Service Designer

Service Designer (Contract)

Brio Partners

Sector: Local Government

Programme: Customer Transformation Programme

Location: Hybrid (on-site days TBC)

Rate: £500 per day, Inside IR35

Start: 2 November 2026

Duration: Until 2 April 2027 (approx. 105 days), potential for extension

Working pattern: 5 days per week

About the programme

Our client is delivering a multi-year, council-wide Customer Transformation Programme to improve how residents, businesses, elected members and partner organisations access council services. The programme is introducing a unified customer front door and a more consistent experience across digital, telephone and face-to-face channels.

The focus is on customer outcomes rather than technology: service redesign, channel shift, reduced avoidable demand, simpler end-to-end journeys and a more joined-up operating model. You will join an established programme team to add specialist service design capacity across multiple workstreams and service areas.

The role

You will be embedded within the programme, working under the direction of the Head of Digital Service Design, alongside business analysts, service teams, subject matter experts and delivery partners. Assignments will vary through the contract as programme priorities evolve.

Key responsibilities

• Plan and facilitate discovery activity across customer-facing services.
• Design and run workshops with customers, stakeholders and service teams.
• Map end-to-end customer journeys and analyse needs, pain points and opportunities.
• Develop service blueprints and future-state service designs.
• Identify opportunities to simplify journeys and reduce failure demand.
• Support the design of customer-focused operating models.
• Work with subject matter experts to define service standards and design principles.
• Contribute to common service patterns that can be reused across multiple services.
• Ensure accessibility, inclusion and assisted digital needs are built into designs.
• Support testing and validation of proposed service designs.
• Help prioritise opportunities emerging from discovery.
• Produce governance papers, presentations and programme documentation, and engage senior stakeholders and service leadership teams.
• Coach and work alongside council staff to build internal service design capability.

Typical outputs

• Discovery findings reports and recommendations
• Customer journey maps and service blueprints
• User needs and service requirements documentation
• Stakeholder maps
• Operating model artefacts
• Workshop outputs
• Reusable templates, approaches and standards

Essential experience

• Service design within large, complex organisations.
• Public sector or local government transformation programmes.
• Customer journey mapping and service blueprinting.
• Workshop design and facilitation with varied audiences, including senior stakeholders.
• User-centred design methods.
• Operating model and service redesign.
• Accessibility and inclusion within service design.
• Working independently and within multidisciplinary teams.

Desirable experience

• Multi-channel customer service transformation (digital, telephone, face-to-face).
• Working to the GDS Service Standard or similar design frameworks.
• Benefits identification and realisation.
• Working within programme governance (design authority, steering groups, programme boards).

Working arrangements

• Hybrid, with attendance at client offices for workshops and stakeholder sessions (frequency TBC).
• Agile ways of working: stand-ups, show and tells, peer reviews and weekly progress reporting.
• Contractor expected to use their own equipment in the first instance.
• Completion of the client's Information Governance training required before start.

Next steps

To apply or discuss further, please send an up-to-date CV and availability to the Brio Partners team.