Portfolio Analyst

Job summary

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is the UK’s largest producer of official statistics, covering a range of key economic, social and demographic topics. These include measuring changes in the value of the UK economy, estimating the size, geographic distribution, and characteristics of the population, and providing indicators of price inflation, employment, earnings, crime, and migration.

This role directly supports the delivery of the Surveys and Economic Statistics Improvement Plan within the newly established Surveys and Economic Statistics (SES) Portfolio. Our Improvement Plan sets out our public commitment to improve the quality and trustworthiness of our statistics and the latest update can be found here.

Job description

A Portfolio Analyst supports delivery confidence across a portfolio of programmes and projects by providing clear, evidence-based insight into performance, risks, dependencies, resources, benefits, outcomes and strategic alignment. You will bring together information from multiple sources to help senior leaders understand whether the portfolio remains on track to deliver intended organisational outcomes, where confidence is reducing, and what decisions or interventions may be required.

In this role you will establish and maintain portfolio information by bringing together milestone reporting, performance measures, risks, dependencies, assumptions, benefits, financial information and resource data. This supports a transparent view of portfolio health,delivery predictability, emerging constraints, opportunities, strategic priorities and outcome traceability.

You will support effective governance by ensuring boards and senior decision makers have reliable, timely and proportionate information on delivery confidence, strategic alignment, risks, dependencies, affordability, benefits and organisational readiness.

Key Responsibilities

• Leads the development of portfolio confidence reporting, providing senior leaders with clear assessments of delivery predictability, emerging risks, systemic constraints, trade-offs and options for intervention. Challenges optimism bias and ensures reporting reflects evidence rather than activity alone.
• Leads portfolio governance, reporting and assurance support, setting standards for consistent assessment of performance, delivery confidence, risks, dependencies, resource pressures, affordability and benefits. Provides independent challenge and presents evidence-based recommendations, options and trade-offs at boards and senior forums.
• Provides visible leadership for portfolio analysis, governance and reporting. Sets direction for how portfolio data is gathered, interpreted and used, building trusted relationships with senior leaders, delivery teams and professional communities. Acts as a subject matter expert, presents insight at boards, coaches and mentors colleagues, and uses influence to drive best practice.
• Builds trusted working relationships with senior leaders, delivery teams and governance forums to support effective decision making. Uses evidence, insight and constructive challenge to influence prioritisation, escalation and intervention decisions.
• Provides portfolio-level analysis of complexity, uncertainty and dependencies, identifying systemic risks, competing priorities and delivery constraints. Supports senior leaders to understand trade-offs and adjust portfolio plans, sequencing or controls in response to emerging evidence.
• Provides strategic oversight of portfolio risks, assumptions, opportunities and dependencies. Uses evidence to identify emerging issues, delivery constraints and risks to objectives, supporting governance bodies with clear assessment of risk exposure, delivery confidence and organisational resilience.
• Leads portfolio pipeline analysis to support prioritisation, sequencing and investment decisions. Develops evidence-based views of demand, capacity, strategic fit, affordability and delivery confidence to inform portfolio choices.
• Leads portfolio-level analysis of outcomes, benefits and strategic value, ensuring senior leaders can understand whether delivery activity remains aligned to intended organisational objectives. Provides challenge where benefits, outcomes or assumptions are unclear, unsupported or misaligned.

Person specification

Essential criteria

• Significant experience of analysing complex portfolio, programme or organisational data from multiple sources to generate evidence-based insights, identifying trends, systemic risks, constraints, opportunities and emerging issues that inform senior decision-making.
• Demonstrable experience of supporting strategic decisions on areas such as investment, prioritisation, sequencing and trade-offs through evidence-based insight, constructive challenge, and the presentation of credible options, implications and recommendations.
• Strong capability in providing objective assessments of delivery confidence and predictability, integrating evidence on key performance indicators, milestones, risks, dependencies, assumptions, resources and finance to provide a clear view of delivery outlook and identify where intervention may be required.
• Experience of assessing progress towards strategic outcomes, benefits and expected value, using evidence to evaluate delivery performance, organisational impact and alignment with strategic objectives.
• Proven ability to understand the information needs of senior stakeholders, applying sound judgement to distinguish strategic issues from operational detail and focus attention on the decisions, risks, opportunities and trade-offs that matter most.
• Excellent communication and visualisation skills, with experience of using a range of analytical, visualisation and presentation tools to synthesise complex information into clear, compelling products that highlight key insights, implications and recommendations for senior stakeholders.

Qualifications

Desirable experience in one of the following qualifications:

- Managing Successful Programmes Practitioner
- Managing Portfolios Practitioner

Or any other similar qualification.

Behaviours

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

• Communicating and Influencing
• Making Effective Decisions
• Leadership
• Seeing the Big Picture

Technical skills

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

• Digital and Data - Expert Level - Project Delivery Profession Framework
• Assurance - Practitioner Level - Project Delivery Profession Framework

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £56,861, Office for National Statistics contributes £16,472 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

The Office for National Statistics is part of the Civil Service, and as such we share a number of key benefits with other departments, whilst also having our