Director General for Economic, Social and Environmental Statistics (ESEG) - ONS - SCS3

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is the UK’s largest independent producer of official statistics and is the recognised National Statistical Institute.  

The Director General for Economic, Social and Environmental Statistics (ESEG) is a high profile post responsible for leadership of all aspects of economic, social and environmental statistics at ONS. This includes directing the delivery of the UK’s most important statistics about the economy; being an authoritative and credible public face of economic, social and environmental statistics and analysis; overseeing the changes needed in modernising the collection and communication of those statistics; and devising and implementing the medium and long term strategic approach to production and dissemination of economic, social and environmental statistics. 

Job description

You will be a key member of the National Statistician’s top-level executive leadership group. It is anticipated you will be regularly invited to, and held to account by the UK Statistics Authority Board as well as the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Select Committee, other Parliamentary scrutiny bodies and across Whitehall.  

You will be responsible for building and maintaining relationships on economic statistics with HM Treasury, the Bank of England, the Office for Budgetary Responsibility, other key users and opinion formers.  

You will play a key role in deputising, on occasion, for the National Statistician domestically and internationally on matters of economic and social statistics as they affect the UK and international statistical system. 

Key Responsibilities 

• Provide enterprise leadership and direction to ensure consistently high quality, relevant, economic statistics and analysis are produced by ONS, including the National Accounts, prices, labour market and business statistics.  
• Lead the transformation of statistics on the UK Labour Market to ensure they meet users’ needs. 
• Instil an outward-facing approach across your Group which anticipates, understands and responds to user needs, and is grounded in a continuously improving understanding of the real world economic and political context.  
• Build confidence, trust and credibility among users and provide an authoritative voice for economic statistics and analysis, personally explaining economic statistics to users including Government, Parliament, the media and the public. 
• Develop an ambitious suite of statistics and analysis – including regular analytical outputs and bespoke analyses tackling individual topics to drive forward work across government missions. 
• Build and manage key stakeholder relations within and outside government, including the Treasury, Bank of England and Office for Budgetary Responsibility.  
• Drive at pace, provide leadership and direction for innovation, major change programmes, new technology and systems.  
• Devise and implement a medium and long-term strategy which builds capability for delivering economic and social statistics at ONS, maximising the potential benefit of relationships across the Government Statistical Service (GSS), Government Economic Service (GES), government and private sector.  
• Build and enhance the UK’s reputation for economic, social and environmental statistics across both the domestic and international statistical systems, maximising the benefits of collaboration and partnership working to ensure the UK is a model of best practice.  
• Make the case for the appropriate funding of economic statistics, optimise value for money and ensure probity and good governance in the use of public money.

Further information on the role can be found in the attached candidate pack. 

Person specification

Essential Criteria

• An inspiring, inclusive and confident enterprise level leader with experience of senior leadership and the ability to operate at Board level in a statistical or analytical capacity, engage people with the ONS vision and strategy and make risk-based decisions.
• A demonstrable and deep understanding of statistics and how they are used, in addition to familiarity with working in an analytical environment as well as a detailed knowledge of economic statistics.
• A leader who is a credible and authoritative commentator on statistics, economics and society with experience dealing with the media and key external opinion formers, commanding respect across sectors including Government, research, and academia.
• Transformative leader with a strong record of delivery and innovation at scale and pace, including experience of leading an organisation through change, and an ability to steer a complex technical portfolio of work.
• An ability to work across boundaries, building capability and promoting strong collaborative working practices within their team, the wider ONS, and across a range of broad and expert stakeholders.