Careers Angel Profile: Alison Morris
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| Name | Alison Morris |
|---|---|
| Email Address | alison.morris@gov.scot |
| Industries/Sectors | Government & Politics |
| Employer | Scottish Government |
| Position | Head of Serious Organised Crime Policy – Divert and Deter |
| Experience | 25-30 years (approx.) |
| Degree | History (graduated in 1988) |
| Other Qualifications | |
| Internships | |
| Information | I've worked for the Scottish Office and then the Scottish Government since 1998. Prior to that I worked for Registers of Scotland (Land Registration) and Lambeth Palace Library. I was seconded to the Scottish Office from the Land Register to work on the Land Reform Act because they needed someone who knew about land information systems and land ownership in Scotland, and I discovered I enjoyed policy work so applied to stay on. Following land reform, I worked in a number of different areas covering such topics as modernisation, e-government, digital inclusion and electronic service delivery and on the efficiency programmes. I then joined the Bill team setting up Creative Scotland (as a merger of the former Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen). Once the Public Services Reform Act (which included the Creative Scotland provisions) had been passed, I moved to the UK Relations team to work on formal and informal inter-governmental relations including the Joint Ministerial Committee and the British Irish Council. I’m currently Head of Serious Organised Crime Policy – Divert and Deter, which is basically about trying to prevent (mainly) young people from becoming involved in organised crime in the first place and trying to prevent people from contributing to organised crime by buying the products. While we do recruit externally at this level occasionally, it's more usual for staff to be recruited at the graduate entry level or through the fast streamer schemes (B1 / B2 level - the old Executive Officer and Higher Executive Officer grades) and work their way up, or to apply for a very senior post (Director-General and up) after a successful career elsewhere. |
| Things I Wish I'd Known |