Senior Regulatory Officer

Requirements of the role

The Bar Standards Board (BSB) regulates barristers and their professional practice and specialised legal services businesses in England and Wales in the public interest. We are responsible for setting education and training requirements, setting standards, authorising organisations, monitoring the service provided, and handling reports. Barristers work at the heart of our justice system so BSB’s mission is fundamentally important to the maintenance of the rule of law.

Our people value our friendly and respectful environment, our support for flexible working, the opportunity to have a high degree of impact and our interesting, challenging, and varied work.  More about our work can be viewed on our website, including our Business Plan 2025-2026.

The Role 

The work involves supervising a portfolio of barristers, chambers, BSB entities and organisations that provide postgraduate Bar training and pupillage. Supervision of the postgraduate Bar training providers forms an important part of our work. We would therefore particularly welcome applications from people with experience in the regulation of higher or professional education, or who have been working in a quality role in higher or professional education.

You will be engaging with a wide range of people and organisations and will be required to communicate confidently and professionally with a range of external stakeholders, as well as with colleagues across the BSB and within the team. You will play an important role in enabling the BSB to foster a constructive relationship with those we regulate and other stakeholders, to achieve appropriate outcomes, resulting in less enforcement action and better protection and promotion of consumers’ interests.

The work is varied and involves engaging with a wide range of people and organisations, including at onsite visits. The team is collaborative and supportive, whether working from the office or at home.

Key responsibilities of the post:

• Gathering information to support our assessment of risk, conducting sample checks of compliance with our regulations and conducting thematic reviews on areas of focus in our strategic plans. We adopt a risk-based approach, in line with our Risk Framework.
• Responding to reports to the BSB from stakeholders including barristers, pupils, members of the public and other regulators where a regulatory risk has been identified and determining an appropriate regulatory response, such as desk-based engagement or onsite visits.
• Liaising with external examiners to oversee the standard of assessments in Bar training.
• Working with colleagues across the BSB on areas of regulatory policy development. Examples of this can be seen in our current business plan on our website.

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