Job summary
- Main area
- Technical Architect
- Grade
- NHS AfC: Band 8a
- Contract
- Permanent
- Hours
- Full time - 37.5 hours per week
- Job ref
- 914-BSA4564
- Employer
- NHS Business Services Authority
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Stella House or Ridgeway House
- Town
- Newcastle Upon Tyne
- Salary
- £50,952 - £57,349 per annum
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 12/05/2024 23:59
Employer heading
Technical Architect
NHS AfC: Band 8a
Job overview
Do you have significant experience in technical architecture, a proven track record of success and a desire to make a difference? If so, then the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) have an exciting opportunity for you to join us as a Technical Architect (AWS).
We design, develop, test, support and operate applications from our digital transformation projects to support patients, colleagues and the public. We deliver relevant and valuable services to millions of users with various needs and abilities.
Hear from our Technical Architects and learn more about what it's like to work in our DDaT (Digital, Data and Technology) team.
What do we offer?
- 27 days leave (increasing with length of service) plus 8 bank holidays
- Flexible working (we are happy to discuss options such as compressed hours)
- Flexi time
- Hybrid working model (we are currently working largely remotely)
- Career development
- Active wellbeing and inclusion networks
- Excellent pension
- NHS Car lease scheme
- Access to a wide range of benefits and high street discounts!
Main duties of the job
The growth and innovation that cloud vendors provide, challenge us to rethink our approach to developing optimal solutions that can drive down cost and timescales whilst enhancing quality. The NHSBSA follows multi-cloud and cloud first principles, technical architects are key to realising that ambition.
Collaborating with other professions such as user research, user experience design, development, test and DevOps, you will create available, secure and performant applications deployed in the cloud that are continuously iterated in an agile manner. Your role will be the technical design lead, ensuring that services are developed in line with business expectation whilst utilising and challenging strategy, patterns, standards, and roadmaps.
You'll be part of our Architecture Community of Practice and help forward the profession. As a technical architect, you will collaboratively identify technical challenges and the patterns and standards that can overcome these and enable the creation of consistent, testable, and modular services rapidly.
Technical Architects in the NHSBSA embrace the drive to be customer-centric and, following fundamental principles, have designed award-winning services that surpass the requirements of end-users:
To provide better service to connected consumers
To work inter-professionally
To set standards for the use of digital
To educate colleagues about the use of digital tools
To be open and transparent
To work in an agile, iterative and data-driven manner
Working for our organisation
Here at the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA), what we do matters.
We manage the NHS Pension scheme, process prescription payments and much more. Our services are used by NHS organisations, contractors and the public: we take pride in being part of something so meaningful, that touches millions of lives.
Just as we design our services around the needs of our customers, we place our people at the heart of our organisation. That’s why when you join us, you’ll be empowered and given the right support to help your career grow.
As one of the UK’s Best Big Companies to work for, we’re all connected to our values: Collaborative, Adventurous, Reliable and Energetic. We care about our people, our purpose, and your progress.
We strive to offer a fantastic colleague experience, where every voice is heard, and every colleague is supported and respected. Wellbeing, diversity and inclusion is at the centre of this, so when you join us, you can connect with our Lived Experience Networks who help us to bring our authentic selves to work.
We welcome applications from people of all backgrounds and circumstances. We are committed and proud to be a flexible employer and will endeavour to offer a working pattern that suits you wherever possible, whether that be hybrid working, flexible hours, job sharing and more.
Ready to join us on our journey to be a catalyst for better health? Apply today and see where the NHSBSA can take you.
We are people connected to care.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
In this role, you are accountable for:
- Collaboratively define “as-is” and “to-be” architectures to develop full technical solutions designs including preparation of technical artefacts, and blueprints; providing a high quality of cost estimation for submission into internal and external business cases and assessments.
- Undertake and lead on investigative analysis within multidisciplinary teams, providing technical authority, making credible and practical technical decisions, communicating these with sensitivity and diplomacy to ensure the right technical direction is followed.
- Facilitate scoping and priority setting of large or complex changes, to enable the delivery to team to provides robust options appraisals and recommendations; harmonising across infrastructures and technologies wherever possible and selecting the most appropriate means to communicate information.
- Proactively devising and managing initiatives to deliver capacity, performance and system availability improvements to meet or exceed targets.
- Translating designs both logical and physical to support user friendly processes and systems, and communication of this across a variety of stakeholders including, business areas, projects or programme teams.
- Sets technical standards, tools, techniques and methods and advises and influences others to adopt these to ensure consistency across the organisational approaches to designs.
- Monitoring the development of new and emerging tools, technologies and products to assess potential value and identifying opportunities to enhance capabilities, products and services within the organisation.
- Taking a major role to identify and share good practices, participating in relevant communities of practice to drive adoption of design standards, trends and patterns.
- Working under general direction; planning your own work to achieve agreed objectives, seeking information when unclear, and escalating as appropriate, any issues or conflicting priorities which may impact deadlines.
- Actively participating and contributing to quality assurance reviews of your work through a variety of approaches such as peer review, learning logs, and engaging in appropriate communities.
In addition to the above accountabilities, as post holder you are expected to:
Undertake additional duties and responsibilities in line with the overall purpose of your role and as agreed by your line manager.
Demonstrate NHSBSA values and core capabilities in all aspects of your work.
Foster an environment where your own and colleagues’ safety and well-being is promoted.
Contribute to a culture which values diversity and inclusion.
Comply with NHSBSA policies, procedures and protocols as they apply to your role.
Working relationships
Responsible to: Enterprise Architect
Key relationships and connections:
Team members
Service delivery teams
Business stakeholders
Service Managers
Suppliers
Peer Networks
Person specification
Personal Qualities, Knowledge and Skills
Essential criteria
- Business change, rationalisation and transformation and implementation of strategic approaches, plans, activities and solutions.
- Evaluation, interpretation, translation and communication of complex data/information from multiple sources and requirements to inform decision making.
- Design of cost effective and scalable enterprise solutions, from development through to implementation in a multi-supplier environment.
Desirable criteria
- A variety of approaches to hosted solutions and data centers including co-Location (and integration into Service Management models)
- Working to GDS Principles and having participated in GDS assessments
Experience
Essential criteria
- Provide business assurance of supplier’s designs and proposals.
- A range of experience across a diverse and detailed technical knowledge, covering web applications and services, cloud technology, information, infrastructure, cloud and managed service architectures.
- Planning and organisational skills across a broad range of activities to support the delivery of project planning and resource management.
- Communicating and negotiating with external bodies, suppliers and organisations to reach satisfactory outcomes for the NHSBSA, including assurance of external design proposals.
Desirable criteria
- Analysing digital / web services in a fast-paced environment
- Open source and cloud technologies and their sourcing.
- Experience of migrating services across different Data Centre locations and legacy application consolidation
- Solution and service design and delivery within an Agile development environment.
Qualifications
Essential criteria
- An IT related degree or equivalent, plus significant demonstrable experience in two of the following: IT Architecture (digital and service), System Design, Business and Technical Analysis and/or Management of a significant ICT implementation
Desirable criteria
- • TOGAF certification or equivalent
- • Experience of working in an agile environment
- • ITIL or SIAM Certification
- • Undertaken GDS Assessor training
Employer certification / accreditation badges
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Michael Dunn
- Job title
- DDAT People Manager
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Telephone number
- 0191 203 5212
List jobs with NHS Business Services Authority in Administrative Services or all sectors