Assistant Director - Commercial


Company:	Government Recruitment Service
Salary:	£69,501 - £69,501
Hours:	Full-time
Location:	Southampton
Job type:	Permanent
Posting date:	17 Aug 2026
Closing date:	6 Sept 2026

Apply for this job

Summary

Can you lead MCA’s Commercial Strategy and Procurement Team delivering a high quality service for stakeholders?

Do you have experience delivering commercial strategies achieving value for money whilst mitigating risk?

Can you provide effective leadership acting with integrity, honesty and an inclusive mindset?

If so, we’d love to hear from you!

The Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) is seeking an Assistant Director of Commercial to join the Corporate Services. The Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) is an Executive Agency of the Department for Transport, providing multiple statutory functions as flag, port and coastal State and delivering international obligations for search and rescue, environmental protection and responding to major maritime incidents. The Procurement function is a key enabler for the Agency to ensure we can deliver against this remit.

As part of the Finance and Analysis directorate, the Procurement team is responsible for MCA’s Commercial Strategy and managing the procurement of goods and services for the Agency and ensuring that its c. £500m total budget is deployed in an efficient and value for money way.

Joining our department comes with many benefits, including:

Employer pension contribution of 28.97% of your salary. Read more about Civil Service Pensions here
25 days annual leave, increasing by 1 day each year of service (up to a maximum of 30 days annual leave), plus 8 bank holidays and a privilege day for the King’s birthday
Flexible working options where we encourage a great work-life balance.

Read more in the Benefits section below!

Find out more about what it's like working at: MCA Homepage | Civil Service Careers

As the Assistant Director - Commercial you will report to the Director of Finance and Analysis, providing strategic focus and oversight of MCA’s commercial activity, ensuring the robustness of commercial decision making and value for money is obtained.

As a key member of the Senior Management Team within the Finance and Analysis Directorate, you will provide effective and inspiring leadership to the Procurement team, fostering a high performing culture through continuous improvement.

Your responsibilities will include, but aren’t limited to:

Leading on MCA's Commercial Strategy, ensuring alignment with MCA objectives and financial plans, and the Government Commercial Function Strategy.

Leading MCA’s Procurement team and embedding a culture of continuous improvement and high performance to ensure the effectiveness of support and commercial advice.

Working closely with leads on MCA’s major projects and programmes, to ensure projects are developed and monitored with strong commercial focus.

Ensuring alignment with the Government Functional Standard for Commercial, including applicable guidance and playbooks.

Providing assurance to MCA’s Accounting Officer by ensuring compliance with procurement legislation.

Building and maintaining key relationships with senior stakeholders, in particular developing trust and rapport, to influence and challenge decision making.

Great line management is important to us as an organisation, and we will equip and support line managers to develop the skills they need. We aim to empower line managers to create teams where people can flourish and deliver excellent outcomes for the public.

For further information on the role, please read the role profile. Please note that the role profile is for information purposes only - whilst all elements are relevant to the role, they may not all be assessed during the recruitment process. This job advert will detail exactly what will be assessed during the recruitment process.

Apply for this job

Proud member of the Disability Confident employer scheme

About Disability Confident

Disability Confident is a government scheme. It encourages employers to recruit and retain disabled people and those with long term health conditions.