under pressure. Excellent communication skills, including the ability to brief clearly, write succinctly and engage confidently with a wide range of audiences. A collaborative approach, with the ability to build effective relationships across organisations and sectors. We welcome applicants from a range of professional backgrounds where transferable emergency planning or resilience experience has been gained. Why join us? This role offers a rare opportunity to work at the heart of a city council, influencing how a complex organisation prepares for and responds to emergencies. You will: Have meaningful responsibility and autonomy in a role that directly impacts public safety. Work closely with senior leaders and partners across Sussex and nationally. Be supported to maintain and develop your professional skills through training, exercising and learning from experience. Join a council committed to being a learning organisation that values wellbeing, inclusion and continuous improvement. Encouraging a diverse workforce Our city is known and loved for its diversity. Not only is the mixture of people, culture and skills vital to the economic and social development of the city, it's what makes Brighton & Hove such a great place to live, work and visit. We are committed to developing and retaining a workforce that is representative of the diverse communities we serve so we welcome applications from individuals from all backgrounds. In order to achieve our aims of proportionate representation, we particularly encourage applicants from a BME or White Other background as well as those who identify as disabled, male or trans. Find out more about our commitment to being a fair and inclusive place to work where everyone can achieve their potential by reading about our fair and inclusive actions, our anti-racism strategy and the work we are doing to encourage a diverse workforce (brighton-hove.gov.uk). Why work for us? As a council, we want to: • be connected • be confident • be innovative and creative • be diverse and inclusive • be healthy and psychologically safe For more information about our values and the benefits of working at the council, visit Why work for us which gives details of our wellbeing support, our benefits including leave and pensions as well as details of our training and development. How to apply Please read our Apply for a job at the council pages carefully. They give you all the guidance you need to complete your application as well as information on what will happen after you've submitted your application and at interview. As part of your application, you will need to provide your education and career history and answer some application/shortlisting questions. Your answers to the application/shortlisting questions are the most important part of your application as they will be used in the shortlisting process to assess whether you meet the essential requirements for the role that are set out in the person specification and to decide whether you should be offered an interview. Before you start your application, please read our Shortlisting questions guidance (brighton-hove.gov.uk) as this gives important advice which will increase your chance of success in the shortlisting process. AI advice for candidates We are interested in hearing about your experience and skills in your own words. While we value people who know how to use AI, we ask that you minimise using it in your application. We are keen to hear how your experience and skills align to our values and the skills and experience needed to perform well in our roles with clear real examples from you. To support you in this, we have guidance on using the STAR model which can help you ensure you are telling us your whole story. We also provide clarity on the skills we are looking for in our adverts and in the job description/person specification attached to each job advert. All the applications we receive are read by at least two hiring managers and we do not use AI in this process. Our experience of reading applications is that those that have heavily used AI contain generic paragraphs that are strikingly similar to other applicants' responses. This makes it extremely difficult to differentiate between applications, and doesn't give us enough evidence of your individual skills. There is a risk that we will therefore not be able to shortlist you. Instead, we recommend you ensure your application stands out by presenting clear examples of your actual skills and experiences in your own words. Additional information Your starting salary will be pro rata if the above position is less than 37 hours or term-time only. We are a workplace that supports flexibility and employee wellbeing in the way we work whilst providing the best service for our customers. Team and service working arrangements are designed to support both employee work life balance and team collaboration. These would be part of your individual working arrangements alongside any personal preference agreed with your manager in advance of joining. Your contractual location will be the designated council office for your team and travel to and from your contractual location would be at your own expense.