Private Secretary

This role sits at the heart of the Department for Business and Trade’s (DBT) Construction, Infrastructure and Energy Directorate (CIE), which is responsible for delivering economic growth across four areas: Energy, Infrastructure Partnerships, Infrastructure & Construction and Ukraine Reconstruction.

The Directorate was recently involved in the UK’s largest trade mission to Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion, launched guidance on the National Digital Twin Programme and delivered an agreement with the Government Peru to deliver a programme of infrastructure partnerships.

Sitting within the Directorate’s Central Office, the private secretary role offers a chance to engage and drive forward strategic priorities. Providing an exciting opportunity to work alongside an experienced and highly respected director, to learn from their leadership and to gain a broad knowledge of multiple high-profile sectors and both domestic policy and international trade delivery.

We are a diverse, friendly, and welcoming directorate, and we actively encourage applications from as diverse a set of candidates as we can possibly get. If you are from a minority group, interested in the role but uncertain about your suitability, please drop us a line – we’d be very happy to have a chat.

As the Private Secretary to the Director for Construction, Infrastructure and Energy, you will play a pivotal role in the running of the Directorate and in ensuring the director makes effective decisions by:Understanding, articulating and helping to drive forward the Director’s priorities; by providing high quality advice backed up by accurate and perceptive insights.Having portfolio responsibility for some of the directorate’s teams; this will involve being the team’s first point of contact for advice on behalf of the Director.Managing the Director’s inbox with regards to meeting requests; reviewing emails to identify priorities and actioning requests that come in, escalation and commissioning briefing on key issues and prioritising incoming mail to ensure key deadlines are met.Forward planning to ensure all briefing and papers are closely managed, identifying and commissioning information/briefings as required.Managing the Director’s diary, travel and logistics, helping to make sure the director’s time is maximised effectively and that appropriate travel arrangements are made.Chairing the Directorate All Staff weekly call to ensure that the directorate is kept informed of key issues.Undertake specific projects and research and analysis on behalf of the Director, including presenting findings in papers, reports and PowerPoint presentations.