The Home Office works to build a safe, fair and prosperous UK. We achieve this through our work on counter‑terrorism, policing, crime, drugs policy, immigration and passports.
The Chief Operating Officer Group works closely with the Home Office’s policy and operational commands to enable us together to deliver the department’s priorities. The group is comprised of different teams and professional functions, including Commercial, Finance, People, Portfolio and Project Delivery, Security, Estates and Information and Digital, Data and Technology.
Do you want to use your commercial skills to help keep our citizens safe and our country secure? To work on contracts or procurements that help to reduce crime, enforce the law and protect our borders, and to protect the most vulnerable in our society? If so, our roles in Home Office for you, our teams are at the cutting edge of public policy making and our work is among the most challenging and rewarding in Government.
The Home Office spends approximately £3bn each year with third party suppliers and this is handled by Commercial Directorate, a team of more than 250 procurement and contract management professionals. The range of goods and services acquired is huge and can include life affecting services and systems including for example services to complex programmes that are unique in Europe with multi‑million‑pound contracts.
At the Home Office, you will have the chance to create a real and tangible positive impact to the country’s future structure, impacting the lives across the UK.
The team plays a critical role in providing expert financial support, advice, guidance and challenge spanning the life cycle of complex commercial arrangements - from early market engagement with suppliers, tender development and risk management with the Business and Commercial colleagues - through to bid evaluation, negotiation and award, and associated contract management, supplier audit and assurance activities.
The Commercial Directorate handles the conduit between the Home Office and those supplier markets that help us provide key services to the public. It provides strategic commercial services such as market intelligence, procurement and contract management activities and its principal aims are to deliver efficiency savings, support the strategic agendas of our client groups by procuring the right products and services in a timely manner and dynamically managing contracts and suppliers, whilst delivering activities in a transparent and compliant manner.
This role provides an exciting opportunity within Home Office Commercial Directorate as a member of the Commercial Finance Team.
We are seeking a hard‑working individual to work at SEO level to lead and support the delivery of Commercial Finance and more widely Commercial’s objectives. This role could be of interest to individuals who have worked in a commercial or finance environment and are looking to broaden their commercial skills in a central commercial function, those with strong transferrable skills or to existing commercial staff who would enjoy taking on a new role.
The Home Office is an equal opportunity employer and value diversity and inclusion. It is committed to creating a welcoming, inclusive workplace where all its people can work and perform at their best.
Your primary function will be to lead and deliver the financial aspects of commercial activity, ensuring the timely delivery of financial requirements and to provide financial support and assurance to stakeholders throughout the commercial lifecycle.
The ideal candidate should have some experience of operating in a commercial finance or a commercial environment. This experience could include the financial aspects of tender preparation and issue, the negotiation and placement of contracts and experience of ongoing contract management activities. This should encompass a good working understanding of accounting, an ability to analyse financial accounts and other financial information, and a proficiency in identifying financial risks and opportunities in order to protect the taxpayer and drive value for money is an overarching consideration.
You will take ownership for leading and supporting contracts and procurements to deliver value and manage risk over the full contract lifecycle, ensuring that the Home Office gets maximum value from the contract.
The successful candidate will:
* Provide financial support, advice and challenge to the Commercial Directorate across the full commercial lifecycle (primarily planning and procurement but including contract management and contract exit) to embed best practice, minimise financial risk, and maximise VFM (Value for Money);
* Develop an effective and collaborative relationship with the wider Commercial Directorate to ensure finance is considered from the start of the contract lifecycle;
* Lead and deliver direct support to procurement Project teams, such as contributing to the development of the procurement approach and development of the most appropriate financial solution and reflecting the same in the contractual documents.
* Lead and deliver direct support such as carrying out assessments of the financial well‑being of prospective suppliers, and undertaking supplier and open book audits and investigations to support the effective use of contract levers to drive VFM from the Department's relationships with key external suppliers.
* You will take ownership for leading and supporting contracts and procurements to deliver value and manage risk over the full contract lifecycle, ensuring that the Home Office gets maximum value from the contract.
Responsibilities (not exclusively):
* Pricing & Payment Mechanisms – Establish appropriate pricing and payment structures for complex procurements through collaboration and challenge with colleagues and SMEs.
* Risk Management – Interpret the risk environment to ensure risks are allocated and managed appropriately between the Authority and suppliers.
* Financial Schedules & Models – Contribute to and tailor contractual financial schedules (e.g., "Model Services Contract") and design the Financial Pricing Model (FPM) with its user manual.
* Bid Evaluation – Lead financial evaluation and scoring of bids to support award recommendations.
* Supplier Engagement & Due Diligence – Support market engagement, negotiations, and conduct financial due diligence on prospective and strategic suppliers.
* Contract Handover & Live Controls – Ensure smooth handover to live contract management and lead investigations into high‑risk suppliers, applying financial control mechanisms.
* Knowledge Sharing & Continuous Improvement – Develop best practice, provide training, and drive process improvements across finance and commercial teams.
* Intelligence & Trend Analysis – Gather and share intelligence to maintain awareness of business trends and inform decision‑making.
In delivering the services above the candidate should:
* Recognise that value for money (VfM) is a key priority when dealing with public money and embed VfM principles in all products;
* Ensure all procurement and products comply with the Department's finance policies, standards and best practice;
* Provide support in embedding the newly published ‘Outsourcing Playbook’, which provides guidelines, rules and principles for the outsourcing of projects.
Working pattern
Due to the business requirements of this role, it is only available on a full‑time basis. However, compressed hours are available.
Travel
Some travel to attend meetings, workshops etc may be required.
#J-18808-Ljbffr