Service Designer (12 months)

What will you be doing?

Day to day, your job will look like:

• Undertaking user research activities with individuals and small groups of people including staff and customers
• Analysing observations from research and turning them in to insights – documenting the existing user experience and touchpoints along the way
• Collecting and analysing data in order to find the bottlenecks, cost-per-transaction or places where people just give up on a service
• Co-facilitating workshops and insight sharing sessions with project teams
• Co-presenting outputs and feedback to internal stakeholders
• Prototyping, testing and learning
• Creating intuitive interface designs that work in the way our users expect
• Informing business cases and options analyses
• Be a proactive thinker, do-er and challenger, so that we can do our best work
• Acting as an advocate for a service design approach and human-centred design
• Above all else, you’ll be an advocate for anyone using a service. This role is your chance to make real change possible and design services people want to use!

About you

Utilising your passion for designing the right things, you will help to define what human-centred design looks like at West Northants and support the Service Design and User Experience Manager in delivering it.

You will be equally happy providing feedback and guidance to technical teams as you will engaging the public in focus groups and creative activities.

You will need:

• Natural openness, curiosity and optimism (a bit of bravery probably wouldn’t hurt either)
• All-round knowledge of human-centred design and the design process
• Experience of different tools and techniques to create user experience journeys and as-is/to-be process maps and low fidelity prototypes
• Skills in capturing needs through a variety of research methods – you’re happy talking to anyone about their needs and pain!
• Experience of running engaging workshops and presentations to get the best out of people in the room
• Experience of user interface design and the ability to conceptualise a user’s end-to-end journey through a service
• Familiarity with Government Digital Service principles and how to apply them
• To demonstrate understanding of accessibility requirements and regulations
• An understanding of how and why to benchmark a service’s data
• Experience of working in an Agile team
• You will be familiar with Government Digital Service design practices and have a copy of Lou Downe’s 15 Principles of Good Services covered in post-it notes!

Our benefits

We offer a wide range of benefits to our employees, these include:

• A team who will listen to, and appreciate, your ideas, and help make them happen
• The opportunity to make a difference to peoples’ lives in an innovative and ambitious team
• Generous annual leave entitlement starting at 27 days annual leave per year, 28 days for senior managers (pro rata, depending on how many hours per week you work), plus bank holidays. An additional 5 days, linked to continuous service, and ability to purchase up to 6 weeks additional leave per year.
• Local Government Pension Scheme plus immediate life cover (3 times your annual salary from day one) and ill-health protection.
• Employee discounts with local and national retailers, days out, finance, health and beauty, travel and eating out plus lots more.
• Cycle to Work scheme
• Car Lease scheme
• Employee Assistance Programme - We have an employee support programme run by Health Assured, an independent, external organisation. Health Assured is available for you and your immediate family members, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year and includes telephone counselling, legal advice, bereavement support and medical information.
• Ongoing training and development opportunities.
• A variety of flexible working options to support your work/life balance, including full or part time, term time, 9-day fortnight, etc. (subject to business needs).
• Our West Ways of Working – We want our workforce to thrive, and we equip our employees with the right technology to support hybrid and collaborative working, on or off site, depending on the role.
• Making a difference - If you want to use your skills and experience with an organisation that are genuinely invested in making a difference, are committed to improving people's lives, and whose success has a direct impact on the wellbeing of your family, friends and people in your local area, then West Northamptonshire Council is the place for you.

The council is in the process of implementing a new pay structure and terms and conditions which will be applicable to this role.  The outcome could result in a future variation to the advertised salary, and this will be discussed at interview.

About us

Newly formed West Northants Council is revolutionising local authority digital services. Our strategy is visionary and ground-breaking - to provide innovative, user-led tools and services, to change lives for our residents. You'll join us on our journey as we create better end-to-end services for our councils and residents.

We need smart people! Armed, prepared and ready-to-go game-changers, visionaries, and challengers, people who want to go at 1,000 miles an hour - we’d rather run fast and learn quickly, than walk slowly and never change anything. You’ll work with like-minded, smart people; you’ll take old ways of doing things and challenge them. We’re big on removing barriers and busting constraints, so you’ll have what you need to help us transform this into a forward thinking, digital local authority that delivers public services in a progressive way.

Please send in your CV and a covering letter as soon as you are ready – we are actively recruiting and may draw the role to close when suitable applications are received. We look forward to hearing from you soon!

If you have any questions about the role, please email Adele Gilpin (adele.gilpin@westnorthants.gov.uk)