Digital service lead – Discover Creative Careers

Deadline for applications: Monday 21 September 2026, 5pm BST
6-month fixed-term contract: October 2026 – March 2027
Full-time
Salary: £50,000 per annum, pro rata
Reports to: CEO, Creative Access
First interviews: Likely to be held 24/25/28/29 September

Some UK travel may be required. Hybrid/flexible working.

This initial fixed term contract covers a defined and critical phase of the DCC digital service, taking the programme through Year 1 discovery, service design, content development and testing, and towards procurement and mobilisation of the permanent service.

There may be an opportunity to extend the role into Years 2 and 3 of the programme, subject to programme requirements, funding and the future digital operating model.

About Creative Access

Creative Access is the leading organisation working to create equity, diversity and inclusion in the UK creative industries. We provide career-long access, opportunities, support and training to make the creative industries better reflect society. Our mission is to break down the barriers faced by those from historically under-represented groups to accessing and building careers. 

About Discover Creative Careers

Creative Access is a delivery partner of Discover Creative Careers (DCC), a major three-year UK-wide programme funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and delivered by a consortium comprising Futures for All, Creative Access and Creative UK (the creative careers collective).

DCC aims to inspire and support young people aged 11–24 to discover the breadth of careers available across the creative industries and take meaningful next steps towards them, with a particular focus on reaching young people from under-represented backgrounds and under-served parts of the UK.

Creative Access leads the programme's digital service, alongside delivery of a significant programme of employability, access and career-development activity.

About the DCC Digital Service

The digital service is intended to become the connective tissue across Discover Creative Careers: helping young people and those who support them to explore creative careers, understand pathways, discover relevant content and opportunities, and move from inspiration towards tangible next steps.

Creative Access is taking a phased approach to developing the digital service. An interim DCC platform launched during the programme's initial mobilisation phase in 2026. Following detailed Phase 2 scoping, we are now developing the longer-term service.

Rather than moving immediately into a major permanent technology build, Year 1 will be used to strengthen and learn from the interim service while undertaking deeper discovery, user research, co-design and service design. In parallel, we will develop and test priority content, user journeys and functionality, including through Discover Creative Careers Month in November 2026.

The evidence generated through this work will inform the specification and procurement of the permanent digital service, with the principal build moving into Year 2.

This means we are looking for someone who can think beyond a website: understanding how content, platforms, technology, social channels, data, opportunities, partners and offline activity combine to create an effective end-to-end service for young people.

The Role

This is a high-impact digital leadership role responsible for taking DCC through the next critical stage of its development.

Over the initial six-month contract, the Digital Service Lead will take the service through:

• Year 1 discovery, user research and service design;
• development and testing of priority user journeys and service propositions;
• Discover Creative Careers Month and other opportunities to test and learn;
• commissioning and evaluation of priority digital content;
• development of the digital product/service roadmap;
• definition of technical, data, content and service requirements;
• preparation and delivery of procurement for the permanent digital service; and
• mobilisation and transition towards Year 2 delivery.

You will be the client-side lead for the digital service, translating an ambitious strategy into a prioritised, evidence-led delivery programme and bringing together specialist expertise as required.

We do not expect you personally to be a user researcher, developer, content producer, technical architect and procurement specialist.

We do expect you to understand how these disciplines fit together, know when specialist expertise is required, commission it effectively and integrate the resulting work into a coherent service.

Key Responsibilities

1. Digital service and product leadership

• Own the development of the DCC digital service and Year 1 digital roadmap.
• Translate the agreed digital strategy into a clear, prioritised delivery programme.
• Maintain oversight across discovery, the interim platform, content, Discover Month digital activity and preparation for the permanent service.
• Develop a clear product and service roadmap, identifying what should be built, bought, integrated, commissioned or delivered through partnerships based on user need, evidence, value for money and long-term sustainability.
• Manage dependencies, risks, priorities, budgets and resources across digital workstreams.
• Provide clear recommendations and decision points to Creative Access, consortium partners and DCMS.
• Ensure the digital service develops as an integrated part of the wider DCC programme rather than as a standalone website.

2. Discovery and service design

• Lead the planning and delivery of a robust discovery and service-design process, turning strategic objectives and existing evidence into clear discovery questions, hypotheses and research priorities.
• Develop and maintain a comprehensive discovery plan covering audiences, methods, activities, responsibilities, outputs and decision points.
• Ensure meaningful research and co-design with young people and the service's wider audiences, including parents/carers, teachers, careers professionals, employers and other influencers.
• Lead or oversee user research, co-design, journey mapping, service mapping and concept development.
• Bring in specialist user research and service-design capability where required.
• Synthesise quantitative and qualitative evidence into clear user needs, service requirements and recommendations.
• Establish an auditable evidence and decision trail through discovery and design.
• Translate discovery into a sufficiently defined service proposition and requirements for procurement.

3. User-centred digital development

• Champion user need throughout service and investment decisions.
• Develop and test end-to-end user journeys across the wider DCC ecosystem, including web, social, content, opportunities, events and partner activity.
• Ensure accessibility, inclusion and safeguarding are fully considered and embedded throughout the service design.
• Work with technical specialists to explore requirements including platform architecture, data, CRM/integration, analytics, search, personalisation and content management.
• Ensure recommendations are proportionate, feasible, scalable and sustainable.
• Challenge assumptions about the appropriate technology or channel and ensure solutions follow evidence and user need rather than the other way around.

4. Content strategy and commissioning

• Oversee delivery and further development of the agreed DCC content strategy as part of the wider digital service.
• Ensure content priorities respond to user need, programme objectives and emerging discovery evidence.
• Oversee the legacy content audit and subsequent curation, migration and commissioning priorities.
• Develop an evidence-led approach to the balance between evergreen service content, campaign/reactive content and social-first content.
• Work with content specialists, young people and consortium partners to ensure quality, accessibility, representation and consistency.
• Oversee external content commissioning and ensure new content complements rather than unnecessarily duplicates existing provision.
• Use Discover Month and other programme activity to test formats, channels and propositions and generate evidence for future content development.
• Work closely with Creative Access's communications and delivery teams team and consortium teams to connect service content, audience development and campaign activity.

5. Measurement, testing and continuous improvement

• Define appropriate success measures for the digital service and its priority user journeys.
• Establish an effective approach to analytics, testing, learning and continuous improvement.
• Use quantitative and qualitative evidence to understand how users discover, navigate and engage with the service and where journeys break down.
• Build opportunities for experimentation and iteration into Year 1 delivery.
• Ensure learning from Discover Month, commissioned content, user research and platform activity informs the Year 2 service.
• Develop an approach to measurement that supports both programme accountability and practical product/service decision-making.

6. Stakeholder, governance and working-group leadership

• Lead digital engagement across Creative Access, Futures for All, Creative UK and DCMS.
• Establish and coordinate agreed digital working groups and specialist contributors.
• Create clear and proportionate routes for audience, programme and specialist input into service design to become consensus-led.
• Maintain clear ownership, roles and responsibilities across digital delivery.
• Prepare evidence, options and recommendations for formal decision points/meetings.
• Communicate complex digital and service-design decisions clearly to non-specialist colleagues and senior stakeholders.
• Identify and actively manage dependencies between digital delivery and other DCC workstreams.

7. Procurement and transition to delivery

• Translate discovery and design outputs into clear requirements for procurement.
• Work with technical, procurement and other specialists to develop a comprehensive procurement brief for the permanent service.
• Lead or support options appraisal and supplier selection.
• Ensure requirements encompass user experience, content, technology, accessibility, inclusivity, data, analytics, governance, integration and ongoing operation.
• Protect continuity between discovery, procurement and subsequent build.
• Support mobilisation and handover to appointed delivery partners.
• Help establish an operating model that enables the service to evolve and improve beyond the initial build.

Person Specification

We are interested in people who combine digital product/service thinking with strong practical delivery capability.

You do not need to have personally delivered every specialist discipline listed in this job description.

You will, however, need sufficient experience and judgement to identify what expertise is required, commission and coordinate specialists effectively, challenge appropriately and integrate their work into a coherent digital service.

Essential experience

• Significant experience leading the development of user-centred digital services or products, ideally from early discovery through design and delivery.
• Experience overseeing digital content strategy, commissioning or editorial delivery.
• Experience designing or overseeing user research and co-design involving multiple audience groups.
• Strong ability to synthesise research, programme evidence and stakeholder requirements into clear user needs, priorities and recommendations.
• Experience translating strategy, concepts and user journeys into a prioritised product/service roadmap.
• Experience leading complex digital work across multiple organisations, stakeholders and channels.
• Strong understanding of the relationship between UX, content, technology, data and operations.
• Experience managing specialist suppliers and multidisciplinary teams.
• Strong programme leadership skills, including managing priorities, dependencies, risk, budgets and decision-making.
• Experience using evidence, analytics or testing to inform digital product/service decisions.
• Ability to communicate complex digital concepts clearly to senior non-technical stakeholders.
• Strong understanding of accessibility, inclusive design and user-centred practice.

Desirable experience

• Experience working with content-rich digital services and multi-channel audience journeys.
• Experience with GOV.UK Service Standard, public-sector discovery and/or agile service development.
• Experience developing requirements for digital procurement and/or supplier selection.
• Experience of young people, careers, education, employability or the creative industries.
• Experience designing services for underserved and under-represented audiences.
• Understanding of safeguarding considerations when developing digital services for young people.
• Experience working within a consortium, partnership or other complex multi-stakeholder environment.

Personal Qualities

• Curious, evidence-led and relentlessly user-focused.
• Strategic, but highly practical and delivery-oriented.
• Comfortable working with ambiguity and turning it into structure and momentum.
• Confident enough to challenge assumptions while remaining collaborative and pragmatic.
• Organised and calm under pressure.
• Able to work effectively across organisational boundaries and build trust quickly.
• Strong instinct for audiences, content, storytelling and engagement.
• Commercially and financially aware, with a strong value-for-money mindset.
• Passionate about inclusivity, accessibility and widening access to creative careers.

Please submit your CV and a covering letter (maximum two sides of A4) explaining your interest in the role and addressing the following:

• Relevant experience: Tell us about your experience of leading or shaping a digital service, product or platform, particularly where you have taken work from discovery and user insight through to requirements, design and/or delivery.
• User-centred approach: Give an example of how you have used audience insight, research or co-design to shape a digital product or service. We are particularly interested in how you translate insight into practical decisions.
• Delivery and collaboration: Describe your experience of bringing together different stakeholders, specialists and suppliers to deliver a complex digital project, including any experience of procurement or commissioning external partners.
• Why this role: What interests you about the opportunity to shape the Discover Creative Careers digital service, and what would you bring to its next phase?

To apply

• Log in to your Creative Access account or register today to apply for this opportunity
• Upload your CV and cover letter as one document (applications without a tailored cover letter will not be accepted)
• Once submitted, you can no longer amend your application, so proof-read carefully
• Please email any queries about this role to Mel Rodrigues, CEO at Creative Access via mel@creativeaccess.org.uk

We welcome and encourage applications from candidates who are under-represented in the creative industries. This includes, but is not limited to, individuals who identify as Black, Asian, or from other ethnically diverse backgrounds, or people of any ethnicity who belong to the following under-represented groups: disabled people, people with the characteristic of gender reassignment, individuals from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, carers and asylum seekers.