IT Manager - Centre of Excellence in Digital Systems (CEDS)

Job Purpose

The Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education (BCRRE) is Europe's largest academic-based group delivering railway science and education. With over 130 academics, researchers and professional support staff, BCRRE provides world class research and thought leadership within railways and offers an expanding portfolio of high-quality education programmes.

BCRRE is the lead partner in the newly-launched £92m UK Rail Research and Innovation Network (UKRRIN) and home to one of UKRRIN's four Centres of Excellence, the Centre of Excellence in Digital Systems (CEDS).

BCRRE is seeking to appoint a talented individual to lead IT service provision across the CEDS. The successful candidate, who will have demonstrable experience in the delivery of IT services in an enterprise environment, will be responsible for planning, procuring, and deploying IT infrastructure/services according to the needs of the centre, leading day-to-day IT support activities within the centre, managing centre IT staff, and liaising with industrial partners on matters involving technical requirements / specifications.

The successful candidate will be responsible for the development and operational management of IT infrastructure within the UKRRIN Centre of Excellence in Digital Systems (CEDS), including the delivery of timely IT support and planning for new services at levels of availability appropriate to the task, in accordance within the requirements of BCRRE and UKRRIN staff. The post-holder will sit within the BCRRE professional services team, a committed group of research & teaching support, and business development staff, working closely with all members of BCRRE to deliver the goals of the UKRRIN Centre of Excellence in Digital Systems. The role will require ongoing dialogue with stakeholders from across the industry, and it is expected that the successful candidate will be able to liaise with industry staff to ensure UKRRIN CEDS project outcomes (e.g. data being delivered by lineside hardware, or published/processed data streams resulting from analytics) are suitable for integration with partner IT systems as appropriate.

Person Specification

• Degree level or equivalent qualifications in a software, computing or scientific discipline, or equivalent experience.
• Demonstrable specialised knowledge and support experience of several of the following areas: Active Directory, Windows desktop administration and patch management, Linux server and desktop administration, enterprise IT security, scientific application management (e.g. Matlab, Solidworks, Labview)
• Demonstrable knowledge of legislation and legal requirements relevant to enterprise IT systems (e.g. GDPR).
• Proven structured and methodical approach to problem solving.
• Proven ability to priories and schedule assigned workloads in the face of conflicting demands.
• Proven ability to formulate a budget, manage and control costs.
• Demonstrable strong customer service orientation with the ability to understand and communicate user requirements, negotiate with centre staff, and to influence and resolve conflict with both internal and external partners where appropriate.
• Proven ability to motivate staff and provide clear direction with respect to requirements and expectations of BCRRE and its industrial partners.
• Strong leadership and management skills, an attention to detail, and an understanding of the importance of adhering to agreed procedures.
• An ability to communicate with staff at all levels (including non-IT specialists), both verbally and in writing.
• Must be able to provide an overview of complex issues, summarising key points to both Admin and specialist staff involved.
• Demonstrably good understanding of service management, change, configuration best practices, processes and procedures is a necessity.
• A proven track record of managing at least one IT support person.
• Demonstrable project management skills / experience, ideally supported by a relevant qualification in project management, e.g. PRINCE2.

Desirable

• Proven experience of managing service provision in an enterprise IT environment - previous experience of supporting IT systems in an engineering environment would be an advantage.
• Demonstrable knowledge of the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) v3 framework at Foundation Level is desirable, but not essential.
• Demonstrable experience and knowledge of the railway industry and digital-related railway research is desirable, but not essential.

Closing Date 5 Jun 2019