# Pre-16 Assurance Manager **Company**: Department for Education **Location**: Coventry, West Midlands, England; Darlington, County Durham, North East, England; City of Westminster, Greater London, England; Manchester, Greater Manchester, North West, England; Sheffield, South Yorkshire, Yorkshire and the Humber, England **Work arrangement**: hybrid **Experience**: senior **Job type**: Flexible **Salary**: GBP 60,222 - 64,518 per year **Category**: Finance **Industry**: Education **Apply**: https://www.jobsgopublic.com/job/pre-16-assurance-manager-106400?utm_source=yubhub.co&utm_medium=jobs_feed&utm_campaign=apply **Canonical**: https://yubhub.co/jobs/job_faf94260-97a ## Description We are seeking a high-calibre individual to be part of the Pre-16 Assurance Leadership Team. You will work as part of the team to deliver the overall assurance plan, with lead responsibilities for a number of critical assurance projects. The Pre-16 Assurance Team provides regularity assurance over circa £77 billion of grant funding, paid to local authorities, local-maintained schools, academy trust schools and early years providers, to both the DfE Accounting Officer, and the National Audit Office (NAO). Your main responsibilities will include: **Leadership and Delivery** - Lead the planning, delivery and reporting on pre-16 assurance work-strands, ensuring assurance objectives are delivered effectively and efficiently. - Own team outputs and deliverables, ensuring plans align with wider assurance objectives, departmental and strategic priorities. - Develop, manage and deliver risk-based assurance plans that deliver efficient and effective assurance over grant funding. - Ensure assurance activities support the successful achievement of Assurance Division objectives. - Identify delivery risks and emerging issues, taking timely action to maintain performance and quality standards. - Oversee the production of clear, concise and evidence-based assurance assessments, reports and briefings for senior stakeholders. - Work with other assurance managers, contributing to the management and delivery of the annual regularity assurance programme. - Liaise with the NAO Audit Team to facilitate delivery of their regularity audit of grants. **Assurance and Risk Management** - Design, develop and implement assurance frameworks, strategies, plans and approaches for complex or high-value grant programmes and funding streams. - Oversee the delivery of either the local authority regularity assurance programme or the academy financial regularity assurance programme. - Evaluate assurance findings and grant data sources to identify trends, risks, control weaknesses and opportunities for improvement. - Ensure sufficient assurance is obtained that grants are being used for their intended purposes and in accordance with funding agreements and departmental requirements. - Lead the escalation and reporting of significant risks and assurance concerns, supporting effective decision-making by senior leaders. - Actively contribute to the Grants Transformation Programme Risk and Assurance strand. **Stakeholder Engagement** - Build and maintain strong partnerships across policy, delivery, finance and commercial functions. - Collaborate with grant policy, management and delivery teams to improve assurance practices and strengthen risk management. - Communicate assurance findings and recommendations clearly and professionally to audited bodies, senior leaders and stakeholders. - Bring together diverse perspectives and evidence to support balanced and informed assurance judgements. **People Leadership** - Create a clear sense of team purpose and foster a high-performing, inclusive and collaborative culture. - Empower individuals and teams with confidence and empathy to take initiative, exercise professional judgement and contribute to continuous improvement. - Manage performance proactively, setting clear expectations and providing regular, honest, direct, kind and constructive feedback. - Support the professional development of team members through coaching, mentoring and targeted learning opportunities. - Promote knowledge sharing, collaboration and continuous learning across the team and wider assurance community. - Champion diversity, inclusion and wellbeing, ensuring all colleagues are supported to achieve their potential. The role offers a salary of £60,222 - £64,518 per year, and a range of benefits including 25 days leave, increasing by 1 day every year to a maximum of 30 days after five years' service, plus the King's Birthday privilege holiday and 8 days' bank and public holidays. ## Skills ### Required - assurance - audit - risk management - governance - control environments - strategic audit - project management ### Nice to have - knowledge of the education, academy and/or local authority sectors - government grant management standards - regularity requirements within public and/or education bodies - CCAB or equivalent qualified accountant --- Source: [Apply at jobsgopublic.com](https://www.jobsgopublic.com/job/pre-16-assurance-manager-106400?utm_source=yubhub.co&utm_medium=jobs_feed&utm_campaign=apply)