Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office Hiring for Sanctions Challenges Officer at London, OR Full Time

Location

London or East Kilbride

About The Job

Job summary

You will be at the forefront of the FCDO’s sanctions work, using this powerful tool to achieve priority foreign policy objectives; you will work across all our sanctions regimes, giving you significant exposure to wider foreign policy thinking in the FCDO.

The Sanctions Litigation Unit is an expanding team at the heart of a FCDO-wide effort across multiple departments and works closely with the Legal Directorate as well as FCDO geographic and thematic desks in managing the thousands of UK and UN designations in place. Your work will have a direct, real-world impact.

We are seeking candidates for two roles in the Sanctions Litigation Unit; working in a collegiate and supportive team you will:

• Work across all of our sanctions regimes, working closely with geographical and thematic teams, Posts, legal advisers, external counsel, OGDs to advise senior officials and Ministers on specific cases;
• Work closely with geographical desks, Legal Directorate, Information Rights Unit, Central Litigation Unit, and other government departments to respond to sanctions challenges, ensuring a consistent and co-ordinated response;
• Manage designation cases to ensure risks are identified, monitored and mitigated; and
• Lead reviews of existing sanctions designations and reviewing representations by designated persons including drafting advice to Ministers.

This is a demanding policy and project delivery role and will test your ability to work at pace across a broad portfolio to drive results in the context of significant uncertainty. It requires an ability to work in a novel and technical area of policy, to quickly grasp and advise on complex detail of particular – often the most complex and fascinating – designations.

Job Description

You will work as part of a team to manage legal and other risks to sanctions designations. Depending on your existing strengths and experience and your exact role in the team, you can expect to:

• Manage designation cases at risk of legal challenge, ensuring that all aspects of the case are effectively gripped and that all risks are managed and mitigated;
• Manage Court Reviews where applications have been made to the High Court by those designated and their legal representatives;
• Manage the review of existing, sanction designations, coordinating evidence gathering, legal review and the necessary clearances, sometimes to tight timetables.

The role will give you the opportunity to develop a range of operational and policy skills, and to demonstrate a breadth of competencies across policy and delivery that is unusually wide for an HEO role, and to develop an understanding of legislative processes. As with all roles in the Sanctions Litigation Unit, your role may flex in response to shifting priorities, given the fast-moving nature of the Directorate’s policy focus.

While the job is largely governed by legislation, you do not need to be a lawyer; an understanding of the law and how it can applies to casework would be useful. However, this is not essential as all relevant training will be provided.

Person specification

It is essential in your application that you provide evidence and proven examples in each of the following Minimum Criteria and Behavioursas far as you are able to do so. These responses will be further developed and discussed with those candidates invited for interview.

Minimum Criteria

• A desire to learn and the motivation to become an ‘expert’ in sanctions policy;
• The ability and resilience to manage multiple projects concurrently, balancing longer-term work with urgent priorities;
• Excellent analytical and strategic thinking skills;
• Strong communication skills, including the ability to present complex and detailed advice clearly to others, including at a senior level, both in writing and verbally;
• The ability to flex between the detail and the big picture, cutting through to the key issues and challenging the status quo when necessary;
• Teambuilding skills to build a strong network that can collectively deliver at pace on a shared objective; and
• An ability to understand and work with legal processes.

Behaviours

We’ll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Working Together
• Delivering at Pace
• Making Effective Decisions
• Communicating and Influencing

We only ask for evidence of these behaviours on your application form:

• Working Together
• Delivering at Pace

Benefits

• A Civil Service Pension.
• 25 days Annual Leave per annum.
• 9 days Public and Privilege holidays per annum.
• Learning and Development tailored to your role.

See the attached candidate pack.

Things you need to know

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window) , and will assess your Behaviours and Experience.

Your Application:

You will be asked to complete:

Your online CV, consisting of:-

• Recent employment
• Education/qualifications

A personal statement (of up to 500 words).

This should highlight how your skills and experience meet the minimum criteria set out in the Person Specification.

Assessment:

A panel will conduct an initial sift of applications. If a large number of applications are received the panel may decide to do an initial sift based on the first competency or behaviour. Those that pass the initial sift will then be considered against the remaining criteria.

If selected for an interview, this will be arranged directly with the hiring manager. Interviews and additional assessment activities will be assessed against the criteria outlined in the Job Profile.

Your Interview:

The interview will last around 60 minutes and will consist of a 5-minute verbal presentation, as well as Behavioural and Motivation questions.

Interviews will be conducted remotely via MS Teams , and the topic of presentation will be sent to you in advance.

At interview, we will assess the following behaviours against the Civil Service Success Profiles

Behaviours:

• Working Together
• Delivering at Pace
• Making Effective Decisions
• Communicating and Influencing

Disability Confident Scheme (DCS)

Candidates who apply under the DCS that meet the minimum criteria for the role will be invited to interview, and are entitled to request reasonable adjustments for the interview. Any reasonable adjustments should be detailed in the application and discussed with the hiring manager if invited to interview.

Further Information

A reserve list may be held for a period of 12 months from which further appointments can be made.

Any move to FCDO from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax Free Childcare. Determine your eligibility at https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk

New entrants are expected to join on the minimum of the pay band.

Applicants who are successful at interview will be, as part of pre-employment screening, subject to a check on the Internal Fraud Database (IFD). This check will provide information about employees who have been dismissed for fraud or dishonesty offences. This check also applies to employees who resign or otherwise leave before being dismissed for fraud or dishonesty had their employment continued. Any applicant’s details held on the IFD will be refused employment.

A candidate is not eligible to apply for a role within the Civil Service if the application is made within a 5 year period following a dismissal for carrying out internal fraud against government.

If you are experiencing accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert, please contact the email address in the ‘Contact point for applicants’ section.

This role is full time only. Applicants who wish to work an alternative pattern are welcome to apply however your preferred working pattern may not be available and you should discuss this with the vacancy holder before applying.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is developed vetting (opens in a new window) . See our vetting charter (opens in a new window) .

People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality Requirements

Open to UK nationals only.

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission’s recruitment principles (opens in a new window) .

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Apply and further information

This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans (opens in a new window) initiative.

The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window) .

Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name : Sanctions Job Enquiries
• Email : [email protected]

Recruitment team

• Email : [email protected]

Further information

The FCDO’s recruitment processes are underpinned by the principle of selection for appointment on merit, on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission Recruitment Principles. If you feel your application has not been treated in accordance with the Recruitment Principles and you wish to make a complaint, you should, in the first instance, contact [email protected]. If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from the FCDO, you can contact the Office of the Civil Service Commissioners.