Cambridge Spark
IT & Systems Manager
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Department: Technology
Location: Hybrid/London based (3 days per week in our London office)
Reports to: Head of Engineering
Hours: 37.5 per week
Salary: (Depending on experience)
A quick note before you apply: We are only able to accept applications from candidates who are currently based in the UK and hold the legal right to work here.
Role Overview
This is a build-and-own role, not a maintain role. Our IT has been run tactically and reactively to date; this role exists to put it on a strategic, well-governed footing as the company grows. You will inherit an estate — collaboration tools, devices, the office network, and a spread of third-party and emerging homebrew tooling — that needs to be brought into good order and given a forward view. You will own it end to end, day to day, while line-managing an IT apprentice and directing our co-managed MSP.
It is a hands-on role as well as a strategic one: you will run the estate, do the harder in-person work yourself, and set the direction for how IT evolves.
Key responsibilities:
- Own a collaboration and endpoint estate that runs properly and securely.
- Identity, access, and a joiner–mover–leaver lifecycle that is timely and auditable.
- Run a reliable office network, infrastructure, and peripheral estate.
- Own a known, governed SaaS and tooling estate, with shadow IT brought into the light.
- Ensure Security operations are executed to a good standard, under vCISO-set policy.
- Own a co-managed MSP held to scope and value.
- Support and grow an IT function that matures and scales with the company.
- Develop and support an IT apprentice
Skills & Knowledge
Essential
- Hands-on administration of collaboration platforms (Google Workspace, Slack) at estate scale.
- MDM and endpoint protection across a mixed device fleet — the specific tooling matters less than the transferable skill.
- Identity and access management, SSO, and the automation & improvement of joiner–mover–leaver processes.
- Networking fundamentals: office LAN, Wi-Fi, firewalls, and connectivity troubleshooting.
- Security-operations literacy: able to operate controls, run access reviews, and work within a recognised framework (e.g. Cyber Essentials, ISO 27001).
- SaaS lifecycle and vendor/contract management, including holding third-party agencies to account.
- Documentation discipline: leaves the estate knowable by others, so that no single person is a point of failure.
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Desirable
- A deeper security background than the essential baseline — whether through formal qualification or hands-on experience — which would let us run a lighter vCISO engagement.
- AI awareness: the judgment to assess AI access and connector requests and decide what to approve, deny, or escalate.
- Lightweight scripting or automation.
- Experience standing up or maturing an IT function from a reactive starting point.
- Exposure to regulated or audited environments (government, NHS, education, banking).
What This Role Is Not
- Not a CISO. Security strategy, assurance, and board-level risk sit with the fractional vCISO; this role executes security operations, it does not set or independently assure its own work.
- Not a first-line support desk. First-line sits with the apprentice and the MSP; aiming this role at the ticket queue would waste the seniority the role is built for.
- Not a pure architect. Strategy is expected — but so is hands-on ownership of the estate and the physical work that comes with it.
Why This Role
- A genuine opportunity to take an IT function from reactive to strategic and own it end to end.
- Direct access to and influence with senior technology leadership.
- A growing, profitable, values-driven business with a social-impact mission in education and skills.
- The autonomy to do the role properly, and to grow an apprentice while you do it.
Background to our Organisation
We are an education technology company that enables corporate and government organisations to achieve their business goals by educating their workforce with critical digital transformation skills to succeed in the AI era.
We deliver unique and innovative professional education that is accelerating the digital transformation of our clients, advancing the careers of their employees, helping people get into work and closing the digital skills gap. We are in a sector that is crucial to the economy and workforce, with a lot of opportunity for change and innovation. We are at the cutting edge of teaching applied data and digital skills, with our unique patented learning platform EDUKATE.AI offering our clients and learners a unique learning experience. EDUKATE.AI was developed with support from Innovate UK and provides all of our learners with 24/7 immediate feedback on their work, helping accelerate the learning process and providing a sandbox environment to experiment on real world datasets.
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Since 2016, we have supported more than 15,000 learners across four continents with nearly 550,000 pieces of code submitted for feedback on EDUKATE.AI. We are trusted by some of the most recognisable brands in the world to educate their workforce, including Microsoft, the NHS, GSK, easyJet, the BBC and John Lewis. Our focus on applied learning to create business impact sets us apart - individual learners have reported applying their skills at work to generate recorded value of up to £40m.
Our Values
At the centre of the way we work together and inspire each other to achieve success are these core values:
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Entrepreneurial
We take initiative and show entrepreneurial spirit which fuels innovation at Cambridge Spark. This includes identifying opportunities for improvement, taking ownership for implementing solutions effectively and driving improvement by using proof of concepts to demonstrate the feasibility and value of their work. -
Team Spirit
Everyone is part of building an open and transparent culture, communicating effectively to raise issues, discuss improvements and share the evidence used to make decisions. -
Customer-focused
Our customers are at the centre of everything we do, inspiring us to create great work. We strive to build friendly, professional and lasting relationships with them to better understand and anticipate their needs. -
Gold Standard
We are experts in our field and are constantly developing our technology and offering. We set the benchmark in our industry: both in what we offer customers and in how we deliver it.
Cambridge Spark is an Equal Opportunities Employer
Cambridge Spark is an Equal Opportunities Employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any kind. Cambridge Spark is committed to the principle of equal employment opportunities for all employees and to providing employees with a work environment free of discrimination and harassment. All employment decisions at Cambridge Spark are based on business needs, job requirements and individual qualifications, without regard to race, colour or ethnicity, ability or disability, gender or gender reassignment, sexual orientation, marital status, religion, age or any other status protected by the laws or regulations in the locations where we operate. Cambridge Spark will not tolerate discrimination or harassment based on any of these characteristics. Cambridge Spark encourages applicants of all ages.
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