Head of Digital Design - Intellectual Property Office - G7

£66,162 plus up to £77,888 with additional allowances.

Published on 9 February 2026. Deadline 16 February 2026.

Newport, NP10 8QQ

Head of Digital Design - An exciting opportunity as part of the DDaT Extended Leadership Team (ELT) to lead our Digital Design team. An established and high performing team which is integral to the current Transformation programme - an ambitious and high profile delivery of modern customer centric services for Intellectual Property. Leading and managing a team of interaction and content designers, coaching and mentoring and helping mature the profession and championing personal development alongside high quality delivery. We need an engaging leader, with a passion for excellence, with great stakeholder skills who can communicate across a range of technical and non technical audiences. You'll get the most from your team by supporting and challenging them as they work across our services and change portfolios. You'll be able to see and appreciate the bigger picture, and see where the design profession sits as part of the wider UCD profession, DDaT directorate and the IPO to play your part in delivering our strategy.

This role will be carried out in line with IPO Hybrid working arrangements where staff are currently expected to spend at least 20% of their time working onsite from one of our offices. This role is based in our Newport Office.

The requirement for attendance at an office location can vary by role so we would encourage candidates to discuss working arrangements with the recruiting manager to agree a reasonable balance between working from home and the office.

Main duties consist of but are not limited to:

• Direct line management of senior designers as well as supporting delivery teams through matrix management.
• Be an advocate for UCD approaches, educating and championing awareness of the benefits of UCD across the organisation.
• Ensure a clear direction for the design community, aligned with the wider DDaT strategy.
• Management of key stakeholders across both IT and the wider IPO.
• Coaching and mentoring all members of the team as well as members of the organisation about the value of user centred design.
• Active engagement to the wider leadership of the Digital, Data & Technology function as part of the Extended Leadership Team.

• Leading and managing technical teams.
• Experience of being part of a leadership team and helping to shape and influence wider decisions across an organisation.
• Extensive experience of user centred design tools and methodologies within both agile and DevOps environments.
• Demonstratable experience of being a user centred design practitioner who drives and implements change across a number of delivery teams simultaneously.
• Demonstrable experience of professional development of a community of design practitioners including development of new talent such as graduates and apprentices.
• Experience of large transformational programmes of work and experience of analysis of componentised delivery methods.
• Influencing, both inside a DDaT department, and across the organisation.
• Knowledge or experience of blue printing, prototyping (including prototyping in code) and storyboarding techniques including giving direction on what tools and methods to use.