Audio Specialist
Location:Central London
Contract Type:Permanent
Hours of Work:Full Time, office based. Home or remote working is not available for this role. Option for flexible working.
Salary:Starting from £50,215. Based on our assessment of skills and experience at interview, you may be eligible for the DDaT framework pay, potentially increasing your base salary up to £61,641.
Shift Work:Option to be part of the on-call rota once fully trained, approximately one week a month.
About Us
MI5 keeps the country safe from serious threats like terrorism and attempts by states to harm the UK, its people and way of life. We carry out investigations by obtaining, analysing and assessing intelligence, and then work with a range of partners, including MI6 and GCHQ to disrupt these threats. Through our protective security arm, we provide advice and guidance to government, businesses and other organisations about how to keep themselves safe. A role in MI5 means you’ll do unique and challenging work in a supportive and encouraging environment, making a real difference to UK national security.
The Role
Join our exciting team of Speech and Audio experts to provide highly specialised and complex analysis to help us keep ahead in an ever-evolving threat landscape and increasingly digital world. Use your specialist audio knowledge to answer some of our most mission critical and time sensitive questions, and team up with data scientists to develop and apply new and innovative machine learning capabilities to help us automate the detection of threats we face.
As an Audio Specialist you will apply your audio engineering expertise in a role that demands highly nuanced listening skills and a sound understanding of digital audio technology. You’ll ensure that the maximum value can be derived from audio and delivered to customers, through your technical assessment and specialist input. Your work will place you at the forefront of this fast-evolving field alongside academics, commercial experts and partners as you help develop techniques and capabilities to support the work of our Audio Analysts and key partners. You’ll have the opportunity to travel internationally to work with partners and attend conferences.
The key responsibilities of the role include fulfilling a wide range of operational requirements from across the business – working with customers by applying audio processing expertise to time sensitive casework. You’ll support the development of audio processing capabilities and tradecraft techniques in line with business requirements, working with partners both internally and externally to provide subject matter expertise and learning from industry best practice. You’ll also collaborate within a team of speech scientists, computational linguistics and data scientists to help the business solve some of its most complex audio problems
This role may involve exposure to offensive and distressing material, and we have wellbeing teams and support in place to help with this. However, please ensure you are happy to proceed on this basis before applying.
About You
You’ll have experience in sound engineering and production acquired through previous work specialising in sound and acoustics, and most likely a degree relating to audio engineering, acoustics or electronic engineering.
You’ll need to demonstrate that you have a high level of competency using a digital audio workstation and you’ll enjoy working closely with customers to creatively solve problems, share ideas and generate innovative solutions. You’ll know how to maintain a user focus to design solutions and explore ways to communicate highly complex subjects to a wide range of audiences.
You’ll be able to show us how you couple your awareness of acoustic measurement and analysis with an interest in machine learning and programming. You apply scientific methods to experimental design and seek out exploratory data analysis and hypothesis testing to reach robust conclusions. You’ll also be committed to understanding the context of our business, its processes, data, priorities, and legal frameworks.
Additionally, you may have experience in microphone selection and placement or a familiarity with audio restoration, archive tools or perceptual audio testing.
For this role, you'll need to have good vision in both eyes, either naturally or corrected with glasses or contact lenses, including full colour and peripheral vision to DVLA group 2 sight. Good hearing, referred to as HSE category 1, is essential. Your eyesight and hearing will be tested during the recruitment process, and you must pass these tests to continue with your application. If you wear hearing aids you will be able to complete the test using these.
Training and Development
We’re proud of our inclusive and supportive working environment, which is designed to encourage open minds and attitudes. And as an organisation that values and nurtures talent, we’re committed to helping you fulfil your potential.
No matter your experience or background, you’ll get lots of dedicated support when you join us. With a personalised induction and your own development partner, you’ll quickly start to understand your new role.
To fully support your development, we appreciate you may want further training and will actively consider your additional training needs. You won’t be on your own here – you’ll be a valued member of a community dedicated to your growth and development.
There may also be the opportunity to take on line-management responsibilities in the future and you would be provided training for this.
Rewards and Benefits
You’ll receive a starting salary of £50,215, as well as other benefits including:
- 25 Days Annual Leave automatically rising to 30 days after 5 years' service, and an additional 10.5 days public and privilege holidays
- Opportunities to be recognised through our employee performance scheme
- Personal Learning Budget
- Interest-free season ticket loan
- Excellent pension scheme
- Cycle to work scheme
- Facilities such as a gym, restaurant and on-site coffee bars (at some locations)
- Paid parental and adoption leave
Equal Opportunities
At MI5, diversity and inclusion are critical to our mission. To protect the UK, we need a truly diverse workforce that reflects the society we serve. This includes diversity in every sense of the word: those with different backgrounds, ages, ethnicities, gender identities, sexual orientations, ways of thinking and those with disabilities or neurodivergent conditions. We therefore welcome and encourage applications from everyone, including those from groups that are under-represented in our workforce such as women, those from an ethnic minority background, people with disabilities and those from low socio-economic backgrounds.
Find out more about our culture, working environment and diversity on our website:
https://www.mi5.gov.uk/careers/diversity
What to Expect
Our recruitment process is fair, transparent, and based on merit. Here is a brief overview of each stage, in order: (add detail of hearing/ eyesight test)
- Application form sift
- One-day assessment centre (in person) which includes:
- Documents check
- Technical question-based interview
- Competency question-based interview
- If successful at Assessment Centre, you will be made a Conditional Offer of employment, subject to vetting
Please note, you must successfully pass each stage of the process to progress to the next. Your application may take around 6 - 9 months to process including vetting, so we advise you continue any current employment until you have received your final job offer.
Before You Apply
To work at MI5, you need to be a British citizen or hold dual British nationality. You can read our full eligibility criteriahere.
This role requires the highest security clearance, known as Developed Vetting (DV). It’s something everyone in the UK Intelligence Community undertakes. You can find out more about the vetting processhere.
Please note we have a strict drugs policy, so once you start your application, you can’t take any recreational drugs and you’ll need to declare your previous drug usage at the relevant stage.
Before you apply, we advise you to consider setting up a separate email address for your contact with us, to ensure your personal and application correspondence remain separate. Try to avoid having identifying features in your email address, such as your first and/or surname and date of birth. This is good practice and will help you to manage your application with us more discretely.
The role is based in central London, so you’ll need to live within a commutable distance. Please consider any financial implications and practicalities before submitting an application. A loan is available to support people relocating to London.
Please note, you should only launch your application from within the UK. If you are based overseas, you should wait until you visit the UK to launch an application. Applying from outside the UK will impact on our ability to progress your application. You should not discuss your application, other than with your partner or a close family member.
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