Current roles
Thank you for your interest in these key senior roles. Details can be found below on the roles we are currently recruiting.
Chief Finance and Operating Officer
About the role
Chief Finance and Operating Officer (CFOO) will be responsible for the delivery of key internal corporate services to support the delivery of the Office for Students (OfS) strategy and objectives as the regulator of higher education in England.
This is a senior leadership role within the OfS reporting into the Chief Executives. The CFOO will be a key part of the organisation’s Executive Committee, and will work closely with government and bodies across the higher education sector.
The CFOO is accountable for the provision of fit for purpose operating platforms and processes which will enable delivery of the business strategy, including Finance, IT, people and estates. The scope of this role is flexible and responsibilities may change over time to include other service areas.
The Process
Stage 1:
To apply, please visit the Apply section of this website, on which you will be asked to submit:
- A CV (no longer than three pages) setting out your career history, with key responsibilities and achievements. Please ensure you have provided reasons for any gaps within the last two years.
- A Statement of Suitability (no longer than three pages), giving detailed and specific examples of achievements in line with the Essential and Desirable criteria in the Knowledge and Experience section of the role profile, together with a sentence explaining why you want to be the next Chief Operating Officer of the Office for Students.
- You will also be asked to complete an equality monitoring questionnaire and provide details of two referees who will only be contacted at the final stage of the process and with your explicit permission.
The evidence provided in the CV and supporting statement will be assessed by the OfS’s recruitment panel, with support from GatenbySanderson, to select a longlist of c.10 candidates who will be invited to progress to the next stage of the process.
Stage 2:
Longlisted candidates will be invited to a preliminary interview with a consultant from GatenbySanderson to explore your motivation and experience in more detail. Lasting approximately 60-75 minutes, you can expect to be asked about your perspective on the OfS’s current context and priorities; a series of competency-based questions inviting you to describe specific examples to assess your ability to meet the essential and desirable criteria; and confirmation of your availability for the key dates in the process and willingness to accept the key terms of the appointment.
These interviews will support the panel in their shortlisting decisions, where we expect to invite up to six candidates to progress to the third and final stage of the process. If the panel decide not to proceed with your application beyond the shortlist stage, you will be informed of the outcome and provided feedback by GatenbySanderson.
Stage 3:
Shortlisted candidates will be invited to facilitate a staff engagement exercise and to attend a panel interview with the Office for Students.
The staff engagement exercise will require you to facilitate a discussion with a small group of OfS staff around a given topic and is designed to help us to build up a rounded picture of each candidate and give us an insight into how you might engage and interact with the wider team. It will assess your engagement and communication skills; the session is not intended to test your subject knowledge or expertise for this particular role. The feedback from this session will form part of the evidence that the interview panel will consider in reaching their final decision.
For the interview, you are likely to be asked to prepare a short presentation, following which a series of competency-based questions will explore your suitability for the post against the published competencies and criteria.
Full details will be provided, and a preparatory call offered to support you, following the shortlist meeting.