The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
Senior Governance Manager
Salary: £45,272 per annum
Hours: Full time or Part time (minimum 0.6 FTE)
Contract Type: Fixed Term (6 months)
Location: Polaris House, Swindon, Wiltshire
Grade: UKRI Band E
Closing Date: 09 Feb 25
Role Context
The Senior Governance Manager role sits within AHRC’s Governance and Executive (GEO) Team. The team is responsible for supporting Council, the AHRC Executive and the organisation in its governance, risk and assurance processes. The team provides secretariat support for AHRC’s Council, Advisory Board and AHRC’s executive committees and works closely with AHRC and across UKRI to promote sound governance, assurance and risk management.
The successful candidate will work closely with senior internal and external stakeholders. They will work autonomously and confidently in managing their governance, risk and assurance responsibilities, supporting AHRC staff in delivering their roles.
The role will require hybrid working with occasional travel to UKRI’s Swindon or London offices, and occasional support for external meetings such as Council, Advisory Board or Away Days.
Key Responsibilities
The role will include some of the following responsibilities, depending on the profile of the successful candidate:
Governance:
* Leading on AHRC’s governance arrangements for its non-executive and executive committees, ensuring committees have a clear purpose, agreed terms of reference, support inclusive and collaborative discussion and are aligned to good corporate governance within government departments as well as UKRI’s processes and procedures.
* Providing advice, briefing and support to the AHRC Executive and colleagues, governance, risk management, assurance and the administration of committees.
* Lead on implementing AHRC’s risk management and assurance framework.
* Implement UKRI policies and where appropriate bespoke guidance within AHRC.
* Manage the Governance pages of the AHRC website and intranet and an appropriate knowledge and information management system.
* Lead on AHRC’s responses to casework, investigating FOIs and complaints and responding in a transparent way to enquiries.
* Represent AHRC in relevant cross-UKRI groups.
* Lead on implementing AHRC’s delegated authority framework.
* When needed, flexibly provide support to the Executive Chair, Directors and Associate Directors for particular projects.
Secretariat:
* Provide a full secretariat service for a portfolio of AHRC’s committees to ensure their effective and efficient management.
* Supervise meeting arrangements, ensuring a planned programme of meeting dates and venues across the year.
* Lead a strategic and forward-looking programme of business across your committee portfolio, linking to other AHRC and UKRI committees.
* Proactively liaise with senior staff and strategic leads to prepare for meetings, and commission, handle and quality assure committee agendas and papers.
* Provide written and verbal briefings to Chairs and senior stakeholders in advance of meetings.
* Produce an accurate, succinct record of meetings, ensuring they are appropriately published in a timely manner and maintain records for your committees.
* Ensure decisions and actions are communicated in a timely and effective way; follow-up post-meeting actions.
* Ensure conflicts of interest are identified and appropriate records maintained.
* Manage the succession planning, recruitment, appointment and induction of committee members, in consultation with UKRI Secretariat.
* Oversee payment of honoraria, expenses and reimbursements.
* Build and maintain excellent relationships with key stakeholders, including committee members, UKRI and other Councils.
* Maintain a high awareness of key strategic issues across AHRC and UKRI to proactively support the effective and efficient co-ordination of AHRC’s strategic decision-making and business management.
Team:
* Work collaboratively with the other members of the GEO and Portfolio Management and Insights (PMI) Teams to ensure a smooth, joined-up approach to problems.
* The successful candidate will not have line management responsibilities but will be expected to work closely with the Band Ds in the team, task managing appropriately and demonstrating inclusive and supportive leadership behaviour.
Role Criteria
S - Assessed at shortlisting
I - Assessed at interview
* Knowledge and understanding of AHRC’s purpose, mission and objectives and how these fit into UKRI’s overall strategy (S&I)
* Understanding of the principles of good corporate governance, assurance and risk management and how they apply to a public sector organisation like UKRI (S&I)
* Understanding of how to provide a high-quality secretariat service for senior committees or boards (S&I)
* Excellent communication skills, including a demonstrable ability to write accurately and succinctly (S&I)
* Acts as a role model for inclusive, supportive and collaborative behaviours for the benefit of the whole organisation (S&I)
* Working knowledge of information technology, and UKRI’s security, knowledge and information management standards (S&I)
APPLICATIONS
Online applications only for this role. Please submit a CV and covering letter to the attachments section which clearly outlines how you fulfil the criteria specified along with your motivation for the role. Ensure that the job reference number is included in the filename description of each document uploaded. Note that failure to address the above criteria or submit an application without a covering letter may result in the application not being considered. Assessment will only be based upon the content of your submitted covering letter and CV and not the ‘Experience’ section of the application process.
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