Visionary Technical Strategist

Role Overview:

• We are seeking an exceptional Technical Lead to oversee the technical aspect of our operations and provide IT support for our MPMS Retirement Solutions application environments and interfaces.

Key Responsibilities:

• Led a team from a technical perspective, providing IT support related to the MPMS Retirement Solutions application environments and interfaces both on-prem and cloud.
• Diagnosed, resolved, root cause analysis of issues, identified and documented problem workarounds, and provided support for scheduled release upgrades and deployments.
• Ensured service requests were appropriately actioned according to service levels and performance targets, managed and provided technical support to core business application environments to ensure 24x7 availability.
• Driven an automation-first culture and developed CI & CD pipelines, ensuring repeatability and resilience was at the heart of all we did.
• E nsured platforms conformed to the necessary HA BC and DR requirements and worked with the wider DevOps team to deliver a resilient environment platform.
• Worked with management and other technology stakeholders to implement best practice, tooling, and methodology to enhance and grow the capability and quality of the service provided by the Business to our Clients.

Accountabilities and Main Responsibilities:

• Strategic Focus
  • Operational Support and Continuous Improvement of Infrastructure Estate, Processes, Development and Test Environments (System, Load, Performance, UAT) for Link Group up to and including Production.
  • Automation, Process Efficiency, and Appropriate Tooling (Management and Deployment/Configurations) Was Utilised to Reduce Cycle Times, Improve Reliability, Audit, and Traceability for All System Deployments Across Multiple Applications.
  • Process, Best Practice, and System Build Standards Were Consistently Applied and Constantly Improved Upon.
  • Ensured That Working With DevOps, the Development Team Had the Right Environment to Maximise the Development Teams' Efficacy and Obstacles Were Removed and Automation Introduced Where Appropriate.
• Operational Management
  • Production Was Managed, Supported, and Controlled with the Appropriate Level of Governance and Agility.
  • Production Environments Were Protected by Governance, Good Practice/Process, Design, and 'Fit for Purpose' Environments, to the Left of Pre-Prod, Supporting All Project and Change Activity.
  • Ensured Project and Change Release(s) Were Packaged to the Right Quality, Repeatable Between Environments Without Change or Modification and Deployed to the Target Environments - Ultimately to Production Without Detriment or Issue in Agreed Timescales.
  • Ensured Software and Application Design Was Challenged, and Contributed to Design in Any Change/Project, Ensuring It Was the Best It Could Be Aligned to the Constraints of the Project/Change.
  • Weak Points in Process, Technology, and Service Were Addressed Through a Culture of Continual Improvement;
  • Software and Processes Were Correctly Documented to Ensure Single Points of Knowledge Did Not Become a Problem and Skills Were Distributed Across the Team and Department.
  • Ensured That Software Deliverables/Artefacts, as Part of Any Change/Project, Were Progressed Providing Appropriate Status Reporting and Updates as Requested by the Line/Project/Change Lead.
• People Leadership
  • Provided Skilled, Capable Resource to Project/Change Leads Suited to the Delivery. Where Gaps in Skills or Resource Existed; These Were Managed to Reduce the Risk to Change, Projects or the Business
  • Managed a Team of Test Environment Engineers & Middleware Specialists and Supported the Environment Management on Non-Prod Environments.
  • Developed Technical Skills Required for Test Environment Management Function for Self and the Team.
  • Provided EDT Support Along With the Global Team as Part of Test Environment Management Team.
• Governance & Risk
  • Ensured Percentage and Number of SLAs Met (Environment Availability, Responsiveness to Requests Etc);
  • Percentage of Releases/Deployments to Production Without Issue.
  • Post Deployment Incident Levels Achieving Set Targets.
  • Server Patch Levels Adhered to Policy.
  • Percentage of Formal Processes Documented.

Experience & Personal Attributes:

• 10+ Years of IT Experience in Relevant Technologies or Engineering Teams.
• 5+ Experience in Managing Projects, Services, and Engineering Teams Working on Cloud (Azure), IaaS, PaaS, and Other Infra Provisioning Services.
• Bachelor's Degree or Higher in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Management Information Systems, and/or Equivalent Work Experience.
• Cloud Fundamentals or Advanced Cloud/Data (Azure Cloud Preferred) Qualification Will Be Additional Advantage.
• Prior Experience in Leading Team of Platform Engineers and Support of Large Complex 24x7 Application Environments Is Essential.
• Ability to Work on New and Emerging Technologies As Required by Link Group Business.
• Strong Experience Providing Technical Support of Applications in Azure.
• Strong Experience in Implementing CI/CD in Multi-Branch Development Model.
• Strong Experience in Optimizing Processes Using DevOps Tooling and Integration for Applications Hosted on Both On-Prem and Azure.
• Strong Experience in Supporting Applications on J2EE, Java, JSP, Apache, and Tomcat.
• Strong Experience in Supporting Multiple Application Servers Including JBoss.
• Experience Supporting Complex Integrated Applications with API.
• Experience in Automation of Tasks Using Ansible, Jenkins, GitHub, PowerShell, Python, and Azure DevOps.
• Availability to Work on Call After Hours and Weekend in a Rostered 24x7 Environment.
• Knowledge of Oracle and SQL Server RDBMS and SQL Problem Solving & Scripting Skills Is Essential.
• Experience With IT Service Management Within ITSM / ITIL Framework.
• Sound Knowledge of MS Office Products.
• High Level of Problem-Solving Skills to Handle Complex Software and Interface Support Issues.

Personal Attributes:

• Good Documentation Skills.
• Strong Interpersonal Skills to Engage With People at All Levels of the Organisation and Build Strong Relationships and Trust With Clients and Internal Stakeholders.
• Experience in the Superannuation Industry or At a Minimum the Financial Services Industry.
• Highly Effective Communication, Collaboration, and Influencing Skills.
• Willingness to Accept Responsibility and Be Accountable for Service Provided.
• Strong Leadership Skills With a Focus on Coaching and Developing Teams.