Head of Software Engineering

Are you ready to lead a team as passionate about public service and technical excellence as you are? The ARE (Agriculture and Rural Economy) Directorate of the Scottish Government is part of the DG Net Zero family of Directorates. ARE’s mission is to work together with stakeholders to enable vibrant and thriving communities and businesses, that protect and enhance Scotland’s nature.

ARE relies on digital services to deliver its commitment to support Scotland’s sustainable economic growth in agriculture, the food industry and in rural areas. It does this through direct payments; a broad range of best practice support and education; and ensuring compliance with regulations. For example, round £600 million is paid annually to customers using the major Rural Payments and Services (RP&S) digital platform and other supporting systems.

ARE Digital and Data (AD&D) is responsible for providing the capability and capacity that ensures these digital services are reliable, secure and up to date. This requires a broad range of technical competencies, mostly provided by in-house and contracted specialists working in multidisciplinary teams.

In this role you will be Head of the Software Engineering domain within the division with responsibility for ensuring ARE’s digital services are developed and maintained to consistently high standards. You will be instrumental in building software engineering capability within the team and will collaborate with Platform, Data, Site Reliability and Cyber Security engineering functions to deliver the Directorate's key digital outcomes including playing a pivotal role in our cloud adoption journey.

Responsibilities

• Delivery & Quality: Technical responsibility for all the stages and iterations of assigned software development projects providing technical advice to stakeholders and set the team-based standards for programming tools and techniques. Leading and developing a team of experts to deliver service improvements you identify and implement opportunities to optimise processes; identify availability and capacity issues, identify, and instigate the required changes. Applying the most appropriate modern standards and practices, coaching and guiding others in these standards advising on the right way to apply standards and methods to ensure compliance.
• Design: Designing systems characterised by medium levels of risk, impact, and business or technical complexity. Establish and iterating design patterns selecting appropriate design standards, methods, and tools, and ensure they are applied effectively. Reviewing the systems designs of others to ensure the selection of appropriate technology, efficient use of resources and integration of multiple systems and technology.
• Prototyping: Advocating for, participating in the use of prototypes, and testing with others, using a variety of prototyping methods and choose the most appropriate.
• Systems Integration: Defining the integration build, co-ordinate build activities across systems and understand how to undertake and support integration testing activities.
• User Focus: Collaborating with user researchers and representing users internally championing user research to focus on all users. You prioritise and define approaches to understand the user story, guiding others in doing so and offer recommendations on the best tools and methods to use.

Success Profile

Success profiles are specific to each job, and they include the mix of experience, skills and behaviours candidates will be assessed on.

Experience:

• Lead Criteria 1 - You write it: Your experience building solutions to problems of high complexity using modern web technologies allows you to use agreed specifications to independently design, code, test and document programs or scripts of high complexity, using the right standards and tools.
• Lead Criteria 2 - You run it: Your experience developing and deploying live systems, allows you to define the monitoring, alerting, and operational procedures of an application in order to consistently identify, locate and fix faults.
• You Design: Your experience engineering systems, with a variety of technologies and patterns allows you to design systems, choosing appropriate technology, approaches, and embedded security controls.
• You Lead: Your experience as a manager enables you to lead improvements to the operation of the engineering organisation, leading initiatives to improve overall engineering team performance.

Experience is assessed at sift, along with a more in-depth assessment at interview.

Technical Skills: This role is aligned to the Lead Developer – Management role within the Software Engineering/Development job family. These skills are assessed by technical assessment, designed to represent the role. Candidates reaching this stage will receive a Technical Assessment Candidate Pack which outlines the specific skills to be assessed, plus the method of assessment.

Behaviours: Making Effective Decisions – Level 4, Working Together – Level 4.

How To Apply: Apply online, providing a CV and Supporting Statement (of no more than 750 words) which provides evidence of how you meet each of the 4 Experience criteria listed in the Success Profile above. Candidates will have their applications assessed against all Experience criteria. If a large number of applications are received an initial sift will be conducted on the Lead Criteria highlighted above. Candidates who pass the initial sift will have their applications fully assessed. If invited for further assessment, this will consist of an interview and DDaT Technical assessment where the behaviours, experiences and technical skills outlined in the Success Profile will be assessed.

About Us: The Scottish Government is the devolved government for Scotland. We have responsibility for a wide range of key policy areas including education, health, the economy, justice, housing, and transport. We offer rewarding careers and employ people across Scotland in a wide range of professions and roles. Our staff are part of the UK Civil Service, working for Ministers and senior stakeholders to deliver vital public services which improve the lives of the people of Scotland. We offer a supportive and inclusive working environment along with a wide range of employee benefits.

Working Pattern: Our standard hours are 35 hours per week, we offer a truly flexible working including full-time, part-time, flexitime, and compressed hours meaning you could work your full hours while working less than 5 days per week.

If you have specific questions about the role you are applying for, please contact Douglas.Chisholm@gov.scot.

DDaT Pay Supplement: This post is part of the Scottish Government Digital, Data and Technology (DDAT) profession, as a member of the profession you will join the professional development system. This post currently attracts a £5,000.00 annual DDAT pay supplement, applicable after a 3-month competency qualifying period. The payment will be backdated to your start date in the role. Pay supplements are reviewed regularly and there is one currently underway. Changes will be communicated when the review is concluded.

Equality Statement: We are committed to equality and inclusion, and we aim to recruit a diverse workforce that reflects the population of our nation.

Further Information: Find out more about our organisation, what we offer staff members and how to apply on our Careers Website. Read our Candidate Guide for further information on our recruitment and application processes.

Apply before: 25th May (23:59)