IT Infrastructure Lead

This is a senior post within the IT Department reporting to the Head of IT & Telecoms. The post-holder is responsible for the company’s Information Technology infrastructure including servers, backup and associated services. The post provides direction of technical strategy for equipment including technical improvements, the technical services budget, technical security controls. This includes maintaining technology service levels by managing updates, securing technology and managing a team of technical specialists. This individual leads on all project related work with an infrastructure requirement. This involves leading on infrastructure design and planning activities to both maintain the business systems but also ensure services are fit for purpose in the delivery of new solutions and services as required by the organisation.

Key Areas of Responsibility & Accountability

• Prioritise own time whilst ensuring deliver of targets set out by the Head of IT Operations.
• Will need to be flexible and adjust work schedules in order to meet departmental, business and customer requirements.
• Maintain a thorough awareness of current and emerging technologies that may be beneficial to the business and undertake the piloting and testing of these where appropriate.
• Being able to produce documentation and positioning papers when required.
• Maintain awareness of health-related information technology systems and their capabilities.
• Maintain an awareness of associated National policies and initiatives.
• Understand, document and support the needs of National applications where they have dependences upon IT Infrastructure.

Team Management

• Conduct regular one-to-one meetings to provide coaching, reinforce leadership values, and support personal and professional development of team members.
• Management of Infrastructure Support Team including supporting of other Managers within the IT Department.
• Lead on the 3rd line Incident out of hours on-call service alongside the Technical Services Manager.
• Ensure appraisals and target setting is conducted for all Infrastructure staff.
• Lead the IT Infrastructure team providing clear leadership and management.
• Deputise for the Head of IT Operations as required.

Technical Management

• Responsible for the maintenance and up-keep for all IT infrastructure assets, including servers, storage and network components including their maintenance and support.
• Manage vendor and supplier relationships, ensuring accountability and maintaining detailed records of service deliverables across both project work and business-as-usual (BAU) operations.
• Ensuring that the monitoring of IT performance and capacity is in place with regular reports being provided.
• To ensure all infrastructure faults / outages are resolved in a timely fashion being the first point of escalation past the Service Desk for such incidents.
• To ensure that appropriate backups exist of all infrastructure assets through the implementation of suitable controls and procedures.
• Will identify and diagnose system problems; providing resolution or temporary workaround options.
• Will provide expertise to the implementation and ongoing support of infrastructure network systems.
• Will respond to complex queries relating to IT infrastructure systems and services and be the technical authority for such requests.
• Understand and resolve highly complex technical and organisational issues in identifying and providing solutions.

Departmental Interfaces

• The post holder will be the prime point of escalation for IT infrastructure issues.
• To ensure that, in close collaboration with the Head of Cyber Security & IT Project Manager, that all Infrastructure assets have appropriate threat mitigation controls / Intrusion Detection controls, Infrastructure Risks and Project Deliverables.
• Support the data and Information Security requirements of the business and according to local and national governance and policy.
• Contribute to IT projects and solutions, meeting the agreed quality standards, timescales and cost budgets.
• In collaboration with Procurement, manage existing IT support contracts through appropriate engagement with suppliers.
• To participate in internal forums, meetings and standing committees as required and to contribute information in regard to central services.
• Negotiate with and influence users and suppliers to ensure project goals are met.

Knowledge Management

• Maintain specialist knowledge in IT infrastructure that may be beneficial to the business and participate in piloting and testing of these where appropriate.
• In collaboration with other departmental staff, maintain appropriate documentation and CMDB with regard to Infrastructure and how they underpin our Services.
• Ensure system and user documentation is available for all systems they implement or upgrade and make sure that this is kept up to date.
• Create technical documentation with a clear understanding of the business and user needs.
• Acquire and maintain detailed knowledge of the IT infrastructure and technologies so that enquiries can be clearly and quickly addressed.

Policy and Procedure

• Adhere and contribute to the creation of departmental change control procedures; providing feedback to the Head of IT & Telecoms where appropriate.
• Development and maintaining of standard operating procedures.
• To adhere to business policies and procedures relating to the operation and security of systems.
• To develop, in collaboration with the Head of Cyber Security, Head of IT Operations, Technical Services Manager, Disaster Recovery / Business Continuity plans for business systems and services and to ensure testing of procedures.
• To ensure any process they put in place maintains data integrity, security and quality.
• Ensure business continuity plans are followed in relation to the support and maintenance of IT Infrastructure.

Communication Skills

• Deliver complex material to a non-technical audience.
• The post holder may be required to communicate with senior managers and project stakeholders to provide feedback, risk analysis, project status and details of emerging issues.

Projects and Change

• Devolved responsibility for IT Infrastructure projects and funds including associated support contracts.
• To analyse, compare and implement highly complex technical solutions.
• Plan and manage the delivery of projects as directed by the Head of IT & Telecoms.
• Plan significant changes to business IT systems and services when required in line with Change Management procedures.
• Ensure that any system or service implementations they contribute towards are fully tested and comply with security and confidentiality standards.
• Create and maintain high quality project documentation such as highlight / progress / exception / completion reports etc. as appropriate.

Strategic Management

• Be responsible for IT infrastructure procurement through the planning and requisition of such assets in line with agreed budget set out by the Head of IT & Telecoms and Procurement.
• Plan activities to avoid or minimise disruption to business systems and services co-ordinating with senior managers and Information Asset Owners.
• Provide strategic direction alongside the Head of IT & Telecoms with the freedom to operationally manage their activities necessary to fulfil business / Department strategic objectives.
• As you will expect the organisation may change from time to time and you will be expected to meet the operational requirements.
• Any other reasonable duties as required from time to time.

To be successful in this role, you will need:

• Significant experience working in a complex IT environment.
• High level of technical knowledge.