Associate Service Owner (Cyber Uplift)

The Government Cyber Unit's mission is to protect public services from cyber threats and digital resilience failures. We are working to achieve a step change in our cyber and digital resilience across government, through delivery of the Government Cyber Action Plan, and working closely with departments and national technical authorities including the National Cyber Security Centre to deliver. This is a challenging time to be working in cyber security and digital resilience, but we have an incredible opportunity to make a difference to people’s lives and promote national security by protecting the public services and national infrastructure they rely on. We work at the forefront of shaping the UK’s national response to emerging cyber and technology issues - from the increasingly complex range of state-sponsored cyber-attacks and supply chain compromises, through to the transformational benefits and security challenges of frontier AI and quantum computing.

We are committed to creating an inclusive and supportive working environment where people can learn, develop and do their best work. Continuous professional development and a focus on wellbeing is core to our unit culture. We welcome applications from candidates who share this ethos and are excited by our mission.

The Cyber Services Team supports the delivery of the Government Cyber Action Plan by coordinating, overseeing and delivering services to help public sector organisations solve cyber security challenges.

The services we provide centrally are those where automation and economies of scale can be applied to address common resilience and cyber problems. These cover the core internet services we all rely on such as DNS, email and web services, as well as vulnerability management, cyber testing and cyber capability uplift.

We ensure that cyber services are easy to find and use, and that the information and support delivered by these services is coherent, valuable, relevant, timely, trusted, reliable and easy to action. We track success using evidence-based objective measures.

Former DSIT recruitment campaigns are continuing as usual, but candidates should be aware that following the Government’s announcement on the changes to some civil service departments, roles will be subject to the machinery of government moves and will ultimately be in one of the new departments. We will provide more information if you are selected for a role. This work remains of high importance to the civil service, and we thank you for your continued interest.

As an Associate Service Owner you’ll:

• define and own the service delivery of Cyber Uplift products that operate at scale for the whole public sector. Work closely with the Head of Cyber Products to ensure that products are coherent and deliver value, in alignment with cyber services’ strategic objectives
• prioritise areas of development that balance user needs, business requirements, performance and policy to drive continuous iterative improvement at different phases of the service life cycle
• lead the team’s agile working practices to develop a scalable and repeatable remediations catalogue to address cyber challenges faced by departments, generating management insights through internal teams and third-party suppliers/vendors
• identify measurable security benefits that represent good value for money alongside competing priorities, developing business cases to provide sustainable funding
• design and implement a long-term strategy and tactical approach for strategic decision-making, working with multidisciplinary teams and security architects to solve problems and share best practice
• build strong stakeholder relationships with departments, technical experts, business partnering and strategy teams to identify and overcome operational constraints, acting as the escalation point
• be a proactive and constructive Cyber Services leadership team member, developing new ideas to meet the Government Cyber Unit strategic vision and objectives
• adopt a user-centric and collaborative approach to manage a small team and define solutions to cyber challenges, evaluate outcomes, lessons learned, and provide insights for scaling or adoption within the wider organisation
• manage the governance and assurance processes to ensure that standards are met, continuously improved and effectively aligned to agreed business benefits and wider government needs

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

The standard selection process for roles at DSIT consists of:

• a simple application screening process - We only ask for a CV and cover letter of up to 750 words. Important tip - please ensure that your cover letter includes how you meet the skills and experience listed in the “person specification” section above
• a 60 minute video interview

Depending on how many applications we get, there might also be an extra stage before the video interview, for example a phone interview or a technical exercise.

While we value the use of AI technology to enhance our daily work, we also value the personal touch and urge applicants to write cover letters without the use of AI to emphasise their own unique experiences.

In the event we receive a high volume of applications, we will conduct the initial sift against the lead criteria which is: proven experience owning the roadmap and delivery of a digital, cyber or technology-enabled service, translating strategic priorities into practical delivery plans, setting and iterating ways of working across different delivery methodologies to manage risks, dependencies and achieve delivery outcomes

In the Civil Service, we use Success Profiles to evaluate your skills and ability. This gives us the best possible chance of finding the right person for the job, increases performance and improves diversity and inclusivity. We’ll be assessing your technical abilities, skills, experience and behaviours that are relevant to this role.

For this role we’ll be assessing you against the following Civil Service Behaviours:

• Leadership
• Seeing the big picture
• Making effective decisions
• Managing a quality service
• Communicating and influencing
• Changing and improving

We’ll also be assessing your experience and specialist technical skills against the following skills defined in the Government Digital and Data Capability Framework for the Service Owner (G7) role:

• Strategic ownership - Practitioner
• Financial ownership - Practitioner
• Life cycle management - Working
• Operational management - Practitioner
• Managing service outcomes - Practitioner
• Leading performance and benefits - Practitioner
• Stakeholder relationship management - Practitioner

Want to know more about who Government Digital and Data are? Click Here

Recruitment Timeline

Sift completion: 9/11/2026

Panel interviews: Starting from 16/11/2026

Candidates that do not pass the interview but have demonstrated an acceptable standard may be considered for similar roles at a lower grade.

A reserve list will be held for a period of 12 months, from which further appointments can be made.

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.

Please note that this role requires SC clearance, which would normally need 5 years’ UK residency in the past 5 years. This is not an absolute requirement, but supplementary checks may be needed where individuals have not lived in the UK for that period. This may mean your security clearance (and therefore your appointment) will take longer or, in some cases, not be possible.

For meaningful checks to be carried out, you will need to have lived in the UK for a sufficient period of time, to enable appropriate checks to be carried out and produce a result which provides the required level of assurance. Whilst a lack of UK residency in itself is not necessarily a bar to a security clearance, and expectation of UK residency may range from 3 to 5 years. Failure to meet the residency requirements needed for the role may result in the withdrawal of provisional jobs offers.

Sponsorship

DSIT cannot offer Visa sponsorship to candidates through this campaign. DSIT holds a Visa sponsorship licence but this can only be used for certain roles and this campaign does not qualify.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.