About the job

Job summary

Do you want to join Defence and play your part in supporting our armed forces to operate effectively?  

Each year a third of the Defence budget is spent on Support. The Defence Support Organisation sits at the heart of providing support to the UK's Armed Forces. We provide logistic and engineering services to UK Armed Forces at home and abroad and have a broad remit spanning from planning to operational delivery. 

We offer an inclusive, encouraging working environment providing opportunities for you to thrive in your role and progress your career. Our core values are Respect, Trust, Understanding and Kindness as we passionately believe these will enable both a diverse workforce and ultimately high performing teams. 

We are looking for enthusiastic and motivated individuals who will embrace these values and proactively demonstrate the principles of inclusion within the organisation. 

This Grade 6 role is eligible for the MOD Digital Skills Allowance (DSA).  The successful candidate can apply for the DSA, which provides an annual non-pensionable pay increment of £6k, £12k or £18k.  Skills will be assessed by an annual MOD moderation panel against the Enterprise Architect role described in the DDAT Capability Framework.

This position is advertised at 37 hours per week.

Strategic Command is going through a significant transformation programme which aims to improve the way the Command conducts its business and delivers for Defence and the nation. As a consequence of this, all posts within Strategic Command Headquarters and in time the wider organisation, are/will be subject to review and potential changes as we continuously improve across the period of the transformation programme. These changes may be minor or could be more substantive and will generate new opportunities. Throughout, the Command’s transformation programme is committed to following the MOD’s framework on managing and supporting people through the change process and places an emphasis on early and open consultation and engagement with the Command’s personnel and Trade Unions.

Job description

Welcome Message from Richard Puttick, CIO of Defence Support.

Would you like to be an integral part of one of the largest digital transformations in UK Government, and play a leading role in modernising our Defence Support processes and systems to face a rapidly changing world? 

Our focus is to transform service delivery through the provision of cutting-edge enterprise solutions, delivering improved outcomes for our users. We architect, design, integrate and govern coherent digitally enabled capabilities for the Support function, which accounts for over £10Bn of MOD annual expenditure. We are looking for people who can help change the Defence Support enterprise for all Defence users, from industry partners to front line operations globally.  If you are capable, curious and experienced, have experience with enterprise architecture, and a digital, data, technical or cyber background, and you want to make a difference to Defence, this is your opportunity to grasp an exceptional challenge. 

Person specification

We are looking for an effective Principal Enterprise Architect to drive improvement by developing the Enterprise Architecture Team, defining good practice, and implementing business transformation.

The Principal Enterprise Architect will provide direction to Defence Support business units and digital leadership, and will network with senior stakeholders across Defence and partner organisations to drive continuous improvement. The successful individual will develop, mature and deliver effective Service roadmaps to support delivery of capabilities and strategic objectives. The role will maximise the opportunities for business change and deliver successful outcomes through a structured approach which embeds CIO architecture and integration principles as a permanent feature of future change initiatives.

Responsibilities of the role include, but are not limited to:

• Providing architecture direction, management advice, and support across the CIO team. 
• Delivering appropriate architecture models, insights, options, and recommendations to support delivery of change programmes.
• Delivering digital service roadmaps aligned with strategic organisational goals.
• Ensuring appropriate architecture governance, processes and practices are in place.
• Prioritising, planning, and managing delivery priorities including status and progress reporting.
• Ensuring alignment with wider Defence Enterprise Architecture practice

 

Highly Desirable 

Enterprise and Business Architecture (good practice, standards, methodologies, and tooling)	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Solution architecture	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Emerging technology trends	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Innovation	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Consultancy (digital)	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Methods & Tools (digital)	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Stakeholder relationship management	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Professional development	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Workforce planning	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6
Performance management (of digital teams)	Highly Desirable	SFIA Level 6

 

Desirable 

Computing/IT/Engineering	Desirable	Certificate of Higher Education
Computing/IT/Engineering	Desirable	Diploma of Higher Education
Computing/IT/Engineering	Desirable	BSc (Honours)
BCS Membership	Desirable	Associate Membership
BCS Certificate in Enterprise & Solutions Architecture	Desirable	Intermediate/Practitioner
Togaf 9.1	Desirable	Certified
Archimate 3	Desirable	Practitioner

Training can be provided where specific skills are missing.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £67,820, Ministry of Defence contributes £18,311 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

Things you need to know

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Experience and Technical skills.

Sift and interview will be based on the required experience, behaviours and functional competencies for the role, your CV should capture the relevant experience set out in the Person Specification.

Interview dates will be shared once the sift has been completed.

CV: Candidates will be required to provide CV details to include job history; qualification details and previous skills and experience.

At Sift, you will be assessed against the following Success Profiles Behaviours:

• Seeing the Big Picture
• Making Effective Decisions
• Communicating and Influencing

At Interview, you will be assessed against the following Success Profiles Behaviours:

• Leadership

Core Technical Skills for Interviewing:

• Enterprise and business architecture
• Making and guiding decisions
• Problem definition and shaping
• Strategic design and business change

Technical Skills Framework:

Enterprise architect - Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework (ddat-capability-framework.service.gov.uk)

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equality of opportunity. There is a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. If you need to advise us that you need additional help or reasonable adjustments for the recruitment process, please contact: DBSCivPers-Resourcingteam3@mod.gov.uk .

As a result of the changes to the UK immigration rules which came into effect on 1 January 2021, the Ministry of Defence will only offer sponsorship for a skilled worker visa under the points based system, where a role has been deemed to be business critical.

The role currently being advertised has not been assessed as business critical and is therefore NOT open to applications from those who will require sponsorship under the points based system. Should you apply for this role and be found to require sponsorship, your application will be rejected and any provisional offer of employment withdrawn.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check. Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window). People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window). The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.