Job summary
- Main area
- Clinical
- Grade
- NHS AfC: Band 8d
- Contract
- Fixed term: 12 months (Until 31st October 2026 - Secondment only for current NHS employees)
- Hours
- Full time
- Part time
- Job ref
- 990-TD-CTDCI-17694-E
- Employer
- NHS England
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Wellington Place/Wellington House/ Hexagon House
- Town
- Leeds/London/ Exeter
- Salary
- £91,342 - £105,337 per annum (exclusive of London weighting)
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 16/10/2025 23:59
Employer heading
Senior Clinical Lead
NHS AfC: Band 8d
Our Organisation
The NHS is building a culture that is positive, compassionate and inclusive – and we all have our part to play.
As employers we are committed to protecting and promoting the physical and mental health and wellbeing of all our colleagues. This underpins our values as set out in the NHS Constitution and supports us to be an Employer of Choice, while helping our colleagues to deliver high quality services for our patients and communities.
As a flexible employer, we want to support you to work in a way that is best for the NHS, our patients and you. Talk to us about how we might be able to accommodate a flexible working arrangement whether that’s a job share, part time, hybrid working or another flexible pattern. In addition, although the role advertised may have a ‘home’ office base indicated, we remain committed to supporting flexibility around workplace locations. If it works for the service, we will do our best to make it work for you.
We are an accredited Living Wage Employer which means that every colleague working for our organisation and third-party contractors will earn a real Living Wage. We are one of over 15,000 organisations, who voluntarily chose to pay the real Living Wage.
Job overview
In this Senior Clinical Lead role, you will join a varied team of clinicians from different professions, working on products and services across NHS England's Transformation Directorate. You will play a key role in shaping the safe delivery of national programmes to provide clear benefits for citizens and patients, and support clinicians to provide better care.
Our Senior Clinical lead provide the framework and direction for our Clinical Informaticians working across programmes and involved in large scale change, as well as providing a key clinical voice to programme teams within Transformation Directorate.
The post holder(s) will support internal clinical safety and assurance activities and provide oversight of the clinical aspects of programmes and projects within Transformation Directorate, deputising for the Senior Clinical Lead across a range of functions.
Candidates are required to be registered and regulated health or care professional with high level specialist knowledge and trained Clinical Safety Officers (CSOs).
Main duties of the job
In this role, you will be required to have regular contact with internal and external stakeholders and will often need to engage with them over sensitive, complex and contentious issues. You will also be expected to lead and support other clinicians across the organisation, ensuring programmes and services have access to appropriate clinical support and are represented in externally facing Programme Boards, Clinical Reference Panels or Clinical Advisory Groups. You will join a multi-professional team of experienced clinicians with a variety of clinical backgrounds, all of whom have chosen informatics as a specialist area of expertise. You will be joining the team at an exciting time, as the role of clinical informaticians becomes more important than ever before in supporting the safe and effective use of technology across health and social care services, for the benefit of patients and citizens.
Working for our organisation
Our work supports the NHS to deliver high quality services for patients and best value for taxpayers.
Our staff bring expertise across hundreds of specialisms — including clinical, operational, commissioning, technology, data science, cyber security, software engineering, education, and commercial — enabling us to design and deliver high-quality NHS services.
We lead the NHS in England by:
- Enabling local systems and providers to improve the health of their people and patients and reduce health inequalities
- Making the NHS a great place to work, where our people can make a difference and achieve their potential
- Working collaboratively to ensure our healthcare workforce has the right knowledge, skills, values and behaviours to deliver accessible, compassionate care
- Optimising the use of digital technology, research, and innovation
- Delivering value for money
Earlier this year, the Government announced that NHS England will gradually merge with the Department of Health and Social Care, leading to full integration. The aim is to create a smaller, more strategic centre that reduces duplication and eliminates waste.
If successful at interview, we will initiate an Inter Authority Transfer (IAT) via the Electronic Staff Record (ESR). This retrieves key data from your current or previous NHS employer to support onboarding, including competency status, Continuous Service Dates (CSD), and annual leave entitlement. You may opt out at any stage of the recruitment process.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
In the Senior Clinical lead role, you will join a varied pool of clinicians from different professions, working on products and services across NHS England's Transformation Directorate.
You will play a key role in shaping the safe delivery of national programmes to provide clear benefits for citizens and patients, and support clinicians to provide better care.
Our Senior Clinical lead provide the framework and direction for our Clinical Informaticians working across programmes and involved in large scale change, as well as providing a key clinical voice to programme teams within Transformation Directorate.
You can find further details about the role, including key responsibilities and accountabilities, alongside the organisational structure and person specification in the attached Job Description and other supporting documents.
Secondments
Applicants from within the NHS will be offered on a secondment basis only, agreement should be obtained from their employer prior to submitting the application.
Person specification
Qualifications
Essential criteria
- Registered and regulated health or care professional with high level specialist knowledge in a key area of practice, holding current professional clinical registration with an appropriate professional body.
- Educated to Masters level or equivalent level or equivalent experience of working at a senior level in specialist area.
- Substantial post-registration NHS/Social care experience demonstrated over a number of years
Desirable criteria
- A trained and accredited clinical safety officer with current application in practice. If not, post holders will be expected to undertake training within 6 months of appointment
Knowledge and Experience
Essential criteria
- Experience of working with NHS quality improvement frameworks, NHS regulatory and compliance frameworks and their requirements.
- Understands the sources and quality of evidence relating to clinical assessment and their application to practice
- Experience of leading complex organisational assessment processes with an understanding of clinical IT systems
Skills Capabilities & Attributes
Essential criteria
- Able to lead and monitor the ongoing research and development of evidence-based clinical guidelines that reflect national guidelines and ensure safe systems of working across NHS England.
- Lead the clinical governance framework through strategic accountability for clinical risk and clinical safety
- Takes accountability for the safe, level and ethical use of information across systems, services and in clinical practice
Employer certification / accreditation badges
Applicant requirements
You must have appropriate UK professional registration.
This post will require a submission for Disclosure to be made to check for any unspent criminal convictions.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Mark Nicholas
- Job title
- Deputy Director for Digital Operations
- Email address
- [email protected]
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