Student Solutions Designer

This is an exciting role offering opportunity for the successful candidate to expand their skills set for managing and developing the University’s Student applications – ensuring that they meet the current and future needs of the University. 

As a Student Solutions Designer, the role is focused on delivering innovative Student Solutions that represent good value in line with the university’s Education Strategies and Architecture Design.  The post holder will act as a change agent to transition quality solutions to IT Services and the user community. The post holder will be a technical expert and a solutions architect responsible for managing the introduction of new solutions and enhancements of Student application such as University Timetabling Systems, Exams & Assessments Systems, Student Information Systems (SITS), Library Management Systems and other related applications in the landscape. 

The successful candidate will be innovative and have a good understanding of solution development lifecycle. They will have experience working with one or more applications within Student domain and excellent technical analysis and problem-solving skills and be able to communicate effectively with both technical and non-technical colleagues at all levels. 

The role will report to the Student Solutions Manager. 

This post will be offered on a full-time, indefinite contract.

• To provide IT Solutions Designs for assigned student products
• To develop the technical vision for a Solution, focused on ‘building the thing’ right
• To design end to end IT solutions that meet customer needs encompassing infrastructure, hardware and software
• To develop and acquire deep E&S domain knowledge
• To provide Design and Solution Architecture, Subject Matter Expertise, along with Service Improvement delivery (including the design artifacts to ensure the solution to meet the business needs, delivered to the agreed standard and fit with architectural principles, standards, etc. in collaboration with the IT Architecture team)
• To participate in horizontal teams both within the IT directorate and across to our business partners
• An ability to work under pressure, utilising your initiative and workload prioritization
• Responsible for translating performance requirements into specific system technical design requirements and functions
• Provide the third line support for applications within Student domain

The above list of responsibilities may not be exhaustive, and the post holder will be required to undertake such tasks and responsibilities as may reasonably be expected within the scope and grading of the post.  

Essential criteria  

1.        Education to degree standard and/or equivalent qualification and experience 

2.        Good knowledge or working experience of providing designing/developing/supporting one or more applications/systems within Student domain (e.g. SITS, Timetabling (Teaching/Exam), Library Management systems, Admission Portal, InPlace, Kaizen, etc)   

3.        In-depth expertise of developing design and architectures for deployment in virtualised on-premises, cloud or hybrid environments  

4.        Good understanding of Student application architecture including familiarisation with SQL, .net, Windows server o/s, virtualization, cloud computing, systems and data security issues, etc.   

5.        Extensive, demonstrable experience in the integration aspects of solution architecture using a variety of protocols and transport mechanisms  

6.        Good understanding of the full solution development lifecycle   

7.        Ability to seek innovative and cost-effective solutions to suit changing priorities with well-developed analytical and problem-solving skills   

8.        Experienced in understanding functional and non-functional for specifying product requirements  

9.        Experienced in working with third parties (both internal and external) to deliver IT solutions   

10.     Excellent stakeholder engagement with key stakeholders in the Education and Students domain on the development and use of Student and Education Products and IT Services  

11.     An understanding of data and integration technologies   

12.    Excellent presentation skills and the ability to confidently communicate   

Desirable criteria

1.       Experience of solution design and architecture   

2.       Knowledge and understanding of cloud computing technology    

3.       Appreciation of key issues within the HE sector (political, social, economic) and appreciation of how these forces drive technology requirements and solutions    

4.       Project and Service Management qualifications/experience (e.g., APM, ITIL 4 )