Principal Technical Architect

The Principal Technical Architect will lead a small team of Technical Architects working across multiple projects or teams on problems that require broad architectural thinking. They will provide leadership in establishing UK Health Security Agency's approach to technical architecture and guide projects in using principles, standards and tooling to deliver new systems and services for citizens.

As Principal Technical Architect, you will provide assurance for architectural designs across the agency, making sure that technical designs fit into the broader strategy for the agency and wider government. You will be responsible for leading the production of technical designs in-line with appropriate government standards including the service standard and the technology code of practice. You will also explore the benefits of cross-government alignment of systems and services.

You will support the delivery of the UKHSA Technology Strategy, and feed into sub-strategies including our Integration and Platform strategies. You will be responsible for producing designs through a defined governance structure, leading the identification of best practice, and promoting the use of reusable patterns and standards. You will build effective partnerships with diverse teams across multiple locations and technologies and provide mentoring and leadership to other architects.

Main Duties of the Job

Your main day to day activities will be:

• Leading a small, specialist team of technical architects


• Creating technical designs and identifying appropriate technical solutions aligned to user needs and UKHSA/government standards.


• Working closely with product managers, business analysts, delivery managers and others as part of cross-functional agile delivery teams


• Overseeing or leading the technical evaluation of proposals from third party suppliers, as part of UKHSA's procurement processes


• Working closely with external suppliers to ensure that their architectures are robust, scalable, open and secure and meet other internal standards


• Ensuring that new products and services are 'secure by design'


• Working with and across other areas of DDaT and the business to develop and document technical designs for the integration and implementation of any solution


• Presenting and championing recommendations to senior stakeholders across the agency, communicating complicated technical concepts concisely to non-technical users.


• Anticipating and advising on future technology that presents opportunities for the organisation


• Managing, coaching and mentoring other technical architects and members of the wider technology team


• Forging close working relationships across other government and health technical architecture communities, exploring the benefits of cross-government alignment


We pride ourselves as being an employer of choice, where Everyone Matters promoting equality opportunity to actively encourage applications from everyone, including groups currently underrepresented in our workforce.

UKHSA ethos is to be an inclusive organisation for all our staff and stakeholders. To create, nurture and sustain an inclusive culture, where differences drive innovative solutions to meet the needs of our workforce and wider communities. We do this through celebrating and protecting differences by removing barriers and promoting equity and equality of opportunity for all.,
• UK nationals


• nationals of the Republic of Ireland


• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK


• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)


• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)


• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020


• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service
  
  Please provide the experience/knowledge that is essential for the candidate to carry out the role


The following technical experience is essential to this role:

• Development and application architecture experience, with good knowledge of open-source technologies and at least one programming language


• Working with external suppliers to ensure that their system architectures are robust, scalable, open and secure, with appropriate overall system design and integration points/APIs, to deliver a high-quality user experience


• Working in dynamic fast paced agile environments, collaboratively and openly with others using continual delivery techniques and DevOps cultures


• Managing and delivering complex technology solutions within time, cost and quality targets


• Designing secure and scalable services within common public cloud platforms (particularly Microsoft Azure or Amazon Web Services) and related technologies (for example, elastic scaling, platform as a service and networking architecture in the cloud)


• Leading and influencing highly specialised technical teams, including steering decision making and improving how those decisions are made and technical systems are operated


• Developing or directly influencing enterprise technology strategies supported by user research, balancing technology against cost, user experience, operational/support experience and strategic goals


• Defining, owning and contributing to the technical roadmap and strategy and demonstrating a detailed knowledge of technical requirements to implement, design and manage associated technologies


Desirable:

• Technology Code of Practice and the Service Standard and how these apply to enterprise IT within an organisation and across government


• Working with senior management to define directorate priorities based on medium- long term strategies and organisational direction, Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.

People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

£65,302 - £78,805
National banding - £65,302 - £75,129 per annum. Outer London - £67,288- £76,967 per annum. Inner London - £69,275 - £78,805 per annum This role comes with a Market Pay Supplement of up to £15,000
A Civil Service Pension with an average employer contribution of 27%, Grade & Salary - Grade 6. National banding - £65,302 - £75,129 per annum. Outer London - £67,288- £76,967 per annum. Inner London - £69,275 - £78,805 per annum

This role comes with a Market Pay Supplement of up to £15,000

The internal roles rules apply to existing Civil Servants, i.e. level transfers move on current salary or the pay range minimum, transfers on promotion move to new pay range minimum or receive 10% increase. Either case is determined by whichever is the highest.

This role is to be appointed under Civil Service Terms & Conditions. Full details on the T&C's are found https://www.ukhsa.reed.com/., Alongside your salary of £65,302, UK Health Security Agency contributes £17,631 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

• Learning and development tailored to your role


• An environment with flexible working options


• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity


• A Civil Service pension with an average employer contribution of 27%


Things you need to know,
• Civil Service Pension Contribution of 27%


• Learning and development tailored to your role


• An environment with flexible working options


• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity


• Range of health and wellbeing support


Any move to UKHSA from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax Free Childcare.

DBS - People working with government systems must complete Basic Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) checks which includes a disclosure and barring security check. Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed for this role is BPSS however there may be a requirement for this role to be SC cleared and you should familiarise yourself with the criteria of security clearance.

This role is Open to all external applicants (anyone) from outside the Civil Service (including by definition internal applicants. Appointments to roles within UKHSA will be made in accordance with the Civil Service nationality rules. These can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nationality-rules This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals


• Nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK


• Nationals of the Republic of Ireland


• Nationals from the EU, EEA or Switzerland with settled or pre-settled status or who apply for either status by the deadline of the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)


• Relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals working in the Civil Service


• Relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals who have built up the right to work in the Civil Service


• Certain family members of the relevant EU, EEA, Swiss or Turkish nationals


We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's Recruitment Principles.

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment.

Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Government baseline personnel security standard

It's important to note that there are currently exceptions to applications being considered if your conviction relates to any of the following:

• life sentences


• arson


• sexual offences


• hate and terror offences


Some departments will also consider the specific offence against the nature of the business, i.e., a conviction for fraud may rule you out for a finance role