Rail Services Lead, South Western Railway (SWR)
| Posting date: | 04 July 2025 |
|---|---|
| Salary: | £59,686 to £65,221 per year |
| Hours: | Full time |
| Closing date: | 20 July 2025 |
| Location: | London |
| Company: | Government Recruitment Service |
| Job type: | Permanent |
| Job reference: | 413823/1 |
Summary
Do you have a strong understanding of the commercial space?
Have you got experience of leading a team / experience of people management?
If so, we’d love to hear from you!
DfT is a high-profile department at the heart of UK government. We work with agencies and partners to support the transport network that helps businesses and gets people and goods travelling around the country. We plan and invest to make journeys better.
This is an exciting opportunity to join the Rail Services (Southern) team who sit within Rail Services Group which is responsible for ensuring the successful development and the day-to-day management of railway contracts.
You will work collaboratively with South Western Railway (SWR) as our delivery partner, so that they operate their Services Agreement (SA) in the interest of passengers, ensuring that they meet their suite of obligations and are supported and challenged to deliver agreed outcomes. You may be required to work flexibly in future across teams managing other Train Operating Companies.
The role is high-profile and fast-moving and will require a blend of strategic stakeholder management, commercial, project management and leadership skills.
Your responsibilities will include, but aren’t limited to:
- Working with senior level executives of SWR, including on the Annual Business Plan, performance assessment and improvement, subsidy reduction and contract
- Advising internal and external stakeholders, Ministers, DfT senior leaders on matters. This can include providing material to the Ministerial and Press teams, sometimes within challenging timescales.
- Management responsibility of a team as well as organising, reporting and planning information and their workloads.
- Managing the contract/agreement and having a clear understanding of the key levers the Department can use to maximise passenger benefits while minimising risk to the taxpayer.
- Developing relationships and working collaboratively with DfTO, NR and Train Operating Companies as part of Shadow Great British Railways (SGBR).
- Build knowledge and play a key role in the transition to the new public ownership Services Agreement, including working closely with the Public Ownership Transition (POTP) team and DFTO.
- Effective use of management information to challenge and support the operator highlighting key trends and issues using data and putting in place improvement plans when necessary.
- Taking the lead on identifying and driving forward solutions, supported by analysis of a range of credible options, to overcome problems. This could include leadership of specific projects such as on rolling stock or cross-cutting issues.
Great line management is important to us as an organisation, and we will equip and support line managers to develop the skills they need. We aim to empower line managers to create teams where people can flourish and deliver excellent outcomes for the public.
For further information on the role, please read the attached role profile. Please note that the role profile is for information purposes only - whilst all elements are relevant to the role, they may not all be assessed during the recruitment process. This job advert will detail exactly what will be assessed during the recruitment process.
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