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Job Title & Grade:

Head of Change Management - G6

Contract Type:

Fixed Term - 24 months

Salary range (depending on location):

National - £71,381 - £80,419

London - £75,674 - £85,257

Please note that unless you are currently employed by the Civil Service and are earning more than the minimum above, if successful you will be offered the minimum for the grade depending on your location.

Location:

National

Directorate:

Transformation

Team:

Transformation

Working Pattern:

The post is supported by the MOJ flexible working policy and includes colleagues who work flexibly, remotely (as part of hybrid working), part time or as part of a job share etc.

If you are applying for a part time role, please note that in order to meet business demands we need cover for a minimum of 3 days a week.

To meet legal requirements, if you are between the ages 16-18 and you are a successful candidate, you will be required to complete an apprenticeship after your initial on the job training.

Reporting to:

Head of Transformation, Deputy Director

Closing date for applications

1^st April 2026

The Legal Aid Agency

We are an executive agency of the Ministry of Justice (MoJ). We are responsible for operationally administering the legal aid fund to provide criminal and civil legal aid advice to people in England and Wales.

Our people are at the heart of achieving excellence. Employing around 1,200 colleagues across England and Wales, we feel proud to have some of the best People Survey results in the Civil Service.

Our LAA commitment to Diversity and Inclusion

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 Diversity and Inclusion Strategy.

As a Disability Confident organisation, we will offer a guaranteed interview to candidates with a disability who meet the essential criteria for this role. Under the Equality Act 2010 a disability is defined as a physical or mental impairment which has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on your ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities which has lasted, or is expected to last, at least 12 months.

If you are responding to a role within the Legal Aid Agency and would like to be considered under the guaranteed interview, please indicate this in your application and let us know of any reasonable adjustments you may require during the sift or later selection processes.

The LAA’s goal is to build an organisation that is open and inclusive and truly values and celebrates the diversity of its workforce. One that reflects and understands the needs of the diverse society we serve. This is regardless of social background, gender, age, ethnicity, sexual orientation, beliefs, disabilities or long-term illness or caring responsibilities.

Reasonable Adjustments
We are committed to ensuring our recruitment process is inclusive and accessible to all. If you have a disability or long-term condition (for example dyslexia, anxiety, autism, a mobility condition or hearing loss) and need us to make any reasonable adjustments to support you through the recruitment process, please let us know by adding the information to the applications system or emailing LAARecruitment@justice.gov.uk after you have applied so that we can discuss options with you.

Transformation
Transformation are responsible for continuing to drive forward simplifying the delivery of legal aid. We want to improve the experience for the people who apply for legal aid, the providers who deliver the services and those of us in the LAA who administer the scheme, while ensuring the LAA remains a great place to work.

Transformation Team
This team is leading the transformation of our organisation through innovation, collaboration and inclusion. Originally established in May 2020, the Transformation Team has grown rapidly over the last five years. We are a hybrid team of business change and project delivery experts, and working in partnership with others is at the heart of what we do. We work together with teams across the agency, with the LAA Digital team, MoJ Project Delivery Function experts, MoJ Policy teams and wider stakeholders across the justice system and government.

We have a large and complex portfolio remit to deliver change that enables recovery from the recent cyber-attack, development and implementation of transformed user facing services, implementation of modern digital architecture, and implementation of Government policy commitments.

Job Summary

The Head of Change Management will be responsible for leading the people side of change across the Transformation Portfolio, ensuring that complex service, process and system changes are adopted, embedded and sustained by staff, providers and stakeholders.

The role is accountable for establishing a consistent, portfolio-wide change management approach, aligned to PROSCI principles, and for reducing delivery and operational risk by ensuring organisational readiness keeps pace with design and delivery decisions.

The focus of any role in the Transformation Portfolio team is dynamic, reflecting our role in responding to evolving operational and policy implementation priorities.

Key Responsibilities:

Portfolio-level change leadership

Own the change management strategy for the Transformation Portfolio, aligned to PROSCI (ADKAR) principles

Define what “good change" looks like across the organisation

Act as the senior authority on adoption, readiness and reinforcement risks

Embedding change management into delivery

Ensure change management is embedded within multi-disciplinary teams and delivery workstreams, not treated as a late-stage activity.

Set clear expectations for:

Change impact assessments

Readiness planning

Training and capability uplift

Go-live and transition support

Work closely with Digital, Policy and Operations leadership to ensure change implications are understood early and inform design decisions

Organisational readiness and risk management

Lead a portfolio-wide view of change impact, capacity and fatigue

Identify cumulative impacts across initiatives and advise on sequencing, pacing and trade-offs

Surface adoption and operational risks to senior governance forums

Stakeholder and workforce engagement

Own the internal change engagement approach, ensuring:

Clear, consistent messaging

Leadership alignment and sponsorship

Two-way engagement with affected teams

Work with External Communications and engagement leads to ensure alignment where changes affect providers and partners

Benefits realisation and reinforcement

Ensure change management activity is explicitly linked to realisation of benefits and OKRs

Establish mechanisms for:

Measuring adoption

Monitoring behavioural change

Supporting post-implementation learning and improvement

Ensure changes are reinforced and sustained, not just launched

Capability and community building

Build and lead a community of change practitioners across the organisation

Set standards, tools and templates aligned to PROSCI methodology

Coach senior leaders, delivery leads and managers in effective change sponsorship and leadership

Leadership and governance

Act as a senior adviser to the Head of Design / Transformation on people-related risks and opportunities

Represent change management in senior governance forums

Deputise as required within the wider transformation leadership team

Essential Qualifications	PROSCI Change Management accreditation or equivalent change management qualification
Essential Knowledge, Experience and skills	Strong knowledge of structured change methodologies, such as PROSCI or equivalent, and ability to apply these consistently across a large portfolio. Experience working across policy, operations, digital and external stakeholders Excellent stakeholder engagement skills, capable of influencing across seniority levels. Strong judgement in high-risk, ambiguous and politically sensitive contexts Experience of creating and implementing change management strategies
Desirable Knowledge, Experience and skills	Experience working in complex transformation programmes Knowledge of MoJ or LAA processes and services Experience leading change affecting external providers Ability to coach, mentor and lead certified change practitioners to achieve a consistent change management approach
Person Specification	Excellent interpersonal and communication skills (both written and verbal) Ability to translate complex information into clear, structured reporting for senior stakeholders Comfortable working with ambiguity and incomplete information and respond quickly to shifting priorities Strong networking skills and ability to apply a collaborative and inclusive approach, valuing different perspectives, in person and virtually Strong influencing skills, and experience of building and maintaining positive relations with key stakeholders across functions Ability to operate in a value-driven style consistent with the values of the public services and specifically with MoJ and wider Civil Service values Values diversity and difference; operates with integrity and openness

Assessment approach

Application Process

To apply please provide a CV and statement of suitability showing how you meet the essential criteria in no more than 1250 words.

Your statement should demonstrate your ability to do all of the essential criteria listed, using examples can help strengthen your application.

Interview / assessment Process

If you are successful through the application stage, you will be invited to an interview via Microsoft Teams where you will be assessed against the following:

Strengths relevant to the role
Some or all of the following Behaviours:

Seeing the big picture

develop and maintain an understanding of economic, social, political, environmental and technological developments to ensure activity is relevant
ensure plans and activities in your area of work reflect wider strategic priorities and communicate effectively with senior leaders to influence future strategies
adopt a government wide perspective to ensure alignment of activity and policy
bring together views, perspectives and diverse needs of stakeholders to gain a broader understanding of the issues surrounding policies and activities

Leadership

promote diversity, inclusion and equality of opportunity, respecting difference and external experience
welcome and respond to views and challenges from others, despite any conflicting pressures to ignore or give in to them
stand by, promote or defend your own and your team’s actions and decisions where needed
seek out shared interests beyond your own area of responsibility, understanding the extent of the impact actions have on the organisation
inspire and motivate teams to be fully engaged in their work and dedicated to their role

Making effective decisions

clarify your own understanding and stakeholder needs and expectations, before making decisions
ensure decision making happens at the right level, not allowing unnecessary bureaucracy to hinder delivery
encourage both innovative suggestions and challenge from others, to inform decision making
analyse and accurately interpret data from various sources to support decisions
find the best option by identifying positives, negatives, risks and implications
present reasonable conclusions from a wide range of complex and sometimes incomplete evidence
make decisions confidently even when details are unclear or if they prove to be unpopular

Communicating and incfluencing

communicate with others in a clear, honest and enthusiastic way in order to build trust.
explain complex issues in a way that is easy to understand
take into account people’s individual needs
deliver difficult messages with clarity and sensitivity, being persuasive when required
consider the impact of the language used
remain open-minded and impartial in discussions, whilst respecting the diverse interests and opinions of others
introduce different methods for communication, including making the most of digital resources whilst getting value for money
monitor the effectiveness of own and team communications and take action to improve where necessary

Your Experience of implementing, promoting, or understanding diversity and inclusion policy - Diversity is the presence of difference, this can include one or more of the protected characteristics (Gender, Age, Race, Disability etc.) or it can be about working patterns, whether we like to jump into a task or reflect on it before acting. Inclusion is how we welcome, value, and celebrate diversity, giving everyone a voice, tapping into ideas, and enabling everyone to be themselves at work and achieve their potential.

For this grade/ role we would expect the candidate to demonstrate understanding of the terms Diversity and Inclusion and be able to explain why they are important in a work environment. We would also expect examples of action they have taken to embrace diversity (e.g., increasing understanding for self or others) or improve inclusion at a cross departmental or organisational level.

Shortlisting is planned for week commencing 30^th March 2026

Interviews are planned for week commencing 27^thApril 2026

If you would like more information on this opportunity, please contact Hannah Payne at Hannah.payne@justice.gov.uk

Complaints procedure

If you have any complaints about this recruitment activity, please share your concerns by emailing LAARecruitment@justice.gov.uk initially. We aim to respond to any complaint within 10 working days.

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