Northgate Application Lead

A London based Local Authority are seeking a Northgate Application Lead on an initial 3 month contract inside IR35. This role will have 2-3 direct reports and requires experience with Northgate Housing System.
Role purpose

The Councils are focused on delivering the best possible outcomes for their communities. To do this we need managers who thrive in a networked organisation and who can provide strong operational leadership.

Key elements of the role:

• Understanding and supporting the Digital Strategy
• Working with their line manager and other leads/managers within the team to manage the team workload
• Directly managing a small number of reports and/or managing a virtual team working on a specific task or project
• Managing other resources such as physical or logical technology/software and vendor services
• Providing appropriate analysis and reporting within their area of expertise
• Coaching less senior members of the team both professionally and technically
• Acting as a lead across the department and the wider customer base in promoting, communicating and developing their area of expertise
• Seeking opportunities for innovation and collaboration
• Demonstrating the culture and values on a day-to-day basis.

The Application Lead role reports directly to the Application Manager and is responsible for the provision of application support, management and development services, either directly to users of the systems or to service delivery functions.

Its main purpose is to:

• Review releases, upgrades and fixes available from software suppliers and implement as appropriate. Maintain awareness of existing and emerging software and hardware solutions and develop upgrade plans
• Tailor software to ensure that the functionality of the application is fully exploited
• Coordinate application upgrades and prepare software implementation procedures with fall back contingency plans
• Analyse test requirements, design and build test case suites, test scripts, and test procedures, with expected results
• Investigate, diagnose and resolve application and database problems in accordance with service level agreements, communicating progress and escalating as necessary
• Investigate available information sources to establish what information is available
• Assesses the integrity of data from identified sources
• Assist users or act on their behalf to extract and manipulate data from applications and databases on an ad hoc basis
• Apply a variety of analytical and presentational techniques, in consultation with experts if appropriate and with sensitivity to the limitations of the techniques
• Ensure that all documentation is written, maintained and executed to the highest standards and act as a champion of the Quality Management System (QMS)
• Contribute to the Change Advisory Board
• Make the best use of resources and time to deliver business benefit to the Councils including flexibility in the resourcing approach that allows for variation in demand at their roles and develop their careers within the department and the wider Councils
• Ensure that requests for support are properly logged, assigned and responded to in a timely manner and according to agreed standards and procedures
• Investigate potential and actual service problems and recommend solutions
• Develop and use formal procedures to plan and test proposed solutions
• Work within and act as a champion of the Council's ITIL Framework.

Main duties of the job

• Design and develop user code to enhance or customise applications to satisfy business objectives and tailor applications to ensure maximum efficiency
• Gather performance statistics from the IT platforms to enable recommendations for the tuning of applications. Tailor application parameters to maximise throughput and efficiency
• Initiate action by systems development staff or software suppliers for system enhancements to overcome known problems or further fulfil user requirements
• Take responsibility for investigative work to determine business opportunities, and specify effective business processes. Specifies their implementation through improvements in information systems, data management, practices, organisation and equipment
• In liaison with colleagues in information governance and information security, contribute to the development and maintenance of corporate data standards
• Contribute to the development and implementation of the data management policy within the organisation.
• Leadership
• Provides inspirational and constructive leadership to the Application team to ensure high performance within a networked operating model
• Facilitates change and innovation, building a team culture that encourages innovative, smart and collaborative working
• Listens to, and works with colleagues to develop team goals in line with corporate strategy, and influences and motivates others to achieve this

The person

In order to successfully deliver the responsibilities of the role, you will need to:

• Have strong leadership skills, modelling a performance culture and constructively building achievement, confidence and skills in others
• Question and challenge conventional thinking, with a continual eye on the bigger picture in terms of the corporate context and external environment
• Role model agility and adaptability in mindset and ways of working
• Work successfully with key stakeholders including Members, residents, businesses, communities, partner organisations and other public services
• Demonstrate commitment to own personal and professional development to meet the changing demands of the role
• Demonstrate a high level of innovation and creativity.

Experience

• Experience of working in digital transformation across an organisation
• Experience in the management of the processes, systems and functions in complex IT and cloud environments
• Experience of complex application support environments
• Management of 3rd party contracts to ensure delivery of products and services to the agreed standard and timeline
• Budget management of environments and staff to minimise costs and ensure cost-effectiveness
• Experience in automated systems supporting specific business functions or processes. Examples: social care, housing management, libraries, customer services, finance
• Familiar with applications/processes which enable selective access to information held within some form of database or "data warehouse". Examples: Exporting data to a spreadsheet via ODBC, writing SQL statements, using Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services or Business Objects
• Proficient in Business Process Improvement Techniques for streamlining business processes which have been modelled and understood. Examples: error-proofing, value added assessment, process cycle time reduction, future-proofing, resilience, reliability, cost effectiveness.
• Principles, methods, techniques and tools for the effective allocation of resources to development projects and business as usual activity
• An understanding of ITIL practices and an appreciation of service hand over.

Please get in touch with lauren.pocknell@investigo.co.uk to be consdiered for this position