Wales' is to appoint a chief operating officer to work alongside the nation's top civil servant.
Dame Shan Morgan is to stand down as Permanent Secretary next year and a recruitment process is already underway to replace her in the role, which pays between £162,500 and £180,000 a year.
The permanent secretary is the most senior civil servant in Wales and leads the nation's civil service.
She is responsible for delivering the agenda set by the First Minister, their ministerial team and the Cabinet Secretary. Wales has 5,000 civil servants, half of whom are based in Wales.
Mr Drakeford said he has looked at how it works in Whitehall and has decided that appointing a chief operating officer would assist whoever is appointed to that role.
Some Whitehall departments have chief operating officers. Last year the Ministry of Defence advertised such a post with a salary of £70,000 a year.
First Minister Mark Drakeford told a meeting of the Senedd that: "A new permanent secretary was advertised on Monday of last week, I think I said before that the adjective permanent is a bit of a misnomer. Permanent secretaries are appointed on fixed five year terms, and the current permanent secretary’s term of office will come to an end at the start of the next calendar year.
"I think I have come to a conclusion that one of the ways in which some Whitehall departments operate has something to offer us here.
"In a number of Whitehall departments alongside the permanent secretary, there’s what's called a chief operating officer. The chief operating officer’s job is to deal with the mechanics of the way a department operates. They deal with staffing matters, terms and conditions, who gets to park their car where. All those sort of things.
"At the moment in Welsh Government they all end up on the desk of the Permanent Secretary. I want a Permanent Secretary whose time is available to help make the programme of the government succeed and I think the new person will be helped if they have a Chief Operating Office alongside dealing with more with the mechanics of government.
"I had opportunity of a conversation with Simon Case, head of the cabinet office in Whitehall, and I think learnt some useful things from what he said to me about how he may learn some of those lessons here."
