Supervision Associate

Please note that this role will close at 00:01 on Wednesday 10th April and therefore we advise getting your application by no later than midnight on Tuesday 9th April.

About Ofcom and Online Safety

Online services are integral to our daily lives: they have unlocked new ways to learn, create, collaborate, and communicate. However, they have also exposed users to new forms of harm including online scams, child sexual exploitation and abuse, and hate speech, as well as content harmful to children, such as pornography.

Ofcom has recently been given wide-ranging new powers by the Online Safety Act 2023. Our role is to hold online services to account for the steps they take to protect users from harm and ensure a safer life online.

We are recruiting a Supervision Associate to support Ofcom in regulating online services. This role will focus on our strategy and operation, ensuring the team has the right focus, direction and resources to protect users and deliver on its ambitious plans. As part of our One Ofcom strategy, this role will be based in Manchester, Edinburgh, Belfast or Cardiff.

About the Team

Ofcom’s Online Safety Group works to ensure UK citizens have a safer life online. The Group’s role is to lead work across Ofcom to implement the new regulatory framework for online safety, alongside the ongoing regulation of video sharing platforms.

The Supervision Team sits within the Online Safety Group and our role is to manage Ofcom’s relationships with regulated services. Our Team provides close, structured engagement with the most impactful services in scope of the online safety regime and promotes compliance among the many thousands of services covered by the new rules. We lead and deliver our supervision strategy in collaboration and coordination with other specialist teams in Ofcom.

Purpose of the role

The Strategy and Operations team within Supervision makes sure we deliver against Ofcom's overall strategy for online safety. We help set a clear strategy across diverse portfolios of regulated services. We track and report our progress against a complex work programme. We also support the development of new capabilities, key relationships, use of technology systems, and automated processes across our supervisory work so we can have the maximum impact.

As a Supervision Associate in this team, your key responsibilities include:

• Supporting the team to develop, deliver and manage the overall programme for Online Safety Supervision
• Planning, co-ordinating projects, and supporting the progress of the team’s key objectives, outputs and outcomes with regulated online services
• Supporting the delivery and day-to-day running of programme management processes and tools across our cross-functional programme, including working with data and tech teams to improve our systems
• Supporting the effective delivery of our governance and organisational reporting processes, gathering input from colleagues as appropriate, for example providing progress and update reports to senior management and supporting the evaluation of progress against team goals
• Building and maintaining effective relationships with teams across Ofcom that work with us, supporting and delivering work to ensure they are updated, included and feel heard
• Supporting the Strategy and Operations Principals and Senior Associates to ensure clear communication and information sharing (with the rest of the Supervision Team, Online Safety Group and across Ofcom), to deliver clear programmatic updates, and to establish ways of working with other teams/organisations
• Supporting the work of Online Safety Supervision Principals and Directors, taking on ad hoc projects as requested
• Developing and fostering online expertise across Ofcom’s online safety programme and keep across online trends and technological developments

Content information and safeguarding

Applicants should be aware that whilst these roles should not involve directly exposure to illegal content, it could potentially involve working time spent on distressing content and material and/or themes. Ofcom is committed to safeguarding our colleagues who undertake this type of work and offers a range of tailored support options, including training, annual psychological assessments for those regularly doing this work and 24-hour access to counselling services.

Skills, knowledge and experience

Essential

• Great organisational skills, including experience of planning and prioritising a varied workload and ability to work in a team environment focused on outputs and outcomes
• Ability to collate information from a number of sources to provide insightful status reports in a timely way
• Ability to manage relationships and excellent collaboration skills, including the ability to represent your team and build relationships with a diverse range of internal stakeholders.
• Interpersonal and communications skills, including an ability to present complicated issues to non-specialist audiences with confidence
• Research and analytical skills, with experience in assessing complex issues and using your judgement to identify problems and develop solutions
• Ability to present complex ideas and solutions in written and graphical form