Tamara Finkelstein, Permanent Secretary at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and Head of the UK Civil Service Policy Profession, is clear that generalist skills are essential but questions whether it is time to move away from generalists as roles sitting outside of professions.

Tamara set out current plans for the Policy Profession, which provides a professional home and career anchor for former generalists, and how it is providing a framework for building and improving skills. This was followed by a discussion about how to build the skills they need and how to embed professional expertise in the policy-making process.

For this discussion we were delighted to be joined by:

• Tamara Finkelstein, Permanent Secretary at Defra and Head of the Civil Service Policy Profession
• Aaron Maniam, Fellow of Practice and Director, Digital Transformation Education at the Blavatnik School of Government
• Lord Vallance, Minister of State for Science, Research and Innovation

The panel was chaired by Alex Thomas, Programme Director at the Institute for Government.

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