Head of Department for Substance Abuse Center, Viborg Municipality

Do you want to lead development, professional direction and strong collaboration in an important welfare area?

We are more curious about you than about your application

In this recruitment we ask you not to send a classic application. Instead, please answer the five questions below, which help us understand your motivation, your way of learning, your judgment and your thoughts about the role.

We do not necessarily believe that the best candidates are the ones who are best at writing applications. We are more interested in what drives you, how you think, and how you meet new challenges. Of course we will read your CV, but your answers are our most important starting point in the first assessment.

• What made you stop and read this advertisement?
• When did you last have to navigate something you didn’t know beforehand?
• What have you chosen in the last year, and what did you learn from that choice?
• Tell us about a situation where you had to build support for a decision or change that not everyone agreed with. What did you do, and what did you learn about creating followership?
• Imagine it is day 30 as department head. What do you hope to have understood about the people, the task and the organization?

Please be concrete. We are not looking for the right answer, but for an insight into how you think, learn and relate to the role.

About the job

As department head you will have overall responsibility for the daily operations and strategic development of the Substance Abuse Center. Your tasks range from staff leadership, budget follow-up and professional development to cross-municipal collaboration and with external partners. We face exciting tasks with development projects and initiatives that require both professional insight and the ability to think new thoughts together. You will play a central role in ensuring a good working environment and developing strong relationships both internally and externally.

About you

You have solid leadership experience and preferably knowledge of the substance abuse field or related areas. You work deliberately with leadership as a discipline and translate both the Leadership Foundation and the MED Foundation into practice. You are willing to navigate in a politically steered organization and see it as a strength in your work. You set a clear professional direction, work inclusively and manage to create a shared understanding of goals and priorities.

You are action-oriented, strategic and can lead self-managing teams in a complex daily life. Personally, you are present, clear and credible, and you manage to create security and trust in relationships.

About us

The Substance Abuse Center is organized in self-managing teams, where collaboration and knowledge sharing are highly valued. We are a dedicated staff group with broad professionalism and a strong collegial community. You report to the Head of Psychiatry and Vulnerable People and become part of a leadership group where sparring and joint development are in focus. The coming years hold many exciting development tasks, not least within cross-cutting initiatives and implementation of new strategies.

About leadership in Viborg Municipality

As a leader in Viborg Municipality you become part of a large and diverse, politically steered organization, where leadership is built on our personnel policy values – Diversity, Decency, Competence = MOD, Viborg Municipality’s Leadership Foundation and the MED agreement. You can read more about the personnel policy values, the leadership foundation and the MED agreement on viborg.dk .

Viborg Municipality aims to create more wholeness and coherence for citizens. Therefore the city council has decided on a coherence model, which forms the basis for the political governance of the municipality and sets goals that create value for citizens.

Salary and employment

Salary is set based on the applicable collective agreement and a concrete assessment of your education, your documented work experience as well as your professional and personal qualifications. Before employment and signing the salary agreement you have the opportunity to receive information about the starting salary in the specific position. Viborg Municipality applies objective and gender-neutral criteria for salary setting in accordance with the rules on equal pay for the same work or work of equal value, and in accordance with the relevant collective agreement. You can find information about salaries at: KRL

Before final employment a criminal record check is conducted.

Interviews

We will hold the first interview round on November 10, 2026 and the second interview round on November 17, 2026. Candidates advancing to the second interview will have a personality profile completed before the second interview. You must set aside time for a discussion of your personality profile on November 16, 2026. There is also the possibility of discussing the personality profile via Teams.

Learn more

Read more about the job in the attached job and competence profile. You can also read more about the Substance Abuse Center here . If you have any questions about the position, you are welcome to contact the Head of Psychiatry and Vulnerable People, Gitte Rafn Jensen, by phone at 22 12 47 95 or email [email protected] .

We look forward to hearing from you.