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Service Designer

Employer
Essex County Council
Location
England, Essex, Chelmsford
Salary
£38001.0 - £42420 per annum + plus benefits
Closing date
16 Sep 2019

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Sector
Corporate Services
Contract Type
Full time
Full time, part time, job share and candidates wanting to work on a flexible basis will all be considered.

Now is an exciting time to join Essex County Council (ECC). We have a clear vision - to develop modern services that meet the needs and expectations of our residents in the internet age - and we're looking for talented people to help us achieve it.

We're making things better by building accessible and adaptable services that are simple to use for our residents and employees. Our work is guided by best practice principles of what makes a good service and you can read about our work at https://servicedesign.blog.essex.gov.uk/. We are also creating a place that's great to do the work in at our new flexible office space in Chelmsford city centre, just a 20-minute train journey from Stratford.

We are looking for a Service Designer to work on some of the most complex and challenging issues facing public services. This is a real chance to make a difference to the lives of people living and working in Essex

About the job


Your job will be to lead agile teams in the design of accessible public and internal services that are simple enough for everyone to use. You will be excited by the challenge of understanding user needs and policy goals to support strategy and decision making, and visualising whole services across business areas and public sector systems.

You will engage directly with stakeholders including commissioners, service managers, operational teams and service users, to help them understand the importance of a user-centred design approach and to design and deliver meaningful, measurable change.

The work is varied and you will have the opportunity to work on ambitious projects to reimagine the future of services as well as designing common patterns for our resident facing transactional services.

As a Service Designer, you will

* Work with executive, senior and operational stakeholders to understand their needs, help define problems and influence a user-centred design approach to working on end to end services.
* Scope, plan and lead collaborative design projects that help answer critical business questions and reimagine services.
* Map user journeys and translate user research into actionable insights, ideas and to make decisions about user needs.
* Communicate ideas, explain design decisions and build consensus with stakeholders including senior decision makers.
* Identify opportunities for service improvement and cost reduction, and validate the feasibility, viability and desirability of these, building a case for change.
* Highlight opportunities to establish benchmarks and to identify measures to track the impact of changes

About you


We're looking for experienced service designers who are committed to using user-centred design to deliver a better experience and better outcomes for users. You'll have strong interpersonal skills and want the opportunity to work in a delivery focused, collaborative environment.

We are looking for someone who can demonstrate:

* Solving complex service design challenges and contributing to design concepts for public services that are simple enough for everyone to use.
* Developing and communicating ideas and concepts using a range of methods and approaches.
* Improving service outcomes whilst reducing costs and applying service-oriented thinking to organisation structures, processes and capabilities.
* Working collaboratively with a range of stakeholders, including facilitating workshops, whilst advocating for the user.
* Excellent communication skills and bringing those who don't have experience of user-centred design along with you.
* An understanding of agile ways of working.

About us


This is an opportunity to be part of a pioneering new team of people who have similar values and are motivated to improve the lives of service users. We are a growing team of fifteen people including Service Designers, Product Managers, User Researchers, Content Designers and Interaction Designers. As a keen collaborator, you will want to help shape how we work to become an exemplar for how teams should 'be' in a modern organisation.

We encourage flexible working and most members of the team work from home or another building at least once a week. You'll find an inclusive culture and a place where your opinion is valued. On top of that, we are a sociable bunch and regularly get together for team lunches and to celebrate our successes.

Next steps
If you would like further information, please visit the Working for Essex website or click the apply button.

Short listed applicants will be invited to a telephone interview during the week beginning 23rd September 2019. If successful at this stage, you will then be invited to a further interview at County Hall, Chelmsford where you'll have the opportunity to meet some of the team.

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