Lead User Researcher

We’re looking for an exceptional Lead User Researcher to help us make a difference to our planet.

As our Lead User Researcher, the job may be suitable for hybrid working, which is where an employee works part of the week in the office and part of the week from home. This is a voluntary, non-contractual arrangement and the location advertised will be your contractual place of work.

Our opportunity is full time, 37 hours per week, but we would also consider applicants wishing to work a minimum of 30 hours per week. Our people are at the heart of what we do and we'll do our best to agree a working pattern that works for everyone.

World changing work

From science to technology, from meteorology to management, and from planning to communication, our expertise helps us stand out as the authority on weather accuracy and climate prediction. We help individuals, industries and government to make better decisions to stay safe and thrive. This is the Met Office. This is who we are.

• We’re a force for good - focusing on our environmental and social impact
• We’re experts by nature - always learning and developing to do things better
• We live and breathe it - putting our purpose at the heart of decision-making
• We’re better together - understanding partnerships and inclusivity make us greater
• We keep evolving - pushing boundaries to make tomorrow better for our customers

Your world of expertise

As our Lead User Researcher, you are an expert practitioner who leads and aligns user research activities across the Met Office. You will ensure teams take a user-centred, evidence-based approach to creating and evolving our services. You will be a leader in our user-centred design team and oversee user researcher practitioners to develop and assure good user research practice and promote a user-focused culture.

Your key duties:

• Ensure delivery teams take a user-centred, evidence-based approach aligned with the Government Service Standards to meet organisational outcomes.
• Facilitate and assure high-quality user research practices across the Met Office by offering teams expert guidance and support in implementing a wide range of user research methodologies and advanced analysis and synthesis techniques.
• Provide consultation to product managers, delivery managers, programme managers and stakeholders on user-centred design resourcing to deliver services and achieve outcomes.
• Source and provide sustainable user-centred design resource across the Met Office.
• Oversee the recruitment and management of user-centred design team members and support their career growth through structured mentoring and coaching.
• Advocate the value of user-centred design and user research across the Met Office to establish good practices aligned with the Government Service Manual and help inexperienced teams to adopt them.
• Improve the practice of inclusive, accessible and ethical research to effectively include all kinds of users in appropriate research activities.
• Advocate for agile working and adapt research practices to meet user needs efficiently.
• Lead user-centred design team initiatives to evolve the standard of user research at the Met Office.

Why join us

Our work is life-changing, often life-saving and always life-enhancing. The Met Office is Great Place to Work UK certified. We are also featured on their ‘Best Workplaces in Tech’ 2023 and 2024 lists, as well as their ‘54 Best Workplaces for Women’ 2023 list.

As our Lead User Researcher, your total reward package will be up to £79,657 annually, which includes:

• £54,515 base pay
• An outstanding Civil Service pension, with an average employer contribution of 28.97%
• Recruitment Retention Allowance (RRA) you will be paid £3,800 per annum as a market supplement to reflect the demand for your skills. Whilst in post, you will be paid this market driven allowance from April 2024 until March 2026 in your monthly pay
• Annual Leave starting at 27.5 days (plus Bank Holidays) rising to 32.5 days (plus Bank Holidays) after 5 years and option to buy or sell up to 5 days per year of annual leave

Essential Criteria, skills and experience:

1. User research methods - You are an expert by nature when it comes to helping organisations adopt an evidence-based approach. You can lead teams to adopt a wide range of user research methods and analysis and synthesis techniques, to generate clear and valuable findings. You provide guidance to teams to continually assure, improve and innovate their user research to meet organisational outcomes.
2. Strategic thinking - You live and breathe an evidence-based approach, helping teams to understand how user-centred design supports with achieving goals and you align work to the organisation’s strategy and objectives. You can synthesise findings from research programmes, producing strategic insights to inform service strategies.
3. Inclusive research - You demonstrate you are a force for good by setting and assuring inclusive user research standards for the organisation, including ethics and safeguarding. You can advocate inclusive practices and help teams design and deliver accessible services that work for all users.
4. Research leadership – You can sustainably resource and lead a team of user researchers to meet organisational goals. You can manage, coach and support teams to produce high-quality user research across the organisation. You can help inexperienced teams to adopt and embed user-centred practices.
5. Stakeholder relationship management - You demonstrate we are better together by working with stakeholders to ensure their objectives are user focused and aligned with organisational strategy, and support teams to meet them. You can influence and negotiate with senior stakeholders to resolve issues and enable progress.
6. Agile research practices - You help teams to keep evolving by advocating for agile working. You can advise teams on how to design and conduct research to respond to the complexity of the product environment and understand the strategic decisions the team needs to make so you can design appropriate research

How to apply

If you share our values, we’d love to hear from you! Click apply to begin your application. Please complete your career history and provide evidence against each of the essential criteria in the supporting statement questionnaire. We recommend candidates use the CARL method (Context, Action, Result and Learning) for presenting evidence of experience and skills.

Closing date 12/11/2025 at 23:59 with first stage interviews commencing from week commencing 24/11/2025. You will hear from us once the closing date has passed.

Using AI in your application

We welcome applications that use AI tools for support in drafting or refining, as long as they accurately reflect your own skills and experience. All hiring decisions at the Met Office are made by people, not AI. For more details, visit our approach to recruitment.

How we can help

If you have any questions or would like to discuss this opportunity further, please contact us at careers@metoffice.gov.uk.

If you’re considering applying and need support to do so, please get in touch. You can request adjustments either within your application or by contacting us. Should you be offered an interview, please be aware there may be a selection exercise which could include a presentation, written test or a scenario-based activity. You can select in your application to be considered under the Disability Confident Scheme. To be invited to interview/assessment under this scheme, your application must meet the essential criteria for the role.

We understand that great minds don’t always think alike and as an equal opportunities employer we welcome applications from those with all protected characteristics. We recruit on merit, fairness, and open competition in line with the Civil Service Code.

We can only accept applications from those eligible to live and work in the UK - please refer to GOV.UK for information. We require Security clearance, for which you need to have resided in the UK for at least 3 of the last 5 years to be eligible. You will need to achieve full security clearance within your first 6 months with us.