Job Advert
Flexible Location: NES is a remote-friendly employer with staff based throughout Scotland. We support office-based and hybrid working arrangements. We welcome conversations about alternative working patterns—please get in touch during the application process to discuss.
Work Pattern: Fixed Term, PartTime, 29 hours 30 minutes per week
Fixed-term or Secondment** for 12 months
**For NHS applicants, an NHS secondment will be offered in the first instance. For non-NHS applicants, a fixed-term or secondment would be considered.
You must have eligibility and entitlement to work in the UK which is required to be maintained throughout your period of employment.
Who We Are
NHS Education for Scotland (NES) is the national health board with statutory responsibilities to effect sustainable change through workforce development, education and training across the health and social care system in Scotland, while working at UK level with partner organisations.
Recognising the value and contribution of social care, NES has established a new Social Care Directorate as a dedicated corporate function. The work of the Social Care Directorate builds on and expands the existing education, training, workforce development and workforce data and technology provided by NES to the social care sector.
The Centre for Workforce Supply (CWS) where this role sits, is in the Social Care and Communities Directorate of NES. The team was commissioned by Scottish Government in 2021, aligned to the National Workforce Strategy for Health and Social Care.
The Opportunity
This is an exciting opportunity to join a dynamic, fast paced and innovative team, delivering a multifaceted programme of work to improve recruitment, retention and increase sustainability across NHS Scotland’s workforce, helping to ensure the sector has the right people, in the right place at the right time.
Reporting to the Head of Programme, you will be responsible for the successful delivery of two vital workstreams – Medical and Workforce Data. By bringing together expertise across NHS Scotland in the areas of workforce data, planning, recruitment, education and development, you will successfully support the identification and prioritisation of workforce challenges and deliver impactful interventions across these workstreams accordingly
Do you want to make a difference to the everyday lives of your NHS workforce?
Do you enjoy rising to the challenge in a fast paced, complex and political environment ?
Do you enjoy collaborating with stakeholders to co-develop innovative solutions?
Do you have a passion for programme management and using data to establish the evidence base for interventions?
Do you want to use your knowledge and skills to improve the sustainability of the healthcare workforce?
Working within the Centre for Workforce Supply you will have the opportunity to implement real change within the NHS Scotland workforce, making a difference to people’s every day working lives
Does this sound like you?
What We Love to See
Principal Leads offer a broad range of skills and experience, if you can offer some or all of these, we’d love you to apply:
- Excellent programme management skills and experience in the management of complex workforce improvement projects across health (ideally the medical workforce).
- Experience in developing health workforce policy, with experience in medical workforce policy being of particular benefit.
- A clear understanding of the challenges facing the health workforce, (ideally medical, across all specialties/career stages) and what interventions could support.
- A clear understanding of the issues faced by the health system in terms of workforce planning.
- A clear understanding of the political and social environment across health, including NHS workforce priorities.
- Experience in successfully working across complex health environments with multiple stakeholders, including clinicians.
- Excellent presentation skills to engage programme stakeholders.
- Experience of developing and facilitating communities of practice across health, successfully engaging hard to reach / busy members of the workforce.
- Experience of designing and developing high quality, impactful programme outputs including reports, improvement resources and best practice guidance.
- Experience of coordinating research and project evaluation.
- Ability to critically analyse and present complex health workforce related information, including datasets, to a range of stakeholders to enable discussion and aid decision making.
- Ability to build highly effective working relationships internally and externally.
- Demonstrate honesty, integrity, care and compassion when dealing with others, utilising tact and persuasion skills when necessary
- Ability to work on own initiative, to organise and prioritise own workloads, to meet strict deadlines
Benefits Which Matter
As a valued employee of NHS Scotland, you can enjoy an extensive range of benefits including:
- Life-work balance - with opportunities for flexible working and hybrid working
- Generous NHS pension scheme
- Annual incremental salary progression (up to the maximum of the salary band) plus annual NHS salary scale review
- Annual Leave - 27 Days increasing in line with service plus 8 days public holiday
- NHS discounts and more
Diversity and Inclusion
Developing a successful national service for Scotland is impossible without ensuring we consider the diverse needs, perspectives and backgrounds of everyone in Scotland in our work.
We are focused on hiring the very best talent available for NES, and actively encourage applications from candidates of all backgrounds and aim to ensure everyone is treated fairly, with respect and has a positive recruitment experience – regardless of the outcome.
It’s not essential to be in a Principal Lead role right now. You may be returning from a career break (e.g. maternity, paternity, caring for others) or returning after working in another field. Your experiences elsewhere can bring a fresh perspective to our work.
If you are considering applying and feel it would be helpful to discuss this initially, please contact Andrea Kwek, Head of Programme for Centre for Workforce Supply, andrea.kwek@nhs.scot
Next Steps
**NHS candidates will be considered firstly on a secondment basis, and so are strongly encouraged to discuss this with their current NHS employer at the earliest opportunity, ideally prior to application.
All applicants who are shortlisted for interview will be contacted by e-mail.
In person OR online interviews (including a presentation) will take place on between the 23rd and 28th of October 2025. The presentation topic will be sent to candidates selected for interview.
For further information please refer to the Job Information Pack below.
Unless otherwise stated the deadline for applications is 23:59 hours on the closing date. Please note, CVs will not be accepted.
To work in the United Kingdom, there is a legal requirement for an individual to demonstrate that they have the relevant permission to work in the country. This permission is, without exception, granted by the UK Visa and Immigrations Service.
As part of the pre-employment checks for a preferred candidate, NHS Scotland Boards will check your entitlement to work in the UK. It can be evidenced through a number of routes including specific types of visa as well as EU settled and pre-settled status. To find out more about these routes of permission, please refer to the GOV.UK website here.
For specific types of post, if you do not have the necessary eligibility to work in the UK, it might be possible (though not guaranteed) to secure sponsorship via a UK Skilled Worker/Health & Care Worker Visa. However, this is only possible if the employer is a licenced Sponsor, and if the post does not fall below the current minimum salary threshold or ‘going rate’. Further information on these criteria can be found here.
It is ESSENTIAL that you have checked that you either already have an appropriate right to work in the UK or that the post would be eligible to be sponsored BEFORE submitting your application form.
If you have any queries regarding the NHS Scotland National Recruitment Portal or the recruitment process, please don't hesitate to contact our recruitment partners, the East Region Recruitment Service, at: EoS.ERRS@nhs.scot