Contracts and Commissioning Officer

Overview

Buckinghamshire Council has an exciting opportunity for an enthusiastic and inspirational Contracts and Commissioning Officer within Client Transport Services.

Full Time - Fixed Term/Secondment Contract (Maternity Cover 11 months – 5 February 2025 to Friday 9 January 2026) – Aylesbury

Interviews to be held - Wednesday 11 and Thursday 12 December 2024

This position is being advertised for Buckinghamshire Council internal and agency employees only.

About us

Client Transport Services have a statutory duty to provide travel arrangements for eligible children and adults to schools, day centres and other establishments.

The service manages high volume transport activity for thousands of mainstream, SEND and social care passengers to get to and from their required setting, whilst working within budgets and cost efficiency measures. It is a challenging, friendly and an extremely rewarding environment to work in.

The Client Transport team commission a mixture of Adult and Children Contracts which include the transportation of vulnerable adults and children to schools, day centres, hospitals, respite care, and/or other establishments or venues.  

The Client Transport Service also carry out a variety of roles to ensure this transport is operated to the highest standard and play a pivotal role in ensuring the health, safety and welfare of its passengers.

Buckinghamshire Council is a relatively new organisation that combines the strengths and expertise of the previous five councils in the county to create positive change for local people, communities, and businesses. We are firmly focused on the future and have made a clear commitment to serve residents better and to provide stronger representation for Buckinghamshire, both locally and nationally. 

About the role

The post holder will have in-depth knowledge and comprehensive experience in commissioning or delivering operationally across services and have dealt with complex commissioning activities to a satisfactory conclusion.

The Contracts and Commissioning Officer will.

• Be managing and delivering a number of complex initiatives simultaneously.
• Manage contracts whilst working within a commissioning/contracting or provider function within a statutory setting, or related provision linked to managing performance and/or commissioning, funding, or contracting services.
• Ensure the successful delivery of commissioned third-party services. You will work closely with other internal teams such as Procurement, Legal and Finance in ensuring compliance and value for money is always being achieved.
• Provide specialist support and quality assurance on all aspects of the commissioning cycle for Transport services. The role holder will take a lead in making sure that commissioned services, and policies in transport are fit for purpose, provide value for money, and actively ensures suppliers are safe for service users.
• Provide advice and guidance to internal staff on all aspects of commissioning and tendering activity and work with the Procurement team to ensure internal processes are aligned to internal regulation and procurement law.
• Maintain efficient records of contract monitoring activities and any safeguarding issues arising.
• Develop strong working relationships with transport suppliers and monitor their overall performance across Buckinghamshire Council transport contracts.
• Be confident in using eTendering, ProContract, In-tend or similar software), Contract Management (CMA) and other internal systems or a willingness to learn.
• Be the contract manager for Transport related systems and lead officer within transport on the Tender Portal (DPS) and Contract Management Application (CMA)

Fixed

As a ‘fixed’ worker, you’ll spend most of your time in the same location, which will likely be a fixed office or location where your role is performed. Typically, you’ll be based in the same location as the rest of your team, because you provide a particular service from that fixed location or need access to information there.

About you

We are seeking a self-motivated, flexible, and enthusiastic candidate who has strong interpersonal skills to support the building and maintaining of relationships both internally and externally this includes the ability to converse at ease with customers, schools, day centre and suppliers.

Other information

Additional information

Please see the attached job summary for further information on this role and person specification.

Number of positions available: 1

Closing date: Friday 6 December 2024

Interview date: 11 and 12 December 2024

Interview-type: MS TEAMS

If you would like to have an informal conversation with the recruiting manager, please contact:

Caroline Piddington, 01296 382450 – Email [email protected]

Jessica Parfitt - 01296 674471 - Email: [email protected]

This post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and therefore applicants are required to declare:

• All unspent convictions and conditional cautions
• All spent convictions and adult cautions that are not protected (i.e. that are not filtered out) as defined by the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (as amended in 2020 and 2023).

For further information on filtering please refer to Nacro guidance and the guidance published by the Ministry of Justice (see, in particular, the section titled ‘Exceptions Order’).

We reserve the right to close the vacancy once we have received sufficient applications, so please be advised to submit your application as early as possible.

Our values and culture

We have a set of values, which our employees have chosen, that represent what we are – Proud, Ambitious, Collaborative and Trustworthy.

By joining Buckinghamshire Council, you can expect:

• a fair and inclusive culture
• the chance to really make a difference to those around you
• health and well-being initiatives including an Employee Assistance Programme, Mental Health First Aiders and mindfulness workshops
• a unified voice through our Employee Representative Group
• ongoing support, and the opportunity to develop and progress in your career with us
• opportunities to take part in fun activities such as fundraising and social events

At Buckinghamshire Council, we know that our biggest strength comes from the people that work for us, and that’s why we’re working hard to ensure we continue to be an accessible and inclusive organisation.

From dedicated staff networks overseen by our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Steering Group, to proudly standing as a Disability Confident employer, it’s important to us that all our colleagues feel engaged, listened to, and valued. Our offer of flexible working empowers a productive and happy workforce and allows employees to combine work with other responsibilities and commitments.

We believe our workforce should reflect the diverse communities we service in Buckinghamshire, and are looking for like-minded individuals to join us in promoting equality, fairness, and inclusion for everyone.

About the Business Unit

Our Communities directorate works across the county to deliver a number of the key customer-facing services that our residents, businesses and visitors rely on every day. 

This directorate includes a wide range of services, including:

• collecting and disposing of waste and recycling
• maintaining our roads and Rights of Way network and parking
• ensuring the delivery of school transport, and supporting sustainable travel including public bus services and School Crossing Patrollers
• managing Country Parks
• leisure facilities, museums, theatres and libraries, as well as developing our Cultural Strategy
• licensing, cemeteries and crematoria

The customer is central to how we develop and deliver all of these services, which help promote our rich and vibrant culture and special environment. 

We are looking for enthusiastic, ambitious and committed individuals to join our team and help us to continue to make Buckinghamshire a great place to live, work and visit. This is an exciting time for us as we bring together the services previously run by five separate councils before Buckinghamshire Council was created. Whilst making major changes to contracts affecting residents across Bucks, we continue to focus on delivering great customer service. You will join us on our journey of continuous improvement - whether that’s through developing strategies and ways of working or delivering services on the ground, every person in Communities is a valued member of the team.

We recognise and reward you

Hard work and success deserves recognition. That’s why we pride ourselves on the benefits we give our people. We actively encourage a good work-life balance and promote flexible and agile working arrangements. We provide discounts on various Cafés, restaurants, shops and auto enrolment onto our generous Pension Scheme. In addition to the opportunity to gain membership to Costco, we have discounted gym memberships, travel discounts with Arriva and much more.

https://jobs.buckinghamshire.gov.uk/working-buckinghamshire-council/