Industrial Placement – Counter Terrorism and Security Division

Location

Dstl Porton Down or Dstl Fort Halstead.

About the job

Summary

Studying for a STEM degree and looking for an exciting placement that’s also surprisingly different?

We are looking for students who want to develop their expertise while delivering high-impact research and scientific services to help protect the UK from current and future terrorist and security threats.

Working for the Ministry of Defence, the Home Office and other government departments, we support ground-breaking technical research and provide unique services to respond rapidly to operational demands and ensure that the UK retains an operational advantage.

We are responsible for ensuring the government has up-to-date skills and capabilities to understand and defeat terrorist threats. We provide the UK expertise in a spectrum of engineering and scientific fields and you’ll be working at the forefront of defence and security research and innovation, a dynamic and rapidly evolving environment.

Job description

Our roles give you the opportunities to:

• Work within a complementary team of specialists to deliver scientific, analytical and engineering solutions.
• Collaborate, nationally and internationally, on field trials and in laboratory testing, to support the delivery of scientific evidence.
• Develop broad networks across the world with external partners, academic institutes and government departments.
• Drive your career, with great opportunities to gain new skills and qualifications, work with field-leading experts and ensure your working life is never boring.

Your team
We will embed you into a diverse team of deep technical specialists from multidisciplinary backgrounds. You will work with other team members, project managers and students in delivering an array of projects.

Where you will be based
We are currently based at Porton Down, Salisbury: Fort Halstead, Sevenoaks.

Responsibilities

Experience
With some knowledge of the role of defence, security and policing when you begin, we’ll expect you to develop an understanding of the UK’s Armed Forces and Security community and their challenges.

Qualifications

You’ll need a good standard of mathematics, English and be working towards a degree (or equivalent) in:

• Chemistry
• Electronic or electrical engineering
• Systems engineering
• Communications engineering
• Software engineering
• Engineering mathematics
• Mechanical engineering
• Computer science
• Physics
• Machine intelligence

Personal qualities

• Enjoys problem solving.
• Has a good attention to detail.
• Creative and innovative.
• Keen to put forward their own ideas.
• Great communication skills.
• Collaborates with others and works well in a team.
• Self motivation to learn new skills and develop.
• Comfortable working under their own initiative.
• Sees the bigger picture and can understand our customers needs.

Security clearance required

All Dstl posts require standard Security Clearance (SC). Candidates should have resided in the UK for the past five years.

Our work in defence, security and intelligence requires our employees to be British citizens who are able to gain a high level of security clearance to understand the work you will undertake to protect us from any security threats. For this reason, we regret that only UK Nationals will be able to apply for this role. If you are an international or dual-national candidate, and you think you have the skills we need, please consider applying to any of our government, security or defence partners across the enterprise. We work closely with the Defence and Security Industry on many projects, so it would be great to work with you via one of our partners

Behaviours

We’ll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Working together.
• Delivering at Pace.
• Communicating and influencing.
• Developing self and others.

Technical skills

We’ll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

• Please state your degree title and list the modules you are studying. Please also provide any results you have received for these modules.
• What technical area holds the most interest for you and why?.
• Please give an example of some technical/engineering/science work you have undertaken.

Benefits

We’ll provide a great range of benefits including:

• Fully flexible working, including alternative working patterns, annualised hours, compressed hours and job share, to name a few.
• Flexible working hours, a 12-month reference period and the ability to bank hours. Up to 20 hours can be taken in any calendar month.
• Excellent learning and development to ensure everyone fulfils their potential.
• Maternity, adoption or shared parental leave of up to 26 weeks full pay followed by 13 weeks statutory pay and a further 13 weeks unpaid, and paternity leave of two weeks full pay.
• Chartership and accreditation support.
• Pension.
• Generous annual leave, with the ability to buy and sell up to five days holiday per year.
• A competitive salary.
• Onsite gyms and restaurants.
• Staff discounts for high street and online shopping, restaurants and days out.

Our diversity networks

Dstl recognises the importance of diversity and inclusion as people from diverse backgrounds bring fresh ideas. We are committed to building an inclusive working environment in which each employee fulfils their potential and maximizes their contribution. We have a number of support networks to ensure all employees feel supported at work.
These include the following:

• Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Network
• Faith and Culture Network
• Parents and Carer Support Network
• Alternative Working Network
• Gender Equality Network
• New Starters Network
• Enabled Network, for people with visible and non-visible disabilities

For further information about Dstl please check out our LinkedIn page.

Things you need to know

Security

• Successful candidates must pass a disclosure and barring security check.
• Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check.
• People working with government assets must complete basic personnel security standard checks.

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles, and will assess your behaviours and technical skills.

We want you to have your best chance of success in our recruitment process, so If at any stage of the application process you would like help or assistance please contact the Dstl Recruitment Team dstlrecruitment@dstl.gov.uk and we will do all we can to support you.

We offer a guaranteed interview scheme for all disabled applicants who provide evidence in their application of meeting the minimum essential requirements of the post, set out in the job description. You will be asked to indicate if you are applying under this scheme when you submit your application.

As part of the selection for these positions you will need to successfully complete the Civil Service Numerical sift Test. This must be completed before you can finish your application so please don’t leave these until the last minute.

The sift will look at your answers to the questions in the application, focusing on your skills and experiences and how these match the requirements of the job description.

The next stage will be a formal interview, due to the current situation this is likely to be via a video link. More details of the interview will be provided in the invitation.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Nationality requirements

Open to UK nationals only.

This job is not open to candidates who hold a dual nationality.

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission’s recruitment principles.

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

Apply and further information

Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Recruitment team, e-mail dstlrecruitment@dstl.gov.uk.

Further information

Should you wish to raise a formal complaint about the Dstl recruitment process you should e-mail dstlrecruitment@dstl.gov.uk stating the nature of the issue. We will respond within five working days.

Reference number
77001

Salary
£17,176

Grade
Administrative Assistant
Dstl Level 1

Contract type
Temporary
Fixed term
Work experience
Internship

Length of employment
50 weeks

Business area
Dstl – Counter Terrorism & Security Division

Type of role
Engineering

Working pattern
Flexible working, full-time, job share, compressed hours

Number of posts
20

Expired