Location: Manchester St James's
Closing date: 06/12/2019
Salary: £55,000 -£60,000
Employment type: Permanent
Department: Group IT - Technical Services & IT Programmes

Job Purpose

To provide solutions design and architecture across the BPP Group. Providing technical leadership on all projects as assigned. Ensuring deliverables are thoroughly designed, tested and fit for purpose following industry best practices, underpinning the BPP business strategy. Responsible for ensuring all solutions directly follow governing architectural principles. Autonomously embed innovation and depth of research into all solutions and design. Be an advocate of technology and the IT department, build trust through integrity of approach, attitude and quality of delivery.

Principal Accountabilities

• Contribute to the evolution of the enterprise architecture function. Understand and support the enterprise’s IT strategies
• Maintain commercial awareness in solutioning, ensuring designs are strategic, not tactical, and continue to underpin the business strategy
• Lead the analysis of the current IT environment to detect critical deficiencies and recommend solutions for improvement
• Continually analyse the technology industry and market trends to determine their potential impact on the enterprise architecture
• Consult with project teams to fit projects to enterprise architecture, as well as to identify when it is necessary to modify the enterprise architecture to accommodate project needs
• Consult with infrastructure development project teams to fit infrastructure to architecture, as well as to identify when it is necessary to modify the technical architecture to accommodate infrastructure needs
• Identify organisational requirements of all architecture design and analysis work
• Communicate the value of the enterprise architecture, be an advocate of the IT Strategy
• Provide technical troubleshooting services for complex problems that developers, DBAs and onsite engineers cannot resolve without assistance
• Ensure the enterprise architecture model is maintained including transition states from current states through to final state architectures, which will include high level integration models and enterprise logical data models
• Provide mentorship support for more junior members of the IT Team
• To carry out other tasks as agreed with the Chief Architect.

Job Contacts

Internal:  

• Management teams of all Lines of Business.
• All BPP IT staff

External 

• Software providers and maintenance suppliers

Dimension

• Design authority
• The authority to determine final solution design on a per project basis
• The technical strategy and architecture associated with the development of bespoke business applications

Key Performance Measures

• Architecture Development – Development and delivery of the solution architecture to fulfil the needs of the business and within agreed timeframes.
• Architecture Support – Assist IT staff with the maintenance and continuing development of deployed solutions.
• Technical Improvement – Contribute to the development and implementation of the IT strategy, ensuring the most cost effective use of technology.

Core Competencies

• Achieving Results – Be aware of key business objectives, and ensure these are applied appropriately to all business activities.
• Building Relationships – Able to develop effective relationships with all BPP staff, and be recognised as providing a leading role in system architecture.
• Commercial and Business Awareness – Knowledge of financial models and budgeting. Be aware of the risks associated with commercial relationships and business operations.
• Customer Focus (internal & external) – Able to understand customer expectations, and ensure customer requirements are met and expectations appropriately managed. Able to focus on solving their problems.
• Communication – Good written and verbal communication skills. Able to communicate with departmental staff and senior management. Simplifying the complex when conveying important design decisions to board level. Demonstrate good communication, both orally and in writing, with colleagues, clients and customers including producing reports, preparing, organising and delivering presentations using appropriate tools and techniques.
• Planning and Organising – Excellent planning and organisational skills. Effective at determining a course of action by breaking it down into smaller steps and by planning and resourcing each of these, making allowance for potential problems. Must manage the field of responsibility within allocated budgets, and be able to plan and forecast future activities.
• Understanding BPP – Understands and promotes BPP strategies, policies and procedures. Aware of how the organisation operates.
• Teamwork – Able to contribute effectively towards the objectives of a team, and be able to share knowledge, ideas and information. Aware of the needs, objectives and constraints of those in other disciplines and functions.
• Problem Solving and Decision Making – Excellent analytical and technical skills. Effective at solving problems in a measured and creative way. Capable of independently assessing a wide variety of tasks, and be proactive in relation to identifying and undertaking activities that are to the benefit of the business. Be responsible for own decisions.
• Influencing and Impact – Act in a professional manner, and exhibit the required behavior that should act as an example to other employees. Good at identifying goals and objectives, and motivating others towards their achievement. Able to network throughout the wider IT community.
• Innovation, Flexibility and Adaptability – Undertake tasks with a positive attitude and respond well to management and client requests. Working locations may include a variety of BPP and client sites. Must be prepared to meet business goals and respond well to change.

Qualifications, knowledge and experience required

• Qualifications – Degree qualified and relevant professional qualification and experience (e.g. computer science, systems analysis)
• Experience – Substantial experience in a strong technical discipline such as application development with significant experience in an architectural role, including stakeholder management. Exposure to multiple, diverse technologies and environments.
• Training – Awareness of TOGAF or Zachman architecture frameworks.
• Skills – Knowledge of all components of holistic enterprise architecture. Knowledge of business re-engineering principles and processes. Familiarity with basic graphical modelling approaches, tools and model repositories.
• Analytical Thinking – Ability to comprehend the functions and capabilities of new technologies. Effective at acquiring an understanding of a problem or situation, and developing an approach to interacting with the situation.
• Strategic Perspective – Needs to keep overall objectives and strategies in mind, and not be deflected by matters of detail. Ability to estimate the financial impact of EA alternatives.
• Stress Handling - Retaining objectivity and proper understanding of a problem or situation when placed under conditions of stress
• Applying standards – Effective in the application of relevant industry and process standards to all tasks undertaken.
• Industry Developments – Must take initiative to ensure technical skills and specialisations are kept up to date in line with industry developments and ensure that all relevant skill sets are current.

Solutions Architect JD