Job Description
Senior Developer
Location: National*
Closing Date: 29th June
Interviews: W/C 27th July (subject to change)
Grade: G7
(MoJ candidates who are on a specialist grade, will be able to retain this grade on lateral transfer)
Salary**: National: £58,511 - £69,150 (which may include an allowance of up to £10,639). London: £63,343 - £73,875 (which may include an allowance of up to £10,532).
Working pattern: Full-time, Part-time, Flexible working, Job share.
Contract Type: Permanent
Number of vacancies: 2
*We offer a hybrid working model, allowing for a balance between remote work and time spent in your local office. Office locations can be found ON THIS MAP
The Role
We’re recruiting for Senior Developers here at Justice Digital, Data and Science to be part of our warm and collaborative OPG Digital team.
This role aligns against Software Developer from the Government Digital and Data Framework.
At Justice Digital, we're dedicated to leveraging technology to drive impactful change across the justice system. As part of the OPG Digital team you will work on both public-facing and internal services that support people making important decisions about their health and financial arrangements.
The multi-disciplinary OPG Digital Team builds services to high Accessibility and Security standards, with Continuous Improvement based on user feedback at the heart of what we do. As a member of this team you’ll help us build systems that benefit from the latest industry best practices, whilst delivering working software early and often.
OPG Digital provide many opportunities for your professional growth, and in turn you will help others with their own professional development. Such activities might include pair-programming, discussions and demonstrations with wider Communities of Practice, and formal training such as apprenticeships.
You’ll receive a range of excellent benefits when you join our department, including:
A generous employer pension contribution of 28.97% through the Civil Service Pension Scheme.
25 days of annual leave, (increasing to 30 days once you have reached 5 years of service), plus 8 bank holidays and a privilege day for the King’s birthday.
Flexible working arrangements including hybrid working, working part time or compressed hours. Designed to support a positive work–life balance.
Employees are allocated 10% of their working time for personal and professional development.
A £1k per person learning budget is in place to support all our people, with access to best-in-class conferences and seminars, accreditation with professional bodies, fully funded vocational programmes and e-learning platforms.
Compassionate maternity, adoption, and shared parental leave policies, with up to 26 weeks leave at full pay, 13 weeks with partial pay, and 13 weeks further leave. And maternity support/paternity leave at full pay for 2 weeks, too!
You can find more details of the Benefits we offer here. To help picture your life at MoJ Justice Digital, Data and Science please take a look at our blog.
Key Responsibilities:
Technical:
Designing, building and maintaining, secure and accessible internal and public facing services
Working on pre-existing codebases
Improving the resilience and stability of software
Applying practices to enable continuous delivery
People:
Developing and influencing people via line management duties, informal and formal coaching, and mentoring
Supporting lead developers in building high performing teams
Helping to build and maintain a diverse, inclusive culture across the development community.
Collaboration:
You’ll collaborate closely with user researchers, product managers, designers, delivery managers, technical architects, and content specialists who share our vision of transforming government services to be quicker and easier to use for everyone.
Technologies:
We use a range of technologies and we’re looking for people who have experience of building web applications and back-end systems in an object-oriented language, and love learning new languages and frameworks.
Application Code: primarily PHP and Golang
Frontend: GOV.UK and MoJ Design Systems, TypeScript, JavaScript
CI/CD: GitHub Actions and Jenkins
Containerization: Docker
Cloud Infrastructure: AWS
Our community:
We currently have over 200 experienced developers who make up the engineering community across the MoJ. You will coach and mentor junior colleagues and take part in informal support networks with your peers. You will be encouraged to play an active role in the engineering community and culture.
We take the responsibility of supportive and effective line management very seriously. We will value the skills you bring to the civil service and help you to build on them. When the time is right, we will support moving between teams or government departments to learn different technologies, or take on more responsibility, according to your career goals.
Take a look at our developer blog and Justice Digital blog to get a sense of our work and culture.
Career Development:
We take pride in our supportive and effective line management. Your skills are highly valued and we’re committed to helping you expand them within the civil service. You'll have opportunities to move between teams or departments, explore new technologies and take on increased responsibilities aligned with your career goals.
If this feels like an exciting challenge, something you are enthusiastic about, and want to join our team please read on and apply!
Person Specification
Essential
Demonstrate proven experience of delivering large and complex software solutions.
Apply modern development and deployment techniques to your work, including continuous integration and continuous delivery.
Demonstrate proven experience of working in a modern object-oriented language and be confident learning new languages.
Have awareness of technologies used for web applications, e.g databases, microservices, backups, CDNs and search, DevOps and Unix-like operating systems.
Champion software maintenance, clean code, coding standards and practices that make change and consistency easier.
Ability to write automated tests to continuously validate your work.
Thrive when you work as part of a team that abides by the spirit of the manifesto of agile software development.
Enjoy sharing knowledge and helping others develop professionally.
Help the team and yourself incrementally improve ways of working.
Solve problems in a systematic way.
Willingness to be assessed against the requirements for BPSS clearance
We welcome the unique contribution diverse applicants bring and do not discriminate based on culture, ethnicity, race, nationality or national origin, age, sex, gender identity or expression, religion or belief, disability status, sexual orientation, educational or social background or any other factor.
Our values are Purpose, Humanity Openness and Together. Find out more here about how we celebrate diversity and an inclusive culture in our workplace.
The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan and the Civil Service D&I Strategy.
Salary Information**
Base salary for this role is - National: £58,511 - £65,329. London: £63,343 - £70,725
New entrants to the Civil Service joining the MoJ are expected to start at the minimum of the pay band.
Existing Civil Servants moving on a level transfer will retain their current base salary or move to the minimum of the pay band for the role, whichever is higher.
Existing Civil Servants who are promoted will either move to the bottom of the new grade’s pay band or receive a 10% uplift, whichever provides the greater increase.
Candidates may also be eligible for a non‑pensionable Government Digital & Data Allowance of up to £10,532 per year (London) or £10,639 (National). This is a temporary allowance, reviewed annually and may be retained, amended, or withdrawn.
The final offer will reflect the skills and experience you demonstrate during the assessment process.
How to Apply
In Justice Digital, Data and Science, we recruit using a combination of the Government Digital and Data Profession Capability and Success Profiles Frameworks. We shall assess a combination of your Experience and Technical skills.
Stage 1 - Application and sift:
To apply for this position, you must submit the following as part of your application:
A CV detailing your career history (including any relevant qualifications). Your CV will be assessed against the essential criteria outlined within the Person Specification of this advert.
A Personal Statement (no more than 750 words) which should outline your experience and skills, giving clear examples of work undertaken.
Applicants who do not submit both a CV and a separate personal statement will be removed from the sift process. A diverse sift panel will review the information in your CV and Personal Statement to assess the sift criteria specified above. We operate an anonymous shortlisting process. Please ensure your CV and Personal Statement do not include your name or any other identifying details.
Should we receive a high volume of applications, a pre-sift based on the following criteria will be conducted before the sift -
Demonstrate proven experience of delivering large and complex software solutions.
At the sift stage, the following criteria will be assessed -
Demonstrate proven experience of delivering large and complex software solutions.
Demonstrate proven experience of working in a modern object-oriented language and be confident learning new languages.
Have awareness of technologies used for web applications, e.g databases, microservices, backups, CDNs and search, DevOps and Unix-like operating systems.
Please access the following link for guidance on how to apply - Application Guidance
Stage 2 – Technical Test:
Candidates who meet the minimum requirements at the sift stage will be asked to complete a 30-minute technical test held over MS Teams. Further details around this technical test will be shared with applicants who progress onwards following the sift process.
The technical test will be assessing the following essential criteria -
Demonstrate proven experience of working in a modern object-oriented language and be confident learning new languages.
Have awareness of technologies used for web applications, e.g databases, microservices, backups, CDNs and search, DevOps and Unix-like operating systems.
Stage 3 - Interviews:
Successful candidates who meet the required standard will then be invited to a panel interview held via Microsoft Teams. At interview stage, you will be assessed against the following Success Profile elements – Experience, Technical and the following behaviours -
Developing self and others
Working together
Making effective decisions
Appointments are made strictly in merit order. In the event that two or more candidates receive identical interview scores, the ‘Demonstrate proven experience of delivering large and complex software solutions’ criterion will be applied as the primary lead criterion to determine the final merit order.
Should you be unsuccessful in the role that you have applied for but demonstrate the capability for a role at a lower level, we reserve the right to discuss this opportunity with you and offer you the position without needing a further application.
A reserve list may be held for up to 12 months, from which further appointments may be made.
Use of Artificial Intelligence
Artificial Intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.
Terms & Conditions
Please review our Terms and Conditions which set out how we recruit and provide further information related to the role and salary arrangements.
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact digitalanddatarecruitment@justice.gov.uk
