Head of National Graduate Leadership Programme

Salary: £64,000- 81,000 dependent on experience, plus £4,000 London weighting if applicable
Location: Hybrid
Employment type: Permanent
Hours Per Week: 37.5
Closing date: 28/05/2024

About Police Now

Our mission is to transform communities, reduce crime and anti-social behaviour, and increase the public’s confidence in the police service by recruiting, developing and inspiring outstanding and diverse leaders in society and on the policing frontline.

We are working towards a day when every community, whatever the socio-economic background of its residents, can thrive without being fearful of crime. We are looking for talented, committed and mission-aligned individuals who will drive us towards achieving our ambitions.

Police Now recruits and trains graduates and career changers with leadership potential to become inspirational police officers and outstanding crime fighters on our National Graduate Leadership Programme and our National Detective Programme. Beyond these programmes, our officers may join our Frontline Leadership Programme and be further developed giving them the best possible chance to progress through the policing ranks and have a lifelong connection with us.

Our 115-strong not-for-profit organisation aims to create systemic change. We need highly capable impactful staff to support the recruitment and development of our officers and to cultivate strong relationships with partner forces and the wider sector.

The purpose of your role

Police Now seeks an exceptional individual to lead the delivery and future design of the National Graduate Leadership Programme (NGLP). This two-year programme aims to train, develop and support brilliant and diverse graduates to be outstanding neighbourhood police officers who will help to change policing culture for the better. Our participants tackle entrenched local problems, and in doing so aim to cut crime and anti-social behaviour and increase police legitimacy in the interest of long-term community transformation. The programme also acts as a talent pipeline for the police service, and participants are supported to develop both their leadership capability and operational policing skills to progress laterally and vertically through policing over time. This role represents the genuine opportunity to influence the future of police constable recruitment and training given Police Now’s role as a lead and innovator in this space.

The role comprises five main parts:

• Role model Police Now’s mission, strategy, values and leadership principles. As a member of the senior leadership team, you will have collective responsibility for the strategy and direction of the organisation, ensuring that we are a role model of leadership, integrity and diversity, wellbeing, efficiency and effectiveness, in policing and beyond.
• Communicate effectively, energetically and inspirationally, advocating and representing the programme with a wide range of internal and external stakeholders ranging from participants through to force contacts and internal teams.
• Deliver an excellent two-year programme of ongoing learning, support and professional development throughout the two-year probationary period that participants undertake following the academy, including working closely with partner forces to resolve challenges that participants may face.
• Deliver an outstanding residential NGLP academy each year, which equips participants with excellent core policing and strong neighbourhood problem solving skills and the understanding of how to deploy those skills and abilities in ethical, organisational and procedurally just ways that increase public confidence and police legitimacy.
• Collaborate internally and externally to evaluate programme delivery and then design and iterate the NGLP year on year so that it continues to be successful, measured against Police Now’s mission, strategy, participant experience and police force and stakeholder requirements

Key responsibilities

ROLE MODEL

• Inspire your team (c. 20 individuals), programme participants, colleagues from partner forces and stakeholders as a powerful advocate for neighbourhood policing and leadership, and the transformational change to communities and to policing itself that both can achieve when delivered well. Effectively, energetically and authentically communicate Police Now’s mission, our theory of change, strategy and vision so that those experiencing our programmes, delivering our programmes and supporting our programmes believe that a more effective, more legitimate, more just police service can be a reality in the future.
• Be an inspirational and effective senior leader and line manager to the NGLP team and within the wider programmes directorate, supporting and developing your direct reports and wider team to deliver outstanding results and improve their own skills, knowledge and abilities, and succession plan for the future to ensure sufficient team resilience to avoid unforeseen events impacting on programme delivery.
• Support your team to effectively project manage the delivery of each NGLP cohort from the academy right through to graduation at the end of the programme. Holding responsibility for the end-to-end participant journey, you will drive innovation and strategic decision making to ensure participant experience and performance remains high, and that risks are identified, monitored, mitigated and eliminated.

DELIVER

• Deliver the NGLP Academy each year, to a standard of excellence measured against Police Now’s mission, theory of change, strategy, programme aims and the views of participants, partner forces, stakeholders and colleagues. You will oversee delivery as Head of Academy, leading a team onsite of circa 250 individuals comprising Police Now employees, seconded inspectors and sergeants from partner forces, and programme participants. You will make the strategic, tactical and operational decisions necessary to keep the academy running effectively, delegating where appropriate and collaborating with colleagues and escalating risks and decisions to the Programmes Director where necessary.
• Oversee the delivery of the post-academy programme, which includes a series of whole-cohort events where all participants come together to showcase their impact, share best practice and eventually graduate from the programme; an extensive participant support and professional development offer ranging from coaching to group problem solving and practical individual support; and the ongoing learning that participants take part in via online learning and assessments.
• Ensure a high quality and purposeful participant journey is delivered through the two-year programme, implementing excellent teaching, learning and operational interventions across the length and breadth of each programme to maximise participant performance, development, wellbeing and impact in their communities and teams. This also involves co-designing enabling activities for the programme, carried out by other teams.
• Oversee participant risk, data and progress tracking systems so that overall progress and risk data is captured and understood to support knowledge of participant performance, acting accordingly with interventions and activities to support high success and retention rates. This also includes proactive support for participants from under-represented groups who often face additional barriers whilst on the programme
• Utilise the right balance of physical and digital delivery methods and use the right channels and systems to achieve our programme objectives. We place great value on inspiring and impactful in-person interactions, supported by excellent learning technology.
• Set and monitor the NGLP team budget based on required activity, ensuring that spend is forecast accurately, and then own this throughout the financial year ensuring effective tracking of spend and reforecasting if required, procurement for goods and services is robust and value for money is achieved.

COLLABORATION

• Work in close partnership with the Programme Director, Head of the National Detective Programme and Head of the Frontline Leadership Programme & Alumni as a leadership team to ensure consistency, efficiency and best practice is achieved between the programmes and participant to alumni journey, as well as to provide aligned and inspirational leadership for the entire Programmes directorate.
• As a member of the Senior Leadership Team, input into the formation of Police Now’s strategy and influence major decisions, communicate and explain our strategy and priorities to your team and external partners and stakeholders, role model our values and leadership principles, provide feedback and support to your senior peers and the executive team. Act as an escalation point for colleagues across the organisation for your own area as well as making logical, reasoned decisions on urgent matters outside of your functional expertise if required.
• Work with colleagues within and across departments to evaluate each NGLP academy and programme and make recommendations to the Programmes Director and Senior Leadership Team to iterate, innovate and improve the design and delivery of the NGLP year on year. Close collaboration and alignment with our Recruitment and Marketing team and Force Partnerships team is also vital to ensure a consistent and exceptional service to participants and forces.
• Collaborate with stakeholders internally and externally to develop our future programme in line with the new Police Constable Entry Pathway (PCEP), including to ensure validation and quality assurance from the College of Policing. Continue to work with our academic partner, Liverpool John Moores University, to deliver our current cohorts in line with the existing Degree Holder Entry Programme (DHEP) framework.
• Be a visible expert on Police Now’s programmes and the role of neighbourhood officer more broadly, and the education and training of police officers, explaining to colleagues, partner forces and stakeholders Police Now’s mission and how successful delivery of the NGLP – including the aims, objectives, methods and details – helps to achieve our mission via our theory of change and strategy.

Key requirements (essential)

• Experience of leading large teams: Demonstrable experience of authentically and successfully leading large, multi-disciplinary teams in complex environments, ideally for a mission-driven purpose. This includes the ability to build and maintain positive cultures and unlock best efforts, creating outstanding results at speed and against adversity.
• Visible and inspirational leadership of our academy, leading by example and navigating a high-pressure and ever-changing environment to ensure excellent delivery and a positive culture at all times. Confidence in public speaking roles to large groups of 200+ is a must.
• Project management: the ability to oversee large and complex projects, including management of decisions, timelines, interdependencies and risks, coordinating your team and working closely with others across the organisation to ensure that programme deliverables are achieved on time and to the required standard
• Diversity & inclusion: Experience of leading and positively influencing a diverse and inclusive workplace, with a particularly strong understanding and expertise regarding underrepresented groups within policing and the barriers faced for these groups.
• Budget management experience from a complex delivery environment involving large budgets, high-value procurement, scrutiny and the need to make difficult choices so that every pound counts. Experience of negotiating contractual terms and pricing at high-value and involving complex contracts.
• Strategic thinking and innovation: the ability to think strategically, grasping the bigger picture and acting on it, to reflect honestly on the performance of self and others and to alter own behaviour and feedback accordingly, and to critically analyse and problem solve logically and effectively.
• Understanding of Police Now’s mission: Genuine emotional and connection with, belief in and understanding of, Police Now’s mission, theory of change, leadership principles and strategy of quality, differentiation and sustainability.
• An understanding of the strategic policing landscape, including how policing nationally comprises a blend of the 43 territorial police forces, several thematic forces, and national institutions, and how this differs from policing locally and regionally.
• An understanding of outstanding public service delivery, and what this would look like for the National Graduate Leadership Programme and participants. This could be gained from policing or other public service role
• Outstanding written and oral communication skills; including the ability to convey complex concepts in a simple and compelling manner appropriately to a range of audiences via public speaking in person and online, briefing notes and business cases.
• Integrity: A firm commitment to organisational justice and the value and ethical imperative of diverse teams and organisations, acting with integrity at the heart of decision making and communication setting.
• Willingness to travel: the ability to attend and stay onsite for the residential Police Now NGLP academy, which runs from mid-July to early September and is currently based in the midlands. There are periods of time within the academy block where our participants are based in force so a residential stay will not be required for those occasions. Other travel will be required, including to attend force meetings or programme events throughout the year, which may require overnight stays.

Key requirements (desirable)

• Policing experience, either as a police officer, detective or working within a policing organisation in a managerial capacity, with a strong understanding of the requirements of the neighbourhood officer role. This will include an understanding of how operational activity on the street (for example, tactical policing activity, prioritisation of some crime types for action over others, resource allocation, public confidence and satisfaction) links to and is driven by strategic imperatives facing police forces (for example, political direction, budget and resource availability, talent and skill availability).
• Matrix team leadership: Experience of leading matrix and virtual teams of 250+ on a temporary or event basis, especially if gained in a public order or similar operational policing environment. This is because Police Now’s academies are run as large-scale policing operations utilising similar command structures.
• Experience in education sector: Demonstrable experience of leading and developing large learning and education programmes with an overarching curriculum and/or large-scale national delivery programmes with complex logistics.
• Learning & Development: Experience of working with or within a learning and development function
• IT Skills: Proficiency in use of the Microsoft Office suite of IT applications, project management platforms and CRM software

What you'll get from us

• A bright, airy and modern office in Zone 1.
• Competitive salary of £64,000-81,000 dependent on experience, plus £4,000 London weighting if applicable
• Flexible working
• 27 days holiday each year, plus bank holidays
• A range of hospitality discounts
• Sanctus coaching (private mental health coaching for the workplace)
• Access to the Vitality programme which includes healthcare benefits, an Employee Assistance Programme and discounts
• Training opportunities for personal development.
• Participation in a pension scheme (with 6% employer contributions and 2% employee contributions)

Please note

The closing date for this role is 10am on Tuesday 28th May.

Regular attendance at our London office is needed for this role, with an onsite requirement for our residential training academy between mid-July and early September.

Applications will be screened as they are received and invited to interview accordingly. Police Now reserves the right to close the advert prior to the advertised date, early applications are therefore encouraged. We strongly encourage candidates to look through our Leadership Principles included in the job pack as these underpin our culture and values, and feature heavily in our recruitment process

This job description is issued as a guideline. It is not exhaustive, and we would be pleased to discuss any constructive comments you may have. Due to the evolving nature and changing demands of our business this job description may be subject to change. You may, on occasions, be required to undertake additional or other duties within the context of this job description and according to the needs of the organisation.

Please note that some roles within Police Now require certain levels of National Security Vetting or screening in order to effectively work with our partners. Therefore, we may ask you to complete this if you are successful.