Senior Manager, Performance Audit & Best Value

Overall purpose of the role

Our Performance Audit and Best Value Group (PABV) delivers a range of audit products to assess how well public money is being used and provide valuable insights and learning. We look at a wide range of issues including climate change, inequalities, digital transformation and how public bodies are recovering from the pandemic and reforming public services. Our Best Value audits in councils look at important issues like how well they perform in delivering services to their communities. Our work programme is dynamic and refreshed on a regular basis to ensure it responds to changing circumstances.

Our work involves:

• identifying audit risks affecting the Scottish public sector
• scoping audit work to ensure it focuses on what matters
• developing audit methodologies, gathering and assessing evidence (quantitative and qualitative)
• forming judgements and conclusions
• writing clear, evidence-based reports for the public, Scottish Parliament, and the Auditor General and the Accounts Commission that include recommendations for improvement to public bodies.

As a Senior Manager in PABV, you will lead high-quality audit work in particular areas of public policy. You will play a significant role in identifying audit priorities to ensure that our work programme is relevant and makes a difference. You will have a clear understanding of the important issues and risks facing Scotland’s public sector, demonstrating strong credibility to

support excellent relationships with external leaders and senior staff in your policy portfolio.

An inspiring leader, you will lead teams to make complex audit judgements and harness the

power of the team to deliver a portfolio of audit work to a world-class standard. You will also contribute to our quality improvement agenda and wider corporate developments across Audit Scotland.

What you will be doing

As one of our senior members of staff, you’ll be inspiring our people and help make Audit Scotland a world-class public-sector audit organisation with your ability to:

• provide effective leadership, build capacity and resilience in the team and motivate, support and encourage people to achieve their full potential

• deliver a range of reports and other outputs and present the findings at the highest client and stakeholder level, including the Scottish Parliament, Accounts Commission, local audit committees and conferences

• take lead responsibility in identifying, developing and maintaining relationships with key staff at the highest levels within clients and stakeholder organisations

• develop and maintain a wider view of the external environment to understand any developments that could affect the context of the audit in the medium to longer term, and develop appropriate audit activity for the dynamic work programme

• undertake significant risk-based decision making, using considerable judgement about the quantity and depth of research, investigation and auditing required in proportion to the circumstances and communicating this to the team

• constructively challenge team judgement and add value from a strategic perspective have responsibility for quality and accountability for signing off audit work

• ensure work is properly resourced in terms of people, abilities and knowledge and communicate this to the team

• conduct an ongoing review of the team’s work to ensure that it is delivered to time, quality and budget

• embrace and promote best practice and share it across the organisation to improve quality

• positively influence organisational culture and contribute to the management of Audit Scotland by playing a key role in developing and implementing corporate activities

Knowledge & Experience

You are educated to degree level and/or have demonstrable relevant experience. You have a deep knowledge and understanding of the Scottish public sector, how it works and the issues it is facing. You are confident in engaging with senior colleagues in a range of organisations and in building and developing effective relationships. You are a strategic and creative thinker, solving demanding problems when the answers are not immediately clear. You can analyse complex issues, including financial information, and recommend practical solutions, based on clear rationales – drawing upon your sound judgement and range of experiences, intuition and professional scepticism to add value in our audit work.

You have strong verbal and written communication skills, combined with sound judgement and experience to present balanced findings and make focused, convincing and persuasive recommendations that have impact. You deal with difficult situations and challenge individuals in a calm, professional and effective manner. You work collaboratively with colleagues on crosscutting and strategic issues. You are self-aware in your own abilities and can plan and manage your own high-quality work as well as the work of your wider team. You ensure work is properly resourced in terms of people, abilities and knowledge and delivered to time, quality and cost criteria.

You have extensive experience in leading teams and in managing, coaching and developing people to bring out the best in your colleagues. You recognise the value of having a dynamic work programme and the need for flexibility where work commitments change, and encourage and support colleagues to be adaptable and resilient. You have the foresight to identify potential organisational challenges and intervene before they manifest.

You have a plan for the future that includes your own continuous development, inspiring others and helping Audit Scotland to be a world-class public-audit organisation. You will undertake professional and personal development to maintain technical expertise, meet Continuing Professional Development (CPD) requirements where appropriate and enhance your career prospects at Audit Scotland.

Person specification - specific knowledge and experience

Essential

• You are educated to a degree level and/or have demonstratable, relevant experience (e.g. audit, scrutiny, research, strategy and policy, service delivery, managing public services, performance management, business management). (S)
• You have sound knowledge and understanding of the Scottish public sector (including public finances and policy), how it works and the issues it is facing. (S&I)
• You have excellent communication (verbal and written) and interpersonal skills and are confident in building and maintaining effective relationships with senior stakeholder. (S&I)
• You have excellent programme management skills, including experience of leading teams to deliver work to time, within cost and to quality standards. (S&I)
• You have excellent analytical skills, including being able to analyse financial information, and the ability to convert analysis into clear judgements. (S&I)
• You can lead and inspire teams of colleagues from a variety of different skills, backgrounds and disciplines. (S&I)
• You are comfortable leading discussions with senior staff in a range or organisations and dealing with difficult situations in a calm, professional and effective manner. (I)

Desirable

• You have experience of developing methodologies for evaluating performance and improving services. (S&I)
• You have a financial qualification (CIPFA, ICAS, other CCAB, CIMA or equivalent). (S)

*S = Shortlisting criteria I = Interview criteria A = Assessment / Exercise

Interested? Next steps

• Click the apply button to complete an application form. If you wish, you can also share your CV. We offer a range of benefits, please visit our careers page for more information at http://www.audit-scotland.gov.uk/careers.
• Our application deadline is Sunday 19th May at midnight.

Audit Scotland

Our vision is that public money is well spent to meet the needs of Scotland's people.

To achieve this, we support the Auditor General for Scotland and the Accounts Commission to provide clear, independent and objective assurance on how effectively public money is being managed and spent. Our work covers about £59bn of public spending, almost 300 public sector accounts, and the services and projects that affect all people and communities in Scotland.

As well as what we do, how we do it is integral to delivering our vision and critical to our wellbeing and our organisational success. We put our organisational values of equality, independence, innovation, integrity and respect at the heart of everything we do.

We employ around 340 staff in a wide variety of roles, working from our main offices in Edinburgh and Glasgow, and through a network of regional offices across Scotland.

There has never been a more interesting or important time to join us. We offer a rewarding place to work, a supportive and open culture and a wide range of professional development opportunities. Benefits include 42 days of annual leave including public holidays, an attractive local government pension scheme with 19.4% employer contributions, personal development allowances and flexible working hours. We’ve also been named one of the top 25 workplaces in Scotland and the UK’s tenth best accountancy workplace in the 2023 Best Companies awards.

Diversity and Inclusion

We value the unique perspective a diverse workforce brings to what we do. Therefore, we’re keen to increase representation in our workforce and support progression of minority ethnic groups. We are also a proud disability confident employer.

Reasonable Adjustments

Audit Scotland’s recruitment process may include various stages and activities including application forms, online assessments, and interviews, to assess whether you meet the requirements of the role.

As a Disability Confident employer, we are committed to providing inclusive and accessible recruitment where everyone is supported to perform at their best.

When applying for a job with Audit Scotland, you will be asked in the application form if you need an adjustment at any stage of the recruitment process. Please include the reason you require an adjustment and details of what adjustment/s might help.

Some examples of adjustments that have been given to candidates include changing the time, location or format of interviews and providing additional time in any assessments and interviews. This is not an exhaustive list, and we will consider any adjustments that you might need.

As part of our commitment to equality and diversity, our equality network groups would be delighted to offer an insight into Audit Scotland’s culture of inclusivity. If you consider yourself to have a visible or hidden disability and wish to hear more about life at Audit Scotland or wish to speak with someone about the possibility of any adjustments, please contact Careers@audit-scotland.gov.uk or call 0131 625 1500 for further information and a member of the HR team will be in touch.

How we work

We employ around 340 staff in a wide variety of roles. They work flexibly at home and in the office as well as from audit sites across Scotland. This isn’t your typical work from home or work from office type job. We’re flexible about working patterns and we’ve transformed how we deliver high-quality public audit. We support you to work in the ways that achieve the best results for you, your team and the business, including your physical location and how you manage your hours. Put simply, we trust you to do your job, and want you to have the ability to have a rewarding work-life balance and best support your individual circumstances, be that childcare, adult carer responsibilities or managing disabilities.

We welcome applications from across the UK. Some travel to our offices or client sites will be necessary at times, but you don’t need to live in Scotland to work for us.

Other conditions

Audit Scotland is committed to ensuring that:

• We minimise our impact on the environment in accordance with Government policy affecting public sector organisations.
• We uphold the principles of equality, fairness & diversity.
• We all work within a safe environment and adhere to good standards of health & safety.
• All information is protected and managed appropriately.
• We maintain independence and political neutrality.