Bowel Screening Pathway Implementation Lead
Job summary
Join NHS England's National Vaccination and Screening Directorate and play a pivotal role in shaping the future of bowel cancer screening across England. This is an exciting opportunity to lead complex transformation programmes that improve patient outcomes, strengthen services and support earlier diagnosis of cancer.
You will oversee a portfolio of interdependent projects and business change activities, driving the successful delivery of strategic priorities across the Bowel Cancer Screening Programme. Working at a national level, you will bring together colleagues from across the NHS, government bodies, digital partners, clinical teams and external organisations to implement change that makes a real difference to millions of people.
You will be a skilled programme leader with strong stakeholder management, governance and delivery expertise. You will be comfortable operating in a complex environment, balancing strategic thinking with practical implementation, and able to build effective relationships across organisational boundaries.
This role offers the opportunity to influence national policy implementation, support digital transformation, improve workforce capability and help reduce health inequalities through one of the NHS's most important prevention and early diagnosis programmes. If you are passionate about delivering meaningful change at scale and want to contribute to improving population health, we would love to hear from you.
Main duties of the job
The Screening Pathway Implementation Lead will play a key role in delivering transformation and service improvement across the NHS Bowel Cancer Screening Programme. Working within NHS England's National Vaccination and Screening Directorate, the postholder will lead projects and business change initiatives that support delivery of national screening priorities.
Key responsibilities include:
- Leading transformation projects across the Bowel Cancer Screening Programme, ensuring successful implementation, business readiness and delivery of benefits.
- Driving the programme's digital transformation agenda and monitoring progress against agreed milestones and objectives.
- Working with national, regional and local stakeholders to implement improvements across the screening pathway.
- Ensuring programme developments, changes and key messages are communicated effectively to services and stakeholders.
- Supporting delivery of the bowel cancer screening data strategy, including oversight of programme metrics, reporting and performance monitoring.
- Chairing and supporting operational working groups, task and finish groups and other forums as required.
- Providing governance, assurance and programme management oversight, including management of risks, issues, dependencies and reporting.
- Building productive relationships with internal and external partners to support successful delivery across the programme portfolio.
About us
NHS England has a wide range of statutory functions, responsibilities and regulatory powers. These are focused on supporting the wider NHS to deliver high quality care, as well as doing those things that are best done once for the whole NHS.
Our staff bring expertise across clinical, operational, commissioning, technology, data science, cyber security, software engineering, education, and commercial specialisms -- enabling us to design and deliver high-quality NHS services.
In March 2025, the Government announced that NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care will increasingly merge functions, ultimately leading to NHS England being fully integrated into the department.
If you currently work within the NHS and if successful at interview, we will initiate an Inter Authority Transfer (IAT) via the Electronic Staff Record (ESR).This retrieves key data from your current or previous NHS employer to support onboarding, including competency status, Continuous Service Dates (CSD), and annual leave entitlement. You may opt out at any stage of the process.
Colleagues with a contractual office base are expected to spend, on average, at least 40% of their time working in our offices.
Staff recruited from outside the NHS will usually be appointed at the bottom of the pay band.
We cannot offer visa sponsorship for any vacancies.
Job description
Job responsibilities
The Screening Pathway Implementation Lead is a key leadership role within NHS England's National Vaccination and Screening Directorate, responsible for delivering complex transformation programmes and service improvements across the Bowel Cancer Screening Programme. The postholder will lead a portfolio of projects and business change initiatives, working closely with national, regional and local stakeholders to ensure successful implementation, effective governance and the realisation of programme benefits.
The role requires strong programme management, stakeholder engagement and change delivery skills, alongside the ability to influence across organisational boundaries and operate within a complex national environment.
For full details of the role, responsibilities, knowledge, skills and experience required, please refer to the attached Job Description and Person Specification.
Person Specification
Education / Training / Qualifications
- Educated to Masters level in a relevant area of academic practice or equivalent experience working at a commensurate band / level. To have one or more of the below programme /project management qualifications or equivalent level of experience: Managing Successful Programmes Practitioner, Managing Successful Programmes Advanced Practitioner, P3O Practitioner APM Registered Project Professional. Major Projects Leadership Academy.
Knowledge and Experience
- Extensive experience of leading change projects and wider programmes of work.
- Proven experience of managing programmes and delivering them within agreed timescales and budgets.
- Experience of delivering complex programmes.
- Must understand the background to and aims of current healthcare policy and appreciate the implications of this.
- Must understand the relationship between the Department of Health and individual provider and commissioning organisations.
- Experience of interpreting national policy and implementing this through programmes of work.
- Previous experience of managing budgets for complex programmes of work, including budget setting and monitoring
- Experience of researching best practice and developing solutions that can achieve optimal outcomes for all stakeholders.
Skills / Abilities
- Ability to provide and receive highly complex, sensitive and contentious information where there may be significant challenge.
- Takes decisions on difficult and contentious issues where there may be a number of courses of action.
- Ability to draw complex qualitative and quantitative information from a range of sources and present it in a clear and concise way.
- Ability to negotiate on difficult and contentious issues including performance and change
Employer details
Employer name
NHS England
Address
Wellington House
London
SE1 8UG
United Kingdom
Employer's website
https://www.england.nhs.uk/about/working-for/