Senior Enterprise Architect

Available Locations

Liverpool, Newport, Norwich, Glasgow or Birmingham.

The following locations listed below are restricted to contracted GCA staff already based in one of these offices:

London, Bristol, Manchester or York.

External applicants are not eligible for these sites. If you select one of these locations as an external applicant your application will unfortunately be withdrawn.

Insight into GCA - Webinar

Watch our Webinar on the above link and gain valuable insight into GCA and our recruitment processes.

Ready to move beyond system design and drive a strategic roadmap that delivers true value for the nation? We are seeking a Senior Enterprise Architect to translate high-level strategy into a resilient, scalable digital estate for the public good.

If you’re prepared to own the architectural governance for products impacting millions of citizens, we want to hear from you. In this role, you will navigate the critical trade-offs between speed, cost, and quality—ensuring that every technical decision maximises efficiency and delivers public value across the organisation.

Job Summary

We are seeking a visionary Senior Enterprise Architect to act as the defining authority for our enterprise-wide DDaT strategy and architecture. In this high-impact role, you will perform as a versatile Enterprise Architect while bringing deep specialisation in data and integration—translating high-level strategic goals into coherent, resilient technical roadmaps and leading critical governance on investments and technical debt to ensure secure, scalable public service delivery. You will lead, mentor, and grow a unified team of Enterprise and Technical Architects, establishing the technical guardrails and maintaining strategic control while steering our complex digital transformation journey and managing preferred delivery partners.

Key Accountabilities:

• Strategic Vision & Roadmap Delivery - Convert the annual business plan into a clear, step-by-step blueprint for the future technology environment (Target State Architecture or TSA). You will manage the plans for moving from the current system to the future one, specifically for major initiatives, to make sure all projects are connected and support the overall business strategy.
• Governance & Assurance Leadership - You will be the technical voice on the Architecture Review Board (ARB). Your role is to manage the 'Front Door' review process, making sure new projects are checked for architectural soundness and fit before budget approval.
• Investment & Technical Debt Management - Ensure strategic bids allocate a dedicated remediation budget (15–20%) to mitigate technical debt.
• Senior Leadership Communication - Maintain the "Level Zero" Architecture Map as a streamlined executive view of the GCA technology estate for Board and ExCo decision-making.
• Blueprinting & Business Alignment - Partner with Business Architecture to create Enterprise Blueprints. You will take high-level strategic goals (e.g. "Improve SME Spend") and map them to specific technical capabilities and data flows required to deliver that outcome.
• Technical Standards & Principles - You will establish and enforce the Secure by Design and Data First architectural principles. You will set the non-negotiable rules that product teams must follow to ensure technical consistency, interoperability, and security across the organisation.
• Strategic Consultancy & Mentorship - Provide Architecture-as-a-Service to senior stakeholders, moving from "activity-based" updates to "outcome-based" advice. You will mentor a team of up to 1-2 architects, establishing a formal competency framework to elevate the team’s strategic influence.
• Architectural Steering & High-Level Design (HLD) - Author Architecture Steer papers to align stakeholders on major investments, and personally develop High-Level Designs for critical, complex initiatives to ensure long-term resilience and strategic alignment.

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• 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) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Experience and Technical skills.

Selection Process

Lead success profile is communicating and influencing.

A reserve list may be held for up to 12 months, which the Civil Service may use to fill future suitably similar vacancies across government for candidates who are considered appointable following interview. Should you be placed on a reserve list and want to be removed please contact recruitment@gca.gov.uk.

Please note that as part of this recruitment process, if you are unsuccessful at the interview stage but are close to the benchmark score you may be considered for and offered a role at a lower pay band within the same job family.

#GCAIND

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.