Data Manager in London

Our Future Health is an ambitious collaboration between the public, charity and private sectors, designed to help people live healthier lives for longer through better prevention, earlier detection and improved treatment of diseases. We will speed up the discovery of new methods of early disease detection, and the evaluation of new diagnostic tools, to help identify and treat diseases early, when outcomes are usually better. With over 2.5M volunteers across the UK, we are now the world’s biggest health research programme of its kind, and our volunteer group is also more diverse than other, similar health research programmes. Technology and data are central to our mission.

We are looking for a Data Manager to join our Data Operations Team and work at national scale on a mission that genuinely improves lives. This is a rare opportunity to work within the data management across a range of large-scale data types, including genetic and health records data; as well as gain exposure to governance, product-oriented approaches, with further opportunities to learn about technical systems, agile delivery, and data as a product.

As a Data Manager you will champion data governance as an enabler rather than a blocker, whilst being an important liaison between the data protection and engineering teams. You will support the safe, effective and scalable use of health data by implementing and supporting practical processes that protect participant trust and enable researchers and teams to use data effectively and with confidence.

Responsibilities

• Help maintain trust in Our Future Health by making sure data is governed, accessed and used responsibly, in line with legal, ethical and information security requirements.
• Help internal teams and researchers use data easily, effectively, and with confidence by putting practical processes and guidance in place.
• Improve how we work day to day by strengthening data management workflows, supporting consistent decisions, and reducing friction around data access.
• Support the organisation as it grows by embedding data management practices that are clear, repeatable, and able to scale over time.
• Help define the scope, specifications, and operational requirements for new data flows, and support teams to resolve issues when they arise.
• Build strong, collaborative relationships with technology, information security, and data protection teams to understand requirements and stay aligned.
• Help develop and maintain data policies and procedures that protect participant privacy, support lawful and accurate data use, enable high-quality data releases and scale with the organisation.
• Keep clear, up-to-date documentation of data management processes, decisions and support workflows, and look for ways to improve and streamline them.
• Support the development of scalable data management and governance solutions, providing clear, well-structured input into technical solutions owned by other teams.
• Support the roll-out and adoption of governance tools and processes by promoting good practice, creating training materials, running sessions, and communicating clearly with different user groups.
• Provide second-line support for data users, helping to triage requests, resolve routine data queries, and escalate issues when specialist input is needed.
• Act as a trained Airlock Reviewer when required, supporting the safe import and export of data, tools and outputs within our Trusted Research Environment.

Requirements

• Ability to contribute to the design and implementation of operational frameworks and ways of working that support strategic goals and work at scale.
• Ability to draft and refine technical policies and processes informed by business needs and stakeholder input, with support from peers and senior specialists.
• Ability to engage and influence stakeholders to help embed new processes.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to explain technical concepts in accessible, value-driven terms.
• Ability to work effectively with technology teams and contribute clear, well-structured requirements into technical delivery work.
• Familiarity with agile delivery and supporting incremental adoption of new tools or processes.
• A solid understanding of data management best practices, GDPR, information security standards such as ISO 27001 and the NHS Data Security and Protection Toolkit.
• Resilience and motivation to problem solve.
• Working knowledge of R or Python, sufficient to understand, run and review outputs from code.

Although not essential, this would be helpful:

• Experience with metadata management, data lineage and cataloguing tools, data quality management and observability systems.
• An understanding of the needs of how data is used by researchers.
• Experience of designing and delivering training to users on new systems / processes.

Benefits

• Competitive base salary from £58,000.
• Generous Pension Scheme - We invest in your future with employer contributions of up to 12%.
• 30 Days Holiday pro rata.