Deputy Director IT Release & Programme Delivery - Belfast

About the job

HMRC is the UK's tax and customs department. We collect the money that pays for the UK's public services and give financial support to people. Our work is central to the business of government and we're proud of our track record. We're an historic and yet modern department, undergoing ambitious transformation which affects all our colleagues and customers. As part of this we are focused on Making Tax Digital, transforming the experience for our customers. We want to make it easy for our customers to get their tax right, whilst enabling HMRC to fulfil its being trusted and valued ambitions.

The Making Tax Digital Programme (MTD) is delivering a fundamental change to tax to help digitalise UK business. MTD is part of the Government Major Projects Portfolio (GMPP), at the heart of HMRC's Tax Administration Strategy and one of HMRC's highest priorities. This cross-society transformation drives extensive interest across the political, business and tax spectrum. We are leading the way in the delivery of modern services for customers which will change how millions of businesses and landlords interact with the tax system, replacing the annual tax return with digital record keeping and quarterly updates. MTD will make it easier for individuals and businesses to get their tax right and will help reduce the amount of tax lost to avoidable errors.

This role is at the centre of everything that MTD does, leading the design and delivery of the services with which internal and external users. We need inspirational leaders to take people on this journey. You will be using your deep programme management expertise, visionary leadership and technology transformation capabilities to work in partnership with our business leaders, setting and delivering the technology transformation execution strategy to support critical activities for the country. You will be accountable for delivering the varied technology commitments and setting up appropriate live services for HMRC to run the processes seamlessly.

Job description

Ensure live service stability and resilience to maintain public confidence in HMRC's digital tax services and deliver GMPP commitments by providing strategic and technical leadership and oversight of the end-to-end customer delivery and live service resolution within the Making Tax Digital (MTD) programme. The role ensures that all hubs and processes operate seamlessly across design, delivery, and implementation, aligning with HMRC's strategic objectives.

• Defining our release plan - driving integration and consistency across programme components to deliver a coherent customer experience.
• Collaborating with senior stakeholders and other Deputy Directors to influence decisions, resolve escalations, and maintain alignment with policy and strategic goals.
• Championing continuous improvement and readiness for change, ensuring operational hubs are equipped to support programme milestones and benefits realisation.
• Accountable for the identification, prioritisation, and resolution of all live service incidents within the MTD programme, ensuring timely recovery and minimal customer impact.
• Own the end-to-end live service management process, including escalation handling, root cause analysis, and implementation of corrective actions.
• Responsible for coordinating across CDIO, operational hubs, and third-party suppliers to resolve incidents and maintain service continuity.
• Lead governance for live service performance, reporting incident trends and resolution progress to the MTD Senior Leadership Team and SRO.
• Build, maintain and lead strong delivery-focused multi-functional delivery teams, regularly assessing progress and value across the MFTs to identify efficiencies.
• Responsible for the technical delivery of MTD.
• Accountable for release planning and overall scope of the Income Tax Service.
• Develop effective release and delivery plans, frameworks and strategies.
• Create a culture of continuous improvement of delivery processes and standards within the programme.
• Drive innovation and learn from experience. Identify interdependencies, common capabilities and opportunities across the programme.
• Provide visible and effective leadership to deliver outcomes.
• Create an empowered environment in which the team can succeed - working effectively together and managing dependencies.
• Work with stakeholders and delivery partners to deliver the programmes end to end test strategy.
• Being accountable for the design and delivery of roadmap Features and Epics and Live Service Incidents solutions to time, cost and quality outcomes as set out in the Roadmap and the latest approved Business Case for MTD involving stakeholders in a clear and transparent manner.
• Ensure the programme is delivered to budget by managing financial forecasts and spend against those forecasts.

Person specification

The successful applicant will need to demonstrate relevant experience and effective delivery of the following essential criteria:

• Significant experience of technical IT delivery including build, test, and release management in the context of a major transformation programme.
• Industry experience of leading Agile delivery and in using Agile tooling such as Jira.
• Inclusive leadership skills - able to demonstrate the capacity to lead in a large and complex operational environment with evidence of developing, nurturing, and motivating high performing, diverse and talented teams.
• Experience of influencing and leading senior level stakeholders, ideally at C-Suite level.

Desirable Criteria:

• Knowledge and understanding of Income Tax Self Assessment and the complex interconnectivity of IT systems, ideally within HMRC's IT architecture and also with third party software being developed for MTD.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £81,000, HM Revenue and Customs contributes £23,465 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Your Civil Service pension is a valuable part of your total reward and is one of your biggest benefits. When you join the Civil Service, you get access to the alpha pension with a generous employer contribution of 28.97% and some of the lowest member contributions in the public sector.

Annual Leave and Bank Holiday Allowance: 25 days annual leave, increasing to 30 days after 5 years' service (allowance pro-rata for part-time colleagues). This is complemented by one day's paid privilege leave to mark the King's Birthday and is in addition to your public holidays.

Equality, Diversity & Inclusion: The Civil Service values and supports all its employees. At HMRC we want to create great places to work that are welcoming to all - where there is a strong sense of belonging and community. We embed inclusion in everything we do.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified, applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action.

Selection process details

This campaign is being managed by HMRC's Executive Resourcing team. All applications should be submitted via Civil Service Jobs no later than 23:55 on Monday 23rd February 2026 and must include:

• A CV detailing your career history, key responsibilities and achievements accounting for any employment gaps within the last two years.
• A Statement of Suitability (no longer than 2 pages) demonstrating how your experience meets the essential criteria.

Your CV and suitability statement will be assessed against the criteria set out in the person specification. Please include your full name on both documents.

Shortlist: The panel will assess the evidence provided in your CV and statement. Candidates whose applications best meet the essential criteria will be selected for interview.

Interview: You will attend a panel interview for a more in-depth discussion of your previous experience and professional competence. This will include a 5-minute verbal presentation. Interviews are expected to take place virtually via Microsoft Teams.

All Criminal Record Checks applications are considered fairly in accordance with the DBS Code of Practice and the Recruitment of ex-offenders Policy. Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

This role has a minimum assignment duration of 3 years. An assignment duration is the period of time a Senior Civil Servant is expected to remain in the same post to enable them to deliver on the agreed key business outcomes.

Security: Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check. People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard checks.

Nationality requirements: This job is broadly open to UK nationals, nationals of the Republic of Ireland, nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK, and 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).

Working for the Civil Service: The Civil Service Code 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. The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities.