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Solution Architect
Inside IR35
Manchester Based
3 Months contract 

The ideal candidate will have worked within the higher education sector previously:

We are seeking a Solution Architect to join our existing architecture team within the ITS Strategy & Architecture department. This team is responsible for architectural design and governance, translating IT strategy into design principles, standards, and guidance. The Strategy & Architecture team plays a key role in defining and understanding IT needs across the organization. The team includes specialists in information architecture, solution architecture, business analysis, and business architecture.

The role:

Initially, this role will be focused on contributing to our Evolve programme, aimed at providing stable and highly available IT services that support both current and future needs. The primary responsibilities of this position include driving the delivery of the "Colleague and Student Compute" and "Environments" workstreams.

The Person:

We are looking for someone with strong engagement, collaboration, and influencing skills, with a passion for working within a large, complex organization. You should be an effective communicator with the ability to guide and support a diverse range of individuals in realizing and implementing solutions. You must be comfortable presenting highly complex information and strategic plans to various stakeholders.

The ideal candidate will have a broad range of technical skills, knowledge, and experience across a wide array of applications, technologies, and data. You should be comfortable working within a complex, heavily integrated system landscape. Experience with TOGAF, SAFe, or other architectural frameworks would be desirable, as well as a strong understanding of modern security principles and processes.

You will work within established governance and delivery frameworks, leading the creation of solution architectures across various implementations. This role involves merging project requirements with strategic roadmaps and principles to ensure project success. Additionally, you will contribute to specific programs of work, collaborating with Engineering teams and suppliers throughout the project lifecycle.

- Enhance the experience for students in PC cluster environments and provide a more robust service for colleagues.
- Develop a new PC cluster provisioning service, including upgraded hardware, provisioning technologies, and a strategy linked to the Teaching and Learning strategy.
- Implement processes for preparing and issuing new organizationally managed devices to colleagues and postgraduate researchers using automation technology.
- Strengthen the relationship between IT Services and the Teaching and Learning community concerning computing services for colleagues and students.
- Familiarity with technologies such as Parallels, AppsAnywhere, and Tanium would be beneficial.

Environments:

- Deliver on-demand, high availability, reusable, stable, and managed environments using industry-standard tools.
- Implement on-demand and automated builds for environments in our core systems.
- Improve release management and data obfuscation technologies and processes.
- Establish robust guidelines, standards, and governance.
- Knowledge of technologies such as Nutanix, VMWare, and Terraform would be advantageous