HM Revenue & Customs
Head of ECS Private Hosting (Lead Platform Owner)
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Job Summary
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Job Description
We are seeking a strategic and experienced Lead Platform Owner to lead the vision and roadmap and manage the integration and evolution of private cloud and on-premises hosting Products and Platforms managed by the ECS Private team, part of ECS.
You will have oversight and availability insight, and act as a key liaison connecting technical teams, business stakeholders, and external partners for collaboration. The Lead Platform Owner ensures alignment of Products and Platforms with business goals and drives operational excellence across stakeholders.
The role works alongside senior IT leadership to maintain strategic alignment and helps drive the reduction in technical debt at the Products and Platforms level.
Responsibilities
Financial and Commercial Management
- Own, deliver and report against agreed delegated budgets. Implement clear cost recovery processes.
- Work closely with Commercial and Supplier Management to execute on contractual and supplier matters.
Platform Lifecycle Management
- Responsible for managing the entire lifecycle of Products and Platforms to maintain operational efficiency and stability. Acting with agency to promote reduction of technology debt at the Products and Platforms level, adoption of Cloud Principles where practicable, and alignment to good data centre management practices where applicable.
- Introduce new Products and Platforms to meet collective stakeholder needs, and retire those Products and Platforms no longer fit-for-purpose.
Strategy Alignment and Development
- Provide platform level leadership and stakeholder engagement across HMRC programmes, assuring outcomes, risk management, and platform alignment to enable the migration and retirement of legacy services.
- Align Products and Platforms strategies closely with overall business goals to maximize value and impact. Develop and maintain Strategy for ECS Private and contribute to wider ECS Strategy.
Continuous Improvement
- Drive ongoing initiatives to enhance Product and Platform capabilities and operational performance and reduction of technology debt.
Risk Security and Compliance Management
- The Lead Platform Owner must implement strong security protocols to protect data and systems from threats.
- Ensure compliance with industry regulations, legal adherence and building of user trust.
Essential Criteria
The successful candidate must be able to clearly demonstrate evidence of the following essential criteria:
- Experience and qualifications around ITIL v4 and ITSM are required.
- Proven experience owning and managing enterprise Products and Platforms or services, ensuring operational performance, stability, scalability and continuous improvement while working collaboratively across technical, service management and business teams.
- Collaborative leadership style, strong written/verbal communication, and ability to influence without direct authority.
- Oversee Products and Platforms performance and scalability, driving improvements and fostering collaboration across teams.
- Experience of budget responsibility and reporting at suitable scale, familiarity with contract structures and relationships and have a high level of commercial awareness.
- Lengthy experience in both cloud and on-premises technologies is essential.
- Proven experience providing strategic leadership for enterprise Products and Platforms, setting direction, developing roadmaps and aligning technical, operational and business stakeholders around shared outcomes.
- Experience leading federated/distributed teams and managing stakeholders across business and technical domains.
- Proven experience identifying, assessing, managing and mitigating risks in complex technology environments, taking proactive action to protect service stability, security, compliance and delivery outcomes.
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Desirable Criteria
- Previous experience in financial services, healthcare, or other highly regulated industries.
- Experience and qualification in Project and Programme Management practices.
- Experience and qualifications in running Agile and Lean based activities.
Further Location Information
Please ensure that you only apply for a location that you are willing and able to work from, as we will only make one offer of employment. Any additional notes included in a ‘Further Location Preferences (optional)’ field within the application form, will not be considered. Please be aware that you cannot change your location preference after submitting your application.
Office Closures
If your location preference is for the following site, it’s important to note that this is not a long-term site for HMRC and we will require you to move to a new building in the future, subject to our location strategy and the applicable employee policies at that time.
For more information on where you might be working, review this information on our locations (opens in a new window)
This Site Is
Telford Plaza, Telford - moving to Parkside Court, Telford
You will be given more information about what this means at the job offer stage.
Leeds Location
Moves Adjustment Payment will be available for this role, provided the successful applicant is a current HMRC colleague in Bradford and meets the eligibility requirements outlined in the HMRC’s Moves Adjustment Payment guidance.
Salary and Benefits
Alongside your salary of £71,725, HM Revenue and Customs contributes £20,778 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).
HMRC operates both Flexible and Hybrid Working policies, allowing you to balance your work and personal commitments. We welcome applications from those who need to work a more flexible arrangement and will agree to requests where possible, considering our operational and customer service needs.
We offer a generous leave allowance, starting at 25 days and increasing by a day for every year of qualifying service up to a maximum of 30 days.
Pension - We make contributions to our colleagues’ Alpha pension equal to at least 28.97% of their salary.
Family friendly policies.
Personal support.
Coaching and development.
To find out more about HMRC benefits and find out what it’s really like to work for HMRC hear from our insiders or visit Thinking of joining the Civil Service
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.
Selection Process Details
How To Apply
As part of the application process, you will be asked to provide the following:
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- A name-blind CV including your Job History, previous Skills and Experiences. Your CV should be limited to your last 3 roles and no more than 200 words per role.
- A 1000-word Personal Statement which should be used to describe how your skills and experience from your career reflect the Essential Criteria of the role. Please provide specific instances from your career detailing successes where you can.
Please evidence any Desirable Criteria where applicable (up to 250 words max). This is not essential for the role but may be considered by the vacancy holder where candidates have the same score at interview.
Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.
Sift
In the event of a large number of applications being received, an initial sift may be held on your CV.
At full sift your CV and your Personal Statement will be assessed, with the successful candidates being invited to interview.
We may also raise the score required at any stage of the process if we receive a high number of applications.
Interview
As part of the panel interview you will prepare and deliver a presentation, of no more than 10-minutes which will be used to assess your Experience. The presentation should be related to the role of Platform Product Owner. The panel will ask scenario based questions, based on your experience and relevance to the criteria of the role.
When answering you will be required to provide a specific instance from your career which demonstrates the skill or experience in question. You would be advised to prepare specific examples from your career in advance.
Further details will be provided prior to the interview to successful candidates.
Interviews will take place virtually via video link.
Sift and interview dates to be confirmed.
Please note that circumstances may arise that require the planned interview format to change. We will endeavour to provide you with as much notice of any change as possible.
Eligibility
Please take extra care to tick the correct boxes in the eligibility sections of your application form. Mistakes sometimes happen but if you contact us later than two working days (Monday-Friday) before the vacancy closes, we may not be able to reopen your application for you. If you do make a mistake with your eligibility form, or have withdrawn yourself in error and need your application reinstated whilst the campaign is still live, please contact us via: unitybusinessservicesrecruitmentresults@hmrc.gov.uk – Use the subject line to insert appropriate wording for example – ‘Please re-open my application – [insert vacancy ref] & vacancy closing date [insert date]’.
To check that you are eligible to apply for this role, please review the eligibility information before submitting your application.
Exceptionally, candidates who are not successful at this grade may be considered for appointment to similar roles at a lower grade where the eligibility criteria are met. If this applies, we will contact you directly.
The HMRC App
The HMRC app can help you with your application
The HMRC app can provide you with your past 5 years' employment history, making the process of filling in your application quicker and easier.
If successful in your application, you will need your National Insurance number for the onboarding process.
Download the HMRC app now and save your National Insurance number to your digital phone wallet.
How to download the HMRC app and sign up for an account
- Download the free HMRC app from the App Store or Google Play store.
- If you have an HMRC online account already, sign straight in using your ID and
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