Emily Goodyear

Since leaving Sixth Form, I have pursued a career in Central Government, working to support major political changes and events such as Brexit and the Coronavirus pandemic. I hadn’t been particularly interested in politics until I started studying for my A Level in Government and Politics in 2010, and I can’t even remember why I chose the subject, but I found it fascinating, and quickly decided that I wanted to pursue working in a political environment. At the time, the Conservative/ Lib Dem coalition had just been elected and I remember Mrs Dickinson telling us this was one of the most extraordinary periods in political history, none of us saw the next decade coming!

I decided to study Law and French at the University of Bristol, I had wanted to understand more about the law and politics, and how they interact, and after some research I knew the course at Bristol would give me the opportunity to pursue this, and having loved studying French in sixth form, I decided to continue this study for as long as possible, in fact I think most of our French A Level class went on to study the language at University, the trip to Paris must’ve had quite the impression on us.

Both in Sixth Form, and at University, I had heard about the Civil Service Fast Stream and thought it would be a good opportunity to get into a career in Central Government, and so I applied, and was very lucky to be successful. I have anchored my career in the Human Resources profession, and my first role in the Civil Service was in the Department for Work and Pensions in Sheffield, working with disabled staff in the department, supporting them to get the help they needed in order to support those in society who most need help. My main focus was on procuring a new contract for the provision of British Sign Language support, so that staff with hearing impairments could not only do their job to the best of their ability, but also communicate and work closely with their teams.

My second role on the Fast Stream was supporting the HMRC Communications profession in London to communicate Brexit legislative changes, tax policy and complicated court judgements to the British public. I worked closely with the Director of Communications to make sure she had the right people, doing the right jobs, at the right time. In this role, I learnt a huge amount about how the Government works, working closely with Press Officers, the HMRC Executive Committee and Finance professionals to deliver the Communications profession HMRC needed to communicate with millions of people.

I graduated from the Fast Stream and moved into a role as the Head of Employee Relations and Performance Management at the Ministry of Defence. I had only been in this role for a few months when we started responding to the Coronavirus pandemic, and I was in charge of the Human Resources response to Coronavirus since March. This involved working closely with the Cabinet Office and Number 10, other Government departments and the Military to produce clear and timely guidance for the over 250,000 individuals we employ across the Civilian, Military and overseas workforce. It’s been an incredibly stressful role, but I have learnt an incredible amount.

My time at Wirral was incredible, and helped me prepare for a career in Government so well, I was always reluctant to do any sort of public speaking (despite being a very chatty person) if I could help it, but my teachers at Wirral supported me to push myself and try this more and more, which meant that by the time I got to University and was debating Law in my seminars, I felt I could articulate my points well without panicking, which has also been crucial in my career. Going straight from school to university to a high degree of responsibility in my career was certainly challenging, but the confidence and self-belief I gained from my time at Wirral has helped me incredibly, and I still think of the advice my teachers gave me now.