Senior Technical Architect

As a pivotal member of HMRC’s multidisciplinary Innovation Team, you will collaborate with User Researchers, Analysts, Designers, Product Managers, Software Developers, Architects, and specialists in policy, innovation and technology. Together, you will develop innovative approaches for digital products that underpin end-to-end services across HMRC and government. This is a unique opportunity to drive meaningful change for HMRC and its customers, and to support a large-scale, dynamic transformation with significant impact on both our customers and staff.

Main Responsibilities

• Rapidly develop an understanding of technologies in use and HMRC’s overarching architecture strategy.
• Collaborate closely with Innovation scrum teams, business partners and IT colleagues to design and deliver innovative, operationally sound solutions that align with strategic end-to-end functional design.
• Demonstrate flexibility, initiative, attention to detail and a strong commitment to quality.
• Deliver customer-focused technology change, articulating complex technical detail in a manner accessible to non-technical audiences.
• Establish credibility and influence, communicating confidently and effectively with diverse stakeholders.
• Work creatively on inception and discovery projects, embracing a “fail fast” approach even where requirements and scope are undefined.
• Interpret and respond to challenges of varying scale, while identifying future opportunities through emerging technology and data, always considering user needs.
• Develop and test innovative concepts and solutions, supporting colleagues with technical and architectural expertise, and designing proof of concepts for future services.
• Engage with internal groups, third parties, external suppliers and academia to develop concepts and MVPs, and run proof of value exercises to demonstrate impact.
• Contribute to business cases and provide compelling recommendations for future direction, influencing policy and strategy at senior levels.

Person Specification

• Lead technical discussions between internal teams and external stakeholders, communicating concepts clearly and driving continuous improvement.
• Evaluate products and tools, delivering enterprise-appropriate recommendations.
• Develop a strong understanding of user needs, designing user-centred technical service propositions.
• Identify business problems and recommend technical solutions and designs.
• Undertake structural analysis of technical issues, translating these into solution-focused technical designs.
• Build collaborative relationships across teams and services.
• Compellingly articulate technical requirements and implications to technical and non-technical colleagues, senior leaders, business partners and customers.
• Work with innovators to design aspirational concepts for future services and processes.
• Mentor colleagues and contribute to the professional development of the team.

Essential Criteria

• Govern high and low-level designs across the full lifecycle, from requirements management to supporting operations teams with service introduction.
• Demonstrate effective, proactive and reactive communication with colleagues, business partners, customers and senior leaders.
• Bridge the gap between technical and non-technical stakeholders, translating technical concepts for universal understanding.
• Provide technical governance and ensure service assurance.
• Guide and make effective decisions, clearly explaining the rationale behind choices.
• Apply technology strategy to meet business and customer needs, creating, refining and challenging standards, policies, roadmaps and vision statements.
• Translate business problems into technical designs, working across multiple services or complex, large-scale projects.
• Remain informed of trends and practices outside HMRC, understanding their impact and integration into broader strategy.
• Look beyond immediate technical problems to identify wider implications and context.

Desirable Criteria

• Software development experience and technical architecture expertise.
• Knowledge of innovative and emerging technologies (e.g. Artificial Intelligence, Geospatial and Synthetic Data, Cryptocurrencies, Open Banking).
• Cloud computing experience, including design and implementation (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, or hybrid environments).
• Demonstrable understanding of agile methodologies and principles.

Join the HMRC Innovation Team and help shape the future of public services through technology, collaboration and forward-thinking solutions.