Pros
Genuinely meaningful work, you're contributing to policy and operations that affect real people at national scale, which gives the day-to-day a sense of purpose you don't always get in the private sector. Strong exposure to large, complex datasets and cross-departmental projects. Good place to build technical depth and learn how decisions get made at senior levels. Supportive, knowledgeable colleagues. A lot of institutional expertise to learn from, and generally collaborative teams. Decent work-life balance and reasonable flexibility around hybrid working. Pension and job security are real benefits. Opportunities to engage with senior stakeholders, sometimes up to ministerial level, which is excellent for development.
Cons
Pay lags noticeably behind comparable commercial roles, particularly for technical and analytical positions. Bureaucracy and legacy processes can slow things down. Tooling and tech stack aren't always current, which can be frustrating if you want to work with modern platforms. Career progression can feel slow and is often more about grade structures than performance. Change can be politically driven and priorities shift, so longer-term projects sometimes stall or get reshaped.