Interim Chief Operating Officer at the Blavatnik School of Government

Policy Leaders Fellow Alumnus, Centre for Science and Policy

Nick Joicey is Interim Chief Operating Officer at the Blavatnik School of Government. He joined the School in January 2025 on a one-year secondment from the UK Civil Service.

Nick Joicey became Second Permanent Secretary and Chief Operating Officer at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) in the summer of 2023. Since 2022 he was Director General for the Economic and Domestic Secretariat in the Cabinet Office, he was previously Director General, Finance at the Department for Work and Pensions since July 2018 and before that he was Director General for Strategy, EU Exit and Finance at Defra, having taken up the position of DG for Strategy, International, Food and Farming there in 2014. He was also Head of the Policy Profession in Defra, and a member of the Department's Supervisory Board.

Prior to joining Defra in 2014 he was Director for International Finance at the Treasury. Before that he led the Treasury’s European teams and was seconded to Washington DC at the UK delegation to the IMF.