I started my career in Civil Service when I was 20. In my earlier days I worked in Department for Work and Pensions (previously the Department for Health and Social Security) in various different roles from Finance Officer managing and looking after the stock of giro cheques, I then moved onto different roles from assessing Income Support payments to giving out Social Fund grants and loans. I then moved into more corporate roles, providing support to HR Director, then moving onto Internal Security Investigations and then onto providing training for staff. When we became Jobcentre Plus, I started supporting customers back into employment as Personal Adviser. I was then temporarily promoted to HEO to manage the Jobcentre front line team. I had very young children, I did not consider promotion/progression until much later, however, I did not stay in one role for very long, I always found the opportunity to move into different roles within my grade which helped me develop in various different roles and skills. Once I felt I was ready to progress to the next grade, I got myself a mentor and explored all the different opportunities that were available. I found that I had so much to offer and there was so much out there that I could do to progress in my career but make a difference to the way we work and how we influence the policies and services we provide. I got promoted to HEO and moved to HMRC from DWP and recently SEO in HMRC. I have always loved every job I have done within the Civil Service, there are so many opportunities to move around in the same grade or on promotion. There is also so much opportunity to learn and gain lots of knowledge and qualifications whilst in work.

I work on the Borders and Trade Customer and Strategy area; my team is responsible for overseeing all the changes to systems that are being implemented to support the movement of goods and people at the UK borders following our exit from the EU. I work closely with Project Managers, Policy and IT specialist and various other internal and external partners to understand the different systems and changes being implemented at our borders and track the implementation of these. My role is to understand any impacts these deliveries would have on our customers and other users of the services, whether there are any dependencies and how they would mitigate any issues that may arise. I gather this intel from various sources and provide an oversight to my senior leaders so that they understand what is happening and whether we are on track with our EU exit agenda to deliver within the timescales we have set with our EU counterparts.

I have a vital role in ensuring that the changes happening to our borders are well thought out and meets the requirements and expectations agreed with the EU when we exited. It gives me a very good insight of the different changes happening at our borders, how it will work, who it will affect and any issues that might arise. I am working with professionals within the HMRC and externally which I find very interesting as I am learning new ways of working at the same time as meeting the UK governments objectives for our borders.

I really believe that if you work hard and give your very best in your career path then you will succeed in the role you want to get to. I took every opportunity in my career to develop my skills and learn new skills which helped me to progress in my career.

I had the opportunity to work on the cross-government Border Delivery team in the early stages of when the UK left the EU. I planned the Industry Day events with EU stakeholders to give them information on the changes that would happen as a result of the UK leaving the EU in case of a no deal scenario as at that time negotiations were still ongoing between UK and EU. I worked with our policy colleagues to understand the changes and responded to questions from our EU stakeholders on the various different things that they were concerned about. I found this role very exciting and felt part of the future chages that were being considered for our country.