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The planning system is one of the most important layers of everyday democracy. It shapes our homes, our neighbourhoods, our environment and therefore our lives. Yet the planning system we have today is famous for being slow, opaque, bureaucratic and inaccessible, especially to those who don’t have a lot of money or time.

We are working with a growing group of councils and the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) as part of the Open Digital Planning initiative (ODP) to build a planning system fit for the 21st century. To do this, we are building Plan✕, an open source, low-code platform that allows planning authorities to collaboratively build and deploy simple, accessible planning services that use ‘rules-as-code’ to bake knowledge such as legislation, policies and guidance into the services themselves, making the planning process simpler and more transparent for everyone.

As we move into the next phase of the project, preparing the product to scale from an initial group of pioneering councils to widespread adoption across England, we are looking for a capable Adoption Lead who is as motivated as we are to succeed: to transform the way the state works, making it more effective, more trusted, and simpler for citizens to engage with.

The Adoption Lead will be promoting and facilitating the adoption of PlanX among Local Planning Authorities (LPAs). Their main responsibilities include:

• Actively go out and promote PlanX to new LPAs and beyond, by organising and facilitating introduction sessions.
• Make occasional visits to Open Digital Planning events and council offices across the UK.
• Be a first point of contact for new councils and other organisations looking to adopt PlanX.
• Work with LPAs willing to adopt PlanX to map their pain points, needs and challenges, and help them create a plan for PlanX adoption.
• Help councils understand and go through the onboarding process, like a concierge, liaising with different teams within the council, Open System Lab (OSL) and Open Digital Planning (ODP).
• Organise periodical check-ins with councils currently using PlanX.
• Gather evidence and help councils with measuring and communicating impact.
• Feedback their understanding of needs and blockers to the team to suggest ways we can improve the product, processes or communications.
• Spotting and understanding barriers to adoption and working with councils and the product team to overcome them or explore alternatives and workarounds.
• Work closely with MHCLG, Lambeth council and council representatives to understand, coordinate and communicate the adoption of PlanX alongside other parts the digital planning ecosystem.

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• Self-led and independent You need to be the sort of person who is able to see the big picture and how the pieces fit together, while working in conditions of uncertainty. You are able to identify problems, opportunities and risks and make decisions based on those, but also identify when decisions have wider implications, and therefore need to be made by or with others. We are looking for someone with very high levels of phronesis.

• A good listener and communicator You are to grow trust, empathetically listen to what people are telling you, read between the lines and understand where people are coming from. You can translate complexity into simple and understandable concepts. You have a track record of building and maintaining good relationships with clients and stakeholders.

• A good storyteller You can influence with authenticity and integrity, making customers feel supported, not sold to. You are able to convincingly design and deliver a presentation about PlanX and its benefits.

• A naturally organised person You are able to break high level goals down into more achievable milestones, formulate strategies, make plans and deliver on them - while also adapting your approach and showing flexibility when needed. You are process oriented and you can easily spot opportunities for setting up processes and iteratively improving them.

• Clear thinker You must be a natural lucid thinker, the person who can see the wood for the trees, even in an uncertain or confusing environment, and help others to do so. When you don’t know the answer to something, you need to have the confidence to say so, and to make judgements as to whether it is something that we need to know or not.

• Purpose driven Motivated by working on things that matter, and will have a meaningful impact on society, not just make a few rich people richer.

• Experience of delivering digital products especially within the domain of digital transformation involving large organisations, with all the complexities that come with managing multiple stakeholders, legacy technology and entrenched ways of working.

• Good understanding of SaaS models and the compliance requirements around them (security, data, commercial models, etc)

• Experience of working with local government Navigating barriers around IT, procurement, finance, legal teams etc.

• Experience navigating IT procurement with large organisations or public sector, especially local government

• Good general comprehension of applying legal agreements to specific scenarios and vice versa

• Experience of sales and account management, including using and optimising CRM softwares

• Some background understanding of planning and Local Planning Authorities, their ways of working and the issues they face

• Ridiculously flexible working. Work where you want and when you want (most of the time at least).

• Work in a liberating organisational structure that focuses hard on giving you freedom to do your best work.

• Work with a small, but incredibly smart, motivated and friendly team of people working together to solve difficult problems in a high-expectations, but always kind and inclusive environment.  

• Be part of a transformative public digital project, with potential to have a huge, positive impact on improving the planning system, our environment and how government works.