During your tenure as Chief Executive Officer, you will ensure:
• UKRI is an agile and responsive science and innovation funder, meeting current and future global research needs and challenges and contributing to the Government’s five missions;
• Ensure adoption of a rapid, data driven, and results orientated approaches, in part through delivery of UKRI’s organisational transformation programmes;
• UKRI focuses on the impact it can have for UK citizens, including through local R&D collaborations, and by nurturing regional clusters of expertise;
• The UK’s pipeline for R&D talent remains strong, within an exceptionally competitive global marketplace;
• Effective, long-term partnerships are built with industry and private sector R&D investors to ensure that UKRI’s investments both deliver economic benefit and enhance UK productivity;
• The continued broad confidence in UKRI by protecting and enhancing long term basic, curiosity driven research while improving the rate of development and deployment of applied research to solve pressing real world problems;
• A step change in UKRI’s engagement with tech focussed company formation and growth, both through the funding and collaborations it has with universities and businesses but also through its own portfolio of Catapults, and cutting-edge institutes and facilities; and
• UKRI supports the development and quality of its component funding bodies to ensure that they can be effective and empowered to deliver what is required.
• UKRI contributes effectively to the wider Government agendas of national security and resilience.
Role Responsibilities
• As Accounting Officer for UKRI you will be responsible to Parliament for ensuring that a budget of £9bn per annum of public funds is spent in line with Government priorities, achieving value for money and managing the associated risks.
• Lead and manage an expert, innovative and evidence based UKRI in successful pursuit of its objectives, providing the outstanding leadership, drive and vision necessary to deliver the high quality of outputs across the portfolio in support of Government objectives, and ensuring that UKRI can act support new forms of funding bodies
• Develop deep and broad relationships with key decision-takers, nationally and internationally, in R&D-intensive businesses and the venture capital community, using every opportunity to attract and grow private sector innovation in the UK, contributing to Government ambitions to accelerate innovation, investment and productivity right across the UK.
• Continue to develop, enhance and grow UKRI’s relationship with the academic community across universities, institutes and charities.
• Set the strategic direction for all pan-UKRI services across UKRI, taking an executive role in managing these, and where necessary, implementing swift and effective change throughout the organisation.
• Develop and lead an exceptional executive team, bringing the brightest stars of UK research and business to lead UKRI’s Councils, empowering them to drive their domains forward, bringing their sectors to bear on national and global challenges.
• Provide strategic oversight of capital and asset management for UKRI including its significant investments into science and technology infrastructure. In doing so, leverage expertise across UKRI to achieve synergies from acting as a single organisation.
• Promote a collective, sophisticated understanding of the research and innovation landscape through development and maintenance of enhanced analytical capability and research data management systems. This should be coupled to new, open and innovative approaches to funding research and innovation. The organisation should not seek to be homogeneous.
• Work with the UKRI Chair and Board to advise the Secretary of State and Ministers on the case for investment in research and innovation at key decision points including spending reviews and funding allocations to priority areas and ringfences.