Guy's & St Thomas' Foundation
Head of Data (18 Months FTC)
How your CV stacks up
Upload your CV to see how well it fits this job role
?%
Head of Data (18 Months FTC)
Head of Data (18 Months FTC)
Application Deadline: 23 July 2026 Department: People & Culture - People/HR Employment Type: Fixed Term Contract Location: London, Hybrid Compensation: £73,000 - £80,000 / year
About the Role
The Head of Data leads the Foundation’s enterprise-wide data strategy, establishing a trusted, secure, well-governed and insight-driven data environment. This role is responsible for delivering data governance, quality, architecture, engineering, reporting, analytics, and effective use of cloud-native data platforms across the organisation.
This leadership role accelerates the Foundation’s journey toward becoming a data-mature, insight-led organisation, supporting strategic decision-making, regulatory confidence, operational excellence, and impact measurement. Reporting to the Director of Transformation, the Head of Data:
- Builds and develops the team
- Shapes the Foundation’s data culture
- Ensures data is a strategic asset that drives value, trust, and innovation
- Delivers a modern, secure, and trusted data environment aligned with the Foundation’s mission
- Ensures high-quality data that strengthens insight, transparency, regulatory confidence, and impact measurement
- Supports a future-ready data capability, fostering a culture that views data as a shared asset enabling decisions, partnerships, and community impact.
Key Responsibilities
Strategic Data Leadership
- Develop and deliver the Foundation’s enterprise data strategy aligned to mission and organisational goals.
- Enable data-driven decision-making across:
- Finance & Legal
- Endowment
- NGOs/Charities
- Impact on Urban Health
- Embed data into:
- Customer experience
- Operational resilience
- Risk management
- Strategic planning
- Achieve measurable outcomes tied to data quality, adoption, and organisational value.
Data Governance & Compliance
- Lead and mature a robust data governance framework, including:
- Standards
- Policies
- Ownership models
- Quality controls
- Metadata management
- Ensure compliance with:
- GDPR
- Data Protection
- Regulatory requirements
- Audits
- Build trusted data through controls like:
- Lineage
- Classification
- Lifecycle management
Reasons to use Rodeo
Start with a chat, not a search bar
Grad scheme, placement, apprenticeship? Not sure what you want yet — that's fine. Your agent talks it through with you and turns "I have no idea" into a shortlist.
It searches the market for you
Every day your agent scans the market matching roles against what actually matters to you, not just keywords on a CV.
Only hits
No noise. No "maybe this fits." Just roles with a clear explanation of why they're right — and where to focus when applying.
Data Architecture & Engineering
- Lead enterprise data architecture design, including:
- Data lakes
- Warehousing
- Integrations
- Pipelines
- Modelling
- Own and optimise cloud-native data technologies on Microsoft Azure, including:
- Fabric
- Azure Data Lake
- Data Factory
- Databricks
- Synapse
- SQL
- Ensure the data platform is scalable, high-performing, secure, and aligned with organisational transformation needs.
- Partner with the Business Systems team to enable seamless integrations with:
- CRM
- Finance
- Impact measurement tools
- Third-party platforms
Analytics, Insights & AI
- Oversee enterprise reporting and analytics, delivering:
- Timely
- Accurate
- Actionable insights
- Govern Power BI, managing:
- Semantic models
- Self-service enablement
- Drive predictive analytics, operational insights, and responsible AI/ML adoption for:
- Enhanced outcomes
- Impact measurement
- Champion delivery and innovation using emerging technologies for operational insight.
Leadership, Culture & Collaboration
-
Collaborate with:
- Head of Change
- Head of Business Systems
- IT Operations Manager To develop end-to-end solutions for business systems, data, and infrastructure.
-
Build and lead a multidisciplinary data team over time.
-
Champion:
- Data literacy
- High-quality data habits
- A culture of curiosity
-
Represent the organisation externally with:
- Regulators
- Suppliers
- Strategic partners
-
Manage internal and external delivery, including:
- Procurement
- Vendor oversight
Role responsibilities are ongoing, requiring flexibility to support the Foundation’s transformation objectives. New tasks relevant to the role may reasonably be assigned.
Requirements
Skills, Attributes & Values
The Foundation seeks a self-starter who:
- Is adaptable and demonstrates integrity.
- Exhibits the Foundation’s core values.
- Has a willingness to learn and develop new skills.
- Commits to members’ continuous improvement, with meticulous attention to detail and due process.
- Delivers consistent, high-quality service to both internal and external stakeholders.
- Possesses strong interpersonal skills and can effectively liaise across communities.
- Communicates confidently (both written and spoken), with strong listening and influencing abilities.
- Can operate strategically and hands-on simultaneously.
Get help with your application
Your very own career expert that helps elevate your application to the next level.
Has strong problem-solving and analytical thinking. Builds trust, develops relationships, and leads through influence.
- Is committed to data ethics, privacy, and responsible technology.
- Keeps up-to-date with emerging technologies.
- Translates technical concepts for senior and non-technical audiences.
Required Experience & Technical Expertise
Proven data leadership experience in regulated or complex environments is essential (charity, financial services, healthcare, public sector or similar). Specific competencies include:
- Enterprise data management, governance and quality.
- Cloud-native data platforms (scaling Lakehouses, pipelines, BI tooling).
- Microsoft Azure ecosystem (Fabric, Data Lake, ADF, Databricks, Synapse, SQL, Purview, DevOps technologies).
- Deep technical mastery of Microsoft Azure.
- Comprehensive understanding of GDPR, data protection, compliance, and risk frameworks.
- Track record of influencing at senior/executive levels and leading cultural change.
Desirable Experience
- Azure Purview governance and responsibility-use AI frameworks.
- Certifications (e.g. Azure Data Engineer, Solutions Architect).
- Working with Azure/OpenAI, Snowflake/BigQuery/Redshift, dbt or orchestration tools.
- Experience enabling insights in impact-driven or donor-focused organisations.
Benefits
- Contributory pension
- Annual personal development budget
- Annual health and wellbeing personal allowance
- Enhanced maternity, paternity, and parental leave pay (no length-of-service requirements).
- Free optional yearly health check-ups
- Support for healthy eating (fruits, onsite lunches)
- Agile working, flexible hours, and IT support
- Shower facilities & bike lock area
- Generous annual leave (27 days + bank holidays)
- Subsidies for glasses
- Employee Assistance Programme
“It took my CV and asked me questions relevant to understanding what kind of jobs to suggest for me. Suggestions were almost perfect. Jobs were exactly what I’ve been looking for.”
Jessica, London
Skills