E&B Senior Advisor – Quality Protocols Review - 28753

We are fully committed to having an inclusive workforce to reflect the communities we serve. We welcome flexible working patterns for all our vacancies, including job share, so please include clearly any information regarding your preferred working arrangements on your application.

Are you looking for a new challenge? Would you like to use your knowledge of the waste industry, along with your natural ability to work collaboratively with internal and external customers, to help contribute to the circular economy? Then this job is for you!

You will lead and coordinate the Environment Agency’s work on end of waste Quality Protocols (QPs). Quality protocols explain when certain waste derived materials can be regarded as non-waste products and no longer subject to waste controls. The aims of QPs are to promote safe and sustainable materials reuse and reduce disposal to landfill, while reducing the risk of inappropriate use of higher risk materials.

Key aspects of the role include:

• working with internal and external stakeholders to review, update and maintain the QPs.
• providing national business and technical leadership for our QP work
• maintaining robust processes, systems and guidance to ensure we provide an effective service
• leading engagement with internal and external stakeholders in relation to the QPs
• providing support to operational staff and customers on issues arising from our regulation of QPs.

You will also support other Definition of Waste work within the team.

This post will sit within the Strategy and Resources from Waste Team, part of the Waste Regulation department in E&B Regulated Industry.

The team provides advice and guidance to internal and external customers on Definition of Waste issues, increasing resource efficiency and reducing regulatory burden where appropriate as well as voluntary commercial external facing services on end of waste.

You will be qualified to at least degree standard (or equivalent) in a relevant discipline.

It is essential that you:

• have a good knowledge of the waste regulation, with a particular understanding of the principles of the Definition of Waste.
• have an understanding of the QPs and how they work
• have experience of leading work with internal and external stakeholders
• are comfortable communicating at all levels and managing conflict.
• can distil key messages from a complex and uncertain picture and understand and explain the implications for different parts of the organisation.
• Have excellent written and verbal communication skills, and the ability to work collaboratively, and
• are comfortable with the concept of remote working and associated management.

We would recommend that you contact either: Mike A Smith - Resources from Waste Team Leader on 07702 719353 mike.a.smith@environment-agency.gov.uk or Rich Fairweather, the current QP lead, on 07799 133172 richard.fairweather@environment-agency.gov.uk

If you are not already in an incident role you will be expected to discuss a suitable one with your team leader.

Application sifting is based on your answers to the three capabilities. Make sure you make full use of the 250-word limit in your answer. Think about the Situation, Task, Action, Result (STAR) approach when framing your answers.

Occasional travel and overnight stays will be required. The post is temporary, but we hope to make it permanent subject to an approved business case.

We are aiming to interview on the 19 April 2024.

In this role you will need to analyse complex data and information supplied by customers to make timely decisions. Please demonstrate how you go about doing that with a relevant example. In your answer you should consider things like how you:

• Have used previous experience and careful analysis to identify potential problems and devised effective solutions to arrive at sound decisions.
• Identified and asked appropriate questions to explore and detect root causes of problems or sources and quality of evidence.
• Applied sound techniques to analyse problems, generated options and selected the best course of action.
• Sought out and considered the best available information before making decisions.
• Confronted any difficult situations head-on where major decisions have had to be made quickly.
• Made sound decisions based on complex or incomplete information and/or within limited timescales.
• Escalated issues when they were beyond your own limitations and/or may have consequences further than your own responsibilities.

Customer focus and care is an essential and integral part of our service. You will need to address the needs of internal and external customers and provides rapid and effective responses. Please give us an example or examples of how you have done this. In particular you should be able to demonstrate how you have done things like:

• Identified and addressed the needs of customers, delivering what is promised and ensuring that they were satisfied with the outcomes,
• Taken personal responsibility to meet customer needs while being polite, courteous and professional,
• Ensured customers received consistent and clear messages supported by accurate and timely information,
• Have monitored and measured customer satisfaction and looked for ways to improve customer service,
• Anticipated and balanced the needs of a range of customers with conflicting priorities, and
• Kept customers informed and managed expectations

In this role you will need to set and deliver high work standards and demonstrate a drive to meet targets. You will also need to prioritise and organise tasks to ensure timely achievement of results. Please give us an example that illustrates this approach to your work. It should include how you:

• Have been tenacious and persevered when others might have given up and by doing so achieved the desired results,
• Anticipated forth-coming issues and adjusted your actions as necessary,
• Have been willing to put in extra effort to meet urgent deadlines when required, and
• Have been resilient and performed well under pressure and responded positively to setbacks and developed alternative actions.

Please give us some examples of how you have used your influencing skills to an achieve an outcome and win someone over especially where initially there may have been a conflict of priorities. Your answer should demonstrate how you have:

• Listened to other’s opinions, understanding their viewpoints, needs and concerns, responding appropriately and maybe lobbied others in advance,
• Presented a credible case and explained the benefits to the audience/listener, anticipating the main objections/arguments,
• Responded to the needs and style of the listener when influencing,
• Sought to achieve a “win-win” outcome and develop the relationship with the person(s) being influenced,
• Prepared convincing written arguments on complex issues, presenting information logically, concisely, and persuasively, and
• Modified and reformulated your case where necessary, read the listener’s mood and adjusted accordingly.