https://mhclgdigital.blog.gov.uk/how-we-work/
How we work
We work in autonomous, agile, multidisciplinary teams. Some of them focus on: funding service design, local digital collaboration, digital planning, Homes for Ukraine, elections, energy performance of buildings, and more.
There are approximately 250 of us working in digital, data and technology roles. We are spread across 20 locations in the UK, which makes us one of the most geographically dispersed government organisations.
Hybrid working gives each of us the flexibility to meet in the office or collaborate online wherever we are in the country.
Our culture
We have created an environment which encourages innovation, experimentation, continuous improvement and knowledge sharing. Our culture is about empowering everyone to be bold and innovate, learn and iterate fast.
Our teams have a high degree of trust to deliver what’s needed, and we ensure that we offer individuals a challenge and the opportunity to develop themselves and their skills.
“I love my role as a Product Manager for Access Funding in the Funding Service team. I get to work with a team of enthusiastic and highly skilled professionals, finding new ways to simplify funding and generate better outcomes for communities.
I feel so lucky that I get to be creative in this role and empowered to try out new ideas. I genuinely look forward to seeing the impact our work has on the people who use our services, knowing that when we solve a problem, it can have a huge impact on so many people’s lives.”
Jo, Senior Product Manager
Our principles and our vision
Everyone in government is focused on outcomes. Whether these are wrapped up in policies or programmes, the underlying driver is about meeting citizens’ needs through good services.
In MHCLG we emphasise that digital is more than digitising things or adopting new tools – it’s a critical partner in shaping responsive, innovative and efficient government. Digital is about working smarter, streamlining how we operate, making policies more responsive, and creating a culture of collaboration. Read more about our vision in this blog post.
Putting users at the heart of everything we do
We actively involve our users in the design process from the very beginning because we know it is the people who use our services that are best able to improve them.
We work collaboratively with policy colleagues to support the department to deliver policy that is fit for the digital age.
Better data
At MHCLG, we are passionate about using data innovatively and exploring new data tools and technology to help shape and monitor policy outcomes.
We aim to be a fully data-enabled organisation and ensure our department can harness the power of data to make better decisions, improve service delivery and enhance user experience.
Find out more about the work we do in data.
Our tech stack
We have a mix of technology platforms across MHCLG. Since 2017 we’ve been cloud first, we don’t have on-premises services and legacy tech to worry about.
We use MS365, Zscaler for zero trust networks, AWS, Terraform and Azure for cloud. We’re very keen on working in the open on Github. Teams use languages including Python, Ruby and Java. We are also exploring artificial intelligence (AI), including Large Language Models (LLMs).
Find out more about our tech stack in this post by one of our lead developers or visit our technology blog.