Applications for this position will close15th May 23:59 UK Time
Salary £44,195 - £48,620
New entrants are expected to join at the minimum of the pay band. A Civil Service Pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%.
Job grade:Grade SEO
Contract type:Fixed term Loan Length of employment 24 months Business area DSIT - Artificial Intelligence
Type of role:Operational Delivery
Working pattern:Flexible working, Full-time, Job share, Part-time
Number of jobs available:2
About the organisation:
The Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (i.AI) is the UK government’s engine room for building products that shape national outcomes. We will be building tools in-house used daily by thousands of civil servants, directly impacting millions of citizens. We take on the hardest problems in government, backed directly by No10, and solve them with a small, high-performing team. Our work is shaping how government adopts AI in practice; through what we build, who we hire, and the standards we set. This team incubates and builds ideas as a team that have impact on citizens.
Your Team:
Founding Sourcing Team
The Sourcing Team will define the calibre of talent inside i.AI. We’re creating a new headhunting function that will drive candidate engagement and direct sourcing. In these early roles, you will set the standard for how we identify and engage exceptional engineers, operators, and designers. You will build the networks, reputation, and systems that make i.AI a destination for Britain’s most talented builders.
Over time, this team will become one of the most important levers for the UK’s AI capability: consistently bringing in individuals who raise the bar, accelerate delivery, and compound the effectiveness of everyone around them. The people who join now will shape not just hiring outcomes, but the long-term quality, ambition and recognition of the organisation itself.
Job Summary:
Find and attract top talent
- Develop a deep, non-obvious understanding of the UK AI talent landscape across startups, frontier labs and hacker houses, and then become part of that world.
- Create and deliver effective search strategies for niche technical roles and senior civil service positions. Delivering at impressive speed whilst giving each candidate an outstanding experience.
Build lasting relationships
- Identify talent through direct outreach, introductions, and events. Create and maintain these connections as friends, thought partners, or sounding boards. You are helping them do the most impressive thing they can.
Create a community and run exciting events
- Attend and run exciting and relevant events to build relationships with key organisations and candidates.
- Experiment with partnerships, meetups and sponsorship to grow brand recognition.
Collaborate across teams
- Partner closely with senior members of the Civil Service and technical staff to define role requirements, selection strategies, and candidate evaluation processes.
- Work alongside the wider Talent Operations team to ensure each candidate has a superior experience from first conversation to final offer.
Personal Specification:
You’d be a great fit if you have some of the below:
Essential Criteria
- Experience sourcing and engaging high-calibre talent.
- Strong understanding of the UK AI ecosystem, particularly startups and frontier labs.
- Ability to design and deliver search strategies.
- Excellent interpersonal and communication skills.
- Evidence of building and maintaining long-term talent pipelines and professional networks.
- A proactive approach to work and a willingness to learn quickly.
- Ability to work at pace while maintaining quality and exceptional candidate experience.
Desirable Criteria
- Experience in an in-house sourcing, research, or executive search role within a technical or research-driven organisation.
- Familiarity with applicant tracking systems, sourcing tools, and data-led approaches to recruitment.
- Has run events or communities before.
Selection process:
Sift : Application sift. Applications will be sifted on CV and a personal statement (max 500 words).
Stage 1: Initial interview (30 minutes). Shortlisted candidates will be invited to an initial interview to see how the role aligns to the candidate’s experience.
Stage 2: Presentation and assessment (45 minutes). Progressed candidates will be invited to a behavioural and presentation-based interview. This will assess your ability to identify top talent and communities, suggest interesting events to attend and why we should attend them.
Stage 3: Final round interview (30 minutes). Candidates who progress will be invited to an interview with senior members of the team.
Timeline: We aim to move quickly through this process. Candidates can expect to hear the outcome of each stage within one week.
What We Offer
Career-defining projects with outsized impact- Backing from the Prime Minister and No10 to scope and build transformative AI projects.
- Unique opportunities to apply technology that could transform the public sector and impact citizens’ lives.
- Talented, supportive and mission-driven colleagues.
Resources & access- Access to frontier models and ample compute.
- Extensive operational, product, strategy, design and delivery support so you can focus on shipping.
- Work with experts across national security, policy, AI research and adjacent sciences.
Growth & empowerment- A team culture and development support that prioritises personal growth.
- Opportunities to own important products early and develop them in small empowered teams.
- 5 days off learning and development, annual stipends for learning and development and funding for conferences and external collaborations.
Life & family*- Opportunity to work from London, Manchester or Bristol offices.
- Contract Type: Fixed-term (24 months) please feel free to ask about this.
- Hybrid working, flexibility for occasional remote work abroad and stipends for work-from-home equipment.
- Generous annual leave - 25 days plus one additional day for each year of service
- Generous paid parental leave (up to 39 weeks full pay + option for additional unpaid time).
- On top of your salary, we contribute 28.97% of your base salary to your pension.
- Discounts and benefits for cycling to work, dental insurance, donations and retail/gyms.
*These benefits apply to direct employees. Benefits may differ for people joining through other employment arrangements such as secondments.
Appointment is conditional on successfully completing UK Government SC clearance. Prior clearance is not required—we will sponsor and support you. You should normally have been resident in the UK for 2 of the past 5 years. Employment is conditional on obtaining and maintaining the required clearance(s). More detail on clearance eligibility can be found on the UK Government website: National security vetting: clearance levels - GOV.UK
In accordance with the Civil Service Commission rules, the following list contains all elements of the selection process.
Eligibility
Not all staff working in a government department or accredited non-departmental public body are considered to be civil servants.
If any of the following statements apply to your circumstances then you should select ‘No’ when answering:
- You are a member of agency staff working in a government department
- You are employed by an external organisation contracted into government roles
- You are a self-employed contractor working in a government department
Nationality requirements
This job is broadly open to the following groups: (non reserved posts only)
- 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
For more information on job nationality requirements and the right to work in the UK, see the Civil Service Nationality rules (opens in a new window) and the UK Visas and Immigration rules (opens in a new window)
Interviews under the Disability Confident Scheme
We want to encourage disabled people to apply for jobs and give them an opportunity to show their skills, talent and abilities at the interview stage. The Civil Service runs a Disability Confident Scheme, offering an interview (opens in a new window) to a fair and proportionate number of disabled applicants that meet the minimum selection criteria for the job.
To be considered for an interview under this scheme you must have:
- a physical or mental impairment, or a long term health condition which has a substantial and long term (over 12 months) adverse effect on your ability to carry out normal day to day activities
- demonstrated in your application and testing stages that you meet the minimum job criteria as set out in the advert or person specification for the post
Reasonable adjustments
We want to support you if you need an adjustment in the recruitment process, even if you do not feel you qualify for the Disability Confident Scheme.
We consider visible and non-visible disabilities, neurodiversity or learning differences, chronic medical conditions or mental ill health. Examples include dyslexia, epilepsy, autism, chronic fatigue, diabetes, or schizophrenia.
Some of the adjustments we have offered are:
- application or interview help
- a time of day that works for you
- extra time
- sign language interpretation
- advice about assistive technology
For more information, you can read the government guidance on Reasonable adjustments for workers with disabilities or health conditions (opens in a new window)
Declaration
- All the information I've given in my application form is true to the best of my knowledge and belief and relates to my own experiences
- This is my only application for this role and accurately reflects my suitability
- I understand a check against the National Collection of Criminal Records and against other records or databases may be undertaken if I'm offered a position
- I understand that I’ll be asked for evidence of identification if I’m offered a post
- I understand my application may be rejected or I may be subject to disciplinary action if I've given false information or withheld relevant details
- I understand my application may be rejected or I may be subject to disciplinary action if evidence of plagiarism is detected. Examples of plagiarism can include presenting the ideas and experience of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own.
If you have any concerns about what we will do with your information, please see our privacy notice (opens in a new window). (amend to greenhouse data protection information)
Additional Information
Use of AI in Applications
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.
Internal Fraud Database
The Internal Fraud function of the Fraud, Error, Debt and Grants Function at the Cabinet Office processes details of civil servants who have been dismissed for committing internal fraud, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned. The Cabinet Office receives the details from participating government organisations of civil servants who have been dismissed, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned, for internal fraud. In instances such as this, civil servants are then banned for 5 years from further employment in the civil service. The Cabinet Office then processes this data and discloses a limited dataset back to DLUHC as a participating government organisations. DLUHC then carry out the pre employment checks so as to detect instances where known fraudsters are attempting to reapply for roles in the civil service. In this way, the policy is ensured and the repetition of internal fraud is prevented. For more information please see - Internal Fraud Register.
Security
Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check and get baseline personnel security standard (BPSS) clearance before they can be appointed. Additionally, there is a strong preference for eligibility for counter-terrorist check (CTC) clearance. Some roles may require higher levels of clearance, and we will state this by exception in the job advertisement. See our vetting charter here.
Nationality requirements
We may be able to offer roles to applicant fromany nationality or background. As such we encourage you to apply even if you do not meet the standard nationality requirements (opens in a new window).
Working for the Civil Service
The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants. The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.
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 (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window). As part of the application process, we monitor statistics on D&I. You can see how we process this data here: Recru
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