Head of Negotiation & Access (Strategic Innovation)

An exciting opportunity has arisen in the Medicines Negotiation & Managed Access Team within NHS England's Medicines Value & Access directorate to fill a vacancy for the Head of Negotiation & Access (Strategic Innovation) for 12 months on a secondment or fixed-term contract opportunity.

The Head of Negotiation & Access (Strategic Innovation) provides strategic leadership for NHS England's innovation partnerships, commercial pilots, and implementation programmes, supporting the adoption of transformative medicines, diagnostics, technologies, and service models.

The role leads engagement with life sciences organisations, government departments, and system partners to develop innovative approaches that improve patient outcomes, support NHS priorities, and maximise value for taxpayers.

The postholder will oversee complex programmes of national significance, ensuring innovations are deliverable, affordable, and aligned to wider NHS strategic objectives. They will provide expert advice to senior NHS England, DHSC, and ministerial stakeholders on innovation adoption, implementation risk, affordability, and partnership opportunities.

The postholder can be based in one of our main offices in London, Leeds, or Manchester. Travel will be required for this role on an ad-hoc basis.

Main duties of the job

The postholder will be responsible for developing and delivering innovative approaches that accelerate patient access to transformative healthcare interventions whilst supporting NHS operational priorities, financial sustainability, and population health improvement.

This assignment will focus on leading a portfolio of strategic innovation programmes, partnerships, and access initiatives that require complex stakeholder management, commercial expertise, and delivery leadership across NHS England, government, and industry partners.

The postholder will work across organisational boundaries to identify, develop, and implement innovative solutions that improve patient outcomes, support NHS priorities, and maximise value from healthcare innovation.

Key Areas of Focus:

• Strategic Innovation Partnerships
• Innovation Programme and Pilot Delivery
• Access, Affordability, and Adoption Strategy
• Policy and Strategic Advice
• Stakeholder Leadership

About us

NHS England has a wide range of statutory functions, responsibilities, and regulatory powers. These are focused on supporting the wider NHS to deliver high-quality care, as well as doing those things that are best done once for the whole NHS.

Our staff bring expertise across clinical, operational, commissioning, technology, data science, cyber security, software engineering, education, and commercial specialisms , enabling us to design and deliver high-quality NHS services.

Benefits

• Colleagues with a contractual office base are expected to spend, on average, at least 40% of their time working in our offices.
• Staff recruited from outside the NHS will usually be appointed at the bottom of the pay band.

Job requirements

Education

• Desirable: Educated to Masters level or equivalent level or equivalent experience of working at a senior level in life sciences.

Knowledge & Experience

• Essential:
• Strong understanding of NHS medicines innovation adoption pathways and implementation challenges.
• Demonstrable experience and understanding of health technology assessment (HTA), pharmaceutical pricing and reimbursement, including the application of health economic principles to inform the development of innovative pricing agreements.
• Substantial experience of working with the pharmaceutical, life sciences, and healthcare sector.
• Extensive experience of managing strategic partnerships with senior stakeholders across multiple organisations, including experience of establishing collaborative arrangements that deliver measurable benefits and align differing organisational objectives.
• Understanding of population health, health inequalities, and opportunities to improve outcomes through innovation.
• Proven and significant leadership experience and/or formal management qualification.

Skills & Capabilities

• Essential:
• Outstanding negotiation and persuasion skills, including demonstrable emotional intelligence when negotiating.
• Demonstrable experience of developing, implementing, and evaluating innovative pilot or strategic initiatives.
• Demonstrable experience of developing strategic proposals and business cases.
• Highly developed communication skills with the ability to communicate on highly complex matters and difficult situations.
• Leadership, vision, strategic thinking, creativity, and planning with highly developed political skills.

Values & Behaviours

• Essential:
• Commitment to and focused on quality, promotes high standards in all they do and able to make a connection between their work and the benefit to patients and the public.
• Values diversity and difference; operates with integrity and openness. Works well with others, is positive and helpful, listens, involves, respects, and learns from the contribution of others.
• Ability to operate effectively within complex governance and accountability frameworks; working collaboratively across organisational boundaries.
• Needs to have a thorough understanding of and commitment to equality of opportunity and good working relationships both in terms of day-to-day working practices, but also in relation to management systems.