Infrastructure Delivery Manager

Job Title: Infrastructure Delivery Manager Location: Remote, UK

First Intuition (FI) is a fast-growing, innovative education provider committed to delivering outstanding learning experiences. At FI, our commitment to excellence is driven by our core driving principle of putting people first. We take pride in nurturing talent, fostering growth, and providing unparalleled support to our students, clients, and team members, ensuring they can thrive personally and professionally. Our success is due to our approach to training and our links with businesses. We work closely with organisations to precisely understand their needs and incorporate these into innovative course designs, where the interaction with students is tailored, personal and reflects their specific circumstances. This approach has led to First Intuition being awarded an ‘Outstanding’ rating by Ofsted. Job summary: The Infrastructure Delivery Manager leads the delivery of FI’s infrastructure change programmes - spanning networking, cloud (Azure/M365), identity, endpoint management, security tooling, resilience/DR, centre fitouts and multi‑site centre technology rollouts. The postholder must bring credible technical depth and/or the ability to direct, challenge, and coordinate specialist vendors and engineering partners to ensure solutions are robust, secure, and aligned to FI’s strategic standards. They turn direction from the Head of Infrastructure, Operations & Security into actionable delivery: shaping solution designs, sequencing complex cutovers across centres, validating configurations, coordinating security controls, and ensuring every implementation meets FI’s performance, reliability, and security expectations. This role is hands‑on in delivery management—creating structure, clarity, and governance around infrastructure change—while ensuring smooth operational handover to IT Operations.

Duties and responsibilities to include:

Infrastructure & Technical Delivery Lead delivery of infrastructure programmes including: Network upgrades (LAN/WAN/SD‑WAN/Wi‑Fi, firewalling, segmentation). Identity and access modernisation (Entra ID, Conditional Access, MFA, Zero Trust patterns). Cloud and M365 platform uplift (Intune baselines, Defender configuration, Azure services). DR and resilience improvements (backup strategy, failover design, recovery testing). Security uplift (EDR/XDR/MDR rollouts, vulnerability reduction, hardening baselines). Review, interpret, and challenge vendor and partner technical designs to ensure alignment with FI’s standards. Validate technical configurations through testing, pilot phases, and evidence‑based acceptance criteria. Project & Programme Management Build and maintain detailed delivery plans, RAID logs, dependency maps, change schedules, and cutover plans. Coordinate multiple infrastructure and security initiatives across FI’s footprint. Manage partner engineering resources, ensuring quality, clarity of scope, and controlled delivery. Run delivery governance—quality gates, readiness checks, risk assessments, and post‑implementation reviews. Ensure all changes follow proper impact assessment, testing, documentation, and change control processes. Centre Technology Delivery Own technical delivery for new site builds, relocations, refurbishments and technology refresh cycles. Work with regional centre teams to coordinate works without disrupting teaching or operational activities. Standardise centre infrastructure by implementing FI’s technical blueprint consistently across sites. Ensure all centre deployments include monitoring setup, documentation, and operational runbooks. Security & Compliance Integration Ensure all projects incorporate secure‑by‑design controls from early stages. Embed security configuration (Defender, MDE, firewalls, M365 security baselines, DLP) into delivery cycles. Work closely with the Information Security Manager to ensure: Remediation of vulnerabilities is planned and delivered. New services comply with governance and accreditation requirements (Cyber Essentials/ISO27001). SOC/MDR/alerting integrations are built into new infrastructure. Cross‑Team Collaboration Work closely with: IT Operations Manager – for operational readiness, handover, and runbook creation. Information Security Manager – for security assurance, risk assessments, and governance alignment. Enterprise Applications Manager / Product Owner – Business Intelligence – where application / BI dependencies intersect infrastructure changes. Vendors and MSPs – ensuring high‑quality engineering output. Translate technical direction into clear communication to all key stakeholders. Operational Handover & Documentation Ensure all new services include: Full documentation (logical/physical diagrams, configs, build standards). Monitoring and logging baselines. Operational runbooks and escalation procedures. Training or knowledge‑transfer sessions for IT Ops. Ensure handovers meet strict acceptance criteria before moving into BAU. Qualifications and skills: Essential: Strong experience delivering complex, multi‑site IT infrastructure projects (network, cloud, identity, endpoint, security). Ability to read, understand, challenge and validate technical designs across: Network and firewall technologies Azure/M365/Entra ID Intune, Defender, Sentinel Identity, access and Zero Trust architecture Demonstrable experience coordinating specialist engineers and third‑party delivery partners. Strong project delivery skillset (waterfall/agile hybrid), with structured documentation and governance discipline. Excellent problem‑solving capability with an ability to break down complex technical issues. Strong communication and stakeholder engagement skills across technical and non‑technical audiences. Ability to produce high‑quality delivery artefacts (plans, architectures, test evidence, runbooks, change packs). Ability to travel to FI centres when required. Desirable Experience in a similar multi‑site educational or regulated environment. Working knowledge of ISO27001, Cyber Essentials, and secure‑by‑design principles. Project management certifications (e.g. Prince2, AgilePM, PMP).