DWP Jobs & Careers Service – Find a Job Replacement (employers) beta
DWP's Jobs & Careers Service – Find a Job Replacement (employers) beta service assessment report
Jobs & Careers Service – Find a Job Replacement (employers)
| Assessment date | 05/05/2026 |
| Assessment stage | Beta |
| Assessment type | Assessment |
| Service provider | Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) |
| Result | Amber |
Service description
This service aims to solve the problem of employers needing to advertise their vacanciesfor free (at the point of use) in a way which gives them and potential applicants confidence around security and trustworthiness.
Employers can register, get verified, then add job adverts manually or via a ‘bulk upload’ function. They can then manage their job adverts, register for the government’s Disability Confident Scheme (a set of commitments around recruiting and employing disabled people) and ask for support from DWP employer advisers. The service provides continuity of service as a replacement for the existing Find a Job which is approaching the end of its commercial contract.
Service users
This service is for:
● large national employers that typically have more of a compliance driven recruitment need and may use the current Find a Job service advertising mostly via the ‘bulk upload’ function
● small and medium employers (SMEs) that are typically open to semi-skilled or trainable candidates. Some of these companies come from struggling sectors, have no human resources team, poor knowledge of recruitment and lack retention expertise. They are seeking free access to a jobs board as they struggle to compete on paid platforms and benefit from government ‘trust signal’. This is the cohort we identify with the greatest need
● DWP employer advisors in local areas / jobcentres and agents on the Strategic Relationship Team (SRT) who provide employment focused support to employers
Note that the jobseeker-facing elements of this service will be assessed separately alongside the other citizen-facing aspects of the wider Jobs & Careers Service.
Things the service team has done well:
● the team has used an appropriate mix of methods to segment and understand the needs of a very large and diverse population
● the team demonstrated how the digital service is solving key problems for users, including the sign-up journey and bulk upload of vacancies, with core user journeys that are informed by research, including with Jobcentre Plus employment advisors and SRT agents
● the team has used established DWP and GOV.UK design system components and demonstrated that they have taken on board feedback both from the accessibility audit and from testing with users with accessibility needs
1. Understand users and their needs
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 2 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● moderated testing was conducted with people who have access needs, with good coverage of dyslexia and visual impairment. To achieve a green rating, this should be built upon with additional testing covering a much broader range of physical and psychological needs. The results of any accessibility audit should be used to inform the focus of any future research in this area
● the team has primarily focused on survey data and mostly unmoderated or remote testing to understand user needs, which makes sense with a population of this size. To achieve a green rating, this should be supplemented with more coverage of digitally excluded users (who might be less likely to engage with these types of research). The current design includes limited scope for people to move back and forth across digital and non-digital channels, so further research in this area will also help the team to understand how well this approach meets user needs
2. Solve a whole problem for users
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 2 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the panel didn’t see evidence of the digital service dependencies, including connecting services, showing how they relate to each other and help fulfil each other’s missions. This could support relevant collaboration aimed at delivering better outcomes to the public
● the panel didn’t see sufficient evidence around how design decisions and iterations aim to meet user needs; this could be in the form of relevant documentation such as a decision log which links designs to user insights or a list of validated assumptions with supporting evidence
3. Provide a joined-up experience across all channels
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 3 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the panel didn’t see enough evidence of the end-to-end journeys from the digital service through email, phone and in person assistance. This would help the team to see varied multi-channel routes and how they connect, then apply consistentinteraction patterns and language where appropriate. In effect, this would position the digital service as a part of the wider live service and enable the team to consider back office needs better. Additionally, it should help facilitate meaningful collaboration withconnecting teams and design for outcomes rather than outputs
● the panel didn’t see enough documentation of the feedback loops spanning digital and non-digital channels, e.g. moving back and forth between a website and a phone line, applying by phone and how an employer manages it. Introducing this would help the team to ensure no one is left behind and/or identify gaps. It would help confirm thatpeople can complete a task regardless of channel (or using multiple channels) andprompt the team to research the complex journeys with users placed at different levels of digital inclusion scale. It would also help to establish metrics to track performance in these less obvious scenarios
● the team should review and document the scripts/guidance used by the SRT agentswhen assisting employers to ensure the content design used in the digital service is consistent with them
4. Make the service simple to use
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 4 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the team should be able to clearly showcase the decisions made during iteration of the interaction patterns and journeys. It would be beneficial to document any new components or interaction patterns in the open, supporting the development of the design system and help others in the design community learn from team’s example
● whilst journeys were tested and iterated based on findings the panel didn’t see comprehensive mapping of user flows. It would be helpful for the team to document them, so that they can demonstrate their work in a clear way and use them to support future design decisions and ensure all scenarios are covered for diverse groups of users
5. Make sure everyone can use the service
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 5 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the panel didn’t see evidence of research across sufficiently diverse user groups, including neurodivergent people and those low on digital inclusion scale. This will help the team consider more complex user needs and further iterate on the current designs, making the service better for all
6. Have a multidisciplinary team
Decision
The service was rated green for point 6 of the Standard.
Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
● the team has the required roles and whilst the team size is large, steps are already being taken to address the challenges that a large team size could bring to coordination, siloing and pace of delivery. The delivery team has plans to work collaboratively with all team members to make further improvements. The panel encourages the team to start by defining the characteristics they wish to maintain as they restructure and seek to make changes within 3 months
7. Use agile ways of working
Decision
The service was rated green point 7 of the Standard.
8. Iterate and improve frequently
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 8 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the service has been unable to run a private beta because of commercial and timeline constraints. This means that a lot of critical learning is likely in the first few weeks of the necessitated sharp transition
● to exit amber, the service team would need to demonstrate in the first 3 months that it has made multiple iterations based on real user feedback of real job postings that have closed successfully
● the service team should draw the attention of senior Digital leaders in DWP on the risks being taken to ensure that leaders are comfortable with these, as they are ultimately accountable to Ministers and Parliament for the digital service
● the communications plan to employers described at the assessment appeared to be light, potentially very close to launch, and infrequent. The service should bolster the comms plans, ensuring expectations are effectively managed across all employer types and comms channels are fully open for rapid feedback and improvement on the back of feedback
9. Create a secure service which protects users’ privacy
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 9 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the team has embedded a set of sensible security controls appropriate to protecting users’ privacy against common threats. To increase the rating to green the team should conduct a structured analysis of potential threats particular to their service, using an appropriate threat model or ‘anti-personas’
10. Define what success looks like and publish performance data
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 10 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the team showed sound methodology on how they would measure mandatory KPIs and the current analytics on the existing service were provided. However, the data collection for the replacement service is not yet live and the panel weren’t shown evidence of this having been set up
● the team showed a good understanding of what their success metrics should look like, but how the data collected would be used to make tangible improvements to the service was not discussed
11. Choose the right tools and technology
Decision
The service was rated green for point 11 of the Standard.
Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
● the team has built the service around suitable cloud-native components; they could further improve by fully demonstrating their zero-downtime deployment capability and working towards an A/B testing capability
12. Make new source code open
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 12 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the service has not yet published any source code, and it has not been fully adhering to the guidance for coding in the open
● whilst the team indicated a clear intent to begin open-sourcing code, there isn’t a plan or timeline to get to all appropriate code related to this service published
● the team intends to begin by publishing parts of the code base they felt would be most valuable; this is a pragmatic way of breaking down the problem and they should aim to do that within three months of their beta assessment. It is difficult to predict what code others might find useful, so the aim must remain to publish all appropriate code ahead of their live assessment
● the team’s use of an internal source code management platform, and dependency on code written by other teams were noted as a challenges in relation to fully going fully open source; the longer addressing this is delayed, the more challenging it will become to fully meet the point 12 of the standard
13. Use and contribute to open standards, common components and patterns
Decision
The service was rated green for point 13 of the Standard.
Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
● the service has made appropriate use of common patterns and services. The service team should ensure any relevant lessons are shared with teams working on related problems (such as one login for business)
14. Operate a reliable service
Decision
The service was rated amber for point 14 of the Standard.
This is amber because:
● the service team has selected an architecture that should offer suitable scalability and resilience. Whilst the service is reliable on paper, limited access to data from the predecessor service and limited proving of the production system through a conventional private beta add some risk from unexpected system behaviours or patterns of use
Next Steps
This service can now move into a public beta phase, subject to addressing the amber points within [three months] time and GDS spend approval.