Department for Work and Pensions
Senior Software Engineer
Job Location
Newcastle Upon Tyne, United Kingdom
Job Description
As a Senior Software Engineer in The Garage Live Service team, you will be accountable for daily operational stability, ongoing development and maintenance of products and services for DWP.
You will coordinate multiple technical teams and stakeholders to oversee the smooth transition of products and services built within The Garage into live service running.
You will provide guidance to your teams that ensures the development of quality software products that have clean, secure, well-documented code following a test-driven approach in collaboration with architecture and engineering principles. With a focus on operational stability, robustness, resilience, availability and quality you will be accountable for the code your teams produce.
To develop, operate and maintain innovative, robust, secure, scalable and cost-effective automation products to be proud of, the Senior Software Engineer will utilise a blend of the latest techniques and technologies such as event-driven architecture, microservice architecture, serverless computing, containerisation, robotic process automation, artificial intelligence, machine learning, computer vision, natural language processing, and optical character recognition.
To help you really make a difference, youll be using the best tools and equipment for the job. We plan and track work in Jira, we document in SharePoint, we communicate using Teams and Slack, we commit, build and deploy code with GitLab, we use best-in-class cloud services from Amazon Web Services (AWS), and we do it all on MacBook Pro devices.
To support you in your role, youll have access to some fantastic learning and development resources; conferences with industry expert speakers, comprehensive instructor-led training, and subscriptions to digital training solutions such as Cloud Academy. You will also have access to support through direct Slack channels with our partners such as AWS, UiPath and MongoDB for every day on the job learning.You will:
Person specification
When giving details in your employment history and personal statement you should highlight your experience in line with essential criteria below:
* An initial sift may be conducted using the lead criterion stated above. Candidates who pass the initial sift will progress to a full sift.
If you would like to learn more about the role, please contact sam.hackett@dwp.gov.uk.
Benefits
We also have a broad benefits package built around your work-life balance which includes:
This job role may be suitable for hybrid working, which is where an employee works part of the week in their DWP office and part of the week from home. This is a voluntary, non-contractual arrangement and your office will be your contractual place of work. The number of days that anyone will be able to work at home will be determined primarily by business need but personal circumstances and other relevant circumstances will also be taken into account. If you are successful, any opportunities for hybrid working, including whether a hybrid working arrangement is suitable for you, will be discussed with you prior to you taking up your post.
Salary Information
Pay for this role is from 55,557 to 78,517.
The maximum salary for the grade is 66,058, however a Digital Allowance of up to 12,459 per annum is available for exceptional candidates. Digital Allowance is non-salary, and non-pensionable, and is classed as a temporary allowance. It is reviewed annually where it could be retained, amended, or removed.
Our offer to successful candidates will be based on an assessment of your skills and experience as demonstrated at interview.
Existing Civil Servants who secure a new role on lateral transfer should maintain their current salary.
Existing Civil Servants who gain promotion may move to the bottom of the grade pay scale or 10% increase in salary whichever would be the greater.
Things you need to know
Selection process details
As part of the application process you will be asked to complete a CV and Personal Statement. Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.
Stage 1: Application
Your application will consist of three parts:
1. A Personal Details application form.
2. Your employment history detailing your responsibilities, skills, accomplishments, plus your qualifications and relevant training. Please copy this information into the box field provided.
3. Personal statement up to 1000 words. Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.
When giving details in your employment history and personal statement you should highlight your experience in line withessential criterialisted inthe Person Specification.
The sift panel will use the information in your employment history and personal statement to assess your experience, skills and knowledge against the essential criteria above.
Applications will be sifted at regular intervals from the date the posts are advertised. Please apply as soon as you can, do not wait until the end of the campaign.
You will receive one combined score for both your Employment History/CV and Personal Statement, which will be provided in your Personal Statement score.
Sift and interview dates to be confirmed.
Important Information
Stage 2: Interview
If youre successful at sift stage you will be invited to a video interview via Microsoft Teams. There, you will be assessed against the experiences listed in the essential criteria.
You will be asked to do a (5 - minute) presentation on a specific topic. The use of visual aids such as PowerPoint is optional. There will be a further 5 minutes for questions Further details will be provided to candidates invited to interview.
Interviews will take place from early January 2025.
Further information
Find out more about Working for DWP
For Hints and Tips on completing your application visit Applying for jobs at DWP Digital.
A reserve list may be held for a period of 6 months from which further appointments can be made.
Reserve list candidates will be posted in merit order by location.
Security Clearance Requirement
For further information on National Security Vetting please visit the following page https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/demystifying-vetting
You must meet the security requirements before you can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check.
For meaningful checks to be carried out, you will need to have lived in the UK for a sufficient period of time, to enable appropriate checks to be carried out and produce a result which provides the required level of assurance. Whilst a lack of UK residency in itself is not necessarily a bar to a security clearance, and expectation of UK residency may range from 3 to 5 years. Failure to meet the residency requirements needed for the role may result in the withdrawal of provisional jobs offers.
The Civil Service values honesty and integrity and expects all candidates to abide by these principles. Please ensure that all examples provided in your application are taken directly from your own experience and that you describe the examples in your own words. Applications will be screened and if evidence of plagiarism or copying examples/answers from other sources is found, your application will be withdrawn. Internal DWP candidates may also face disciplinary action.
Reasonable Adjustment
At DWP we value diversity and inclusion and actively encourage and welcome applications from everyone, including those that are underrepresented in our workforce.
We consider visible and non-visible disabilities, neurodiversity or learning differences, chronic medical conditions, or mental ill health. Examples include dyslexia, epilepsy, autism, chronic fatigue, or schizophrenia.
If you need a change to be made so that you can make your application, you should: Contact Government Recruitment Service via DigitalRecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk as soon as possible before the closing date to discuss your needs.
Complete the Reasonable Adjustments section in the Additional requirements page of your application form to tell us what changes or help you might need further on in the recruitment process. For instance, you may need wheelchair access at interview, or if youre deaf, a Language Service Professional.
For further information on reasonable adjustments, terms and conditions and how we recruit visit the How We Recruit, page
Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.
Security
Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.
Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window) .
See our vetting charter (opens in a new window) .
People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.
Nationality requirements
This job is broadly open to the following groups:
Working for the Civil Service
The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.
We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window) .
The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.
The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.
Diversity and Inclusion
The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window) .
Location: Newcastle Upon Tyne, GB
Posted Date: 11/21/2024
You will coordinate multiple technical teams and stakeholders to oversee the smooth transition of products and services built within The Garage into live service running.
You will provide guidance to your teams that ensures the development of quality software products that have clean, secure, well-documented code following a test-driven approach in collaboration with architecture and engineering principles. With a focus on operational stability, robustness, resilience, availability and quality you will be accountable for the code your teams produce.
To develop, operate and maintain innovative, robust, secure, scalable and cost-effective automation products to be proud of, the Senior Software Engineer will utilise a blend of the latest techniques and technologies such as event-driven architecture, microservice architecture, serverless computing, containerisation, robotic process automation, artificial intelligence, machine learning, computer vision, natural language processing, and optical character recognition.
To help you really make a difference, youll be using the best tools and equipment for the job. We plan and track work in Jira, we document in SharePoint, we communicate using Teams and Slack, we commit, build and deploy code with GitLab, we use best-in-class cloud services from Amazon Web Services (AWS), and we do it all on MacBook Pro devices.
To support you in your role, youll have access to some fantastic learning and development resources; conferences with industry expert speakers, comprehensive instructor-led training, and subscriptions to digital training solutions such as Cloud Academy. You will also have access to support through direct Slack channels with our partners such as AWS, UiPath and MongoDB for every day on the job learning.You will:
- Lead multiple Software Engineering teams providing technical leadership and guidance.
- Provide coaching and mentoring to your teams to help with their professional development.
- Provide support for products running in live service, which will include out-of-hours support as and when required, and the opportunity to join an out-of-hours on-call rota.
- Co-ordinate and support the effective resolution of production incidents, whilst communicating with internal and external stakeholders.
- Conduct code reviews to ensure the quality and maintainability of products transitioning into live service running.
- Collaborate across teams and liaise with Architects, Technical Leads, and DevOps Engineers to investigate technical solutions.
- Produce comprehensive technical documentation for wider consumption.
- Design and lead the strategies for building reusable libraries and services.
- Ensure alignment to DWP standards and best practice for all product development and support.
- Lead the collaboration & sharing of knowledge and best practice with the wider software engineering community.
Person specification
When giving details in your employment history and personal statement you should highlight your experience in line with essential criteria below:
- Lead Criteria : Expert knowledge and extensive experience creating and maintaining robotic process automation using UiPath and Blue Prism, as well as JavaScript/Node.JS and TypeScript technologies, frameworks and design principles. Capable of leading the production of software solutions of the highest quality.*
- Extensive experience of Test-Driven Development (TDD) and Behaviour Driven Development (BDD) practices and techniques.
- Knowledge and experience of APIs, RESTful services and Microservice Architectures.
- Expert knowledge and extensive experience of developing on cloud-based environments like AWS and Azure.
- Knowledge and experience of SQL and NoSQL database applications such as Postgres, MySQL and MongoDB.
- Experience and the skills required to build up a useful, robust automated test suite to support a continuous deployment environment.
- Experience of leading multidisciplinary engineering teams, communicating with stakeholders, driving delivery, ensuring standards, ways of working and building supportive and collaborative culture.
* An initial sift may be conducted using the lead criterion stated above. Candidates who pass the initial sift will progress to a full sift.
If you would like to learn more about the role, please contact sam.hackett@dwp.gov.uk.
Benefits
We also have a broad benefits package built around your work-life balance which includes:
- Working patterns to support work/life balance such as job sharing, term-time working, flexi-time and compressed hours.
- Generous annual leave at least 23 days on entry, increasing up to 30 days over time (prorata for part time employees), plus 9 days public and privilege leave.
- Support for financial wellbeing, including interest-free season ticket loans for travel, a cycle to work scheme and an employee discount scheme.
- Health and wellbeing support including our Employee Assistance Programme for specialist advice and counselling and the opportunity to join HASSRA a first-class programme of competitions, activities and benefits for its members (subscription payable monthly).
- Family friendly policies including enhanced maternity and shared parental leave pay after 1 years continuous service.
- Funded learning and development to support progress in your role and career. This includes industry recognised qualifications and accreditations, coaching, mentoring and talent development programmes.
- An inclusive and diverse environment with opportunities to join professional and interpersonal networks including Womens Network, National Race Network, National Disability Network (THRIVE) and many more.
This job role may be suitable for hybrid working, which is where an employee works part of the week in their DWP office and part of the week from home. This is a voluntary, non-contractual arrangement and your office will be your contractual place of work. The number of days that anyone will be able to work at home will be determined primarily by business need but personal circumstances and other relevant circumstances will also be taken into account. If you are successful, any opportunities for hybrid working, including whether a hybrid working arrangement is suitable for you, will be discussed with you prior to you taking up your post.
Salary Information
Pay for this role is from 55,557 to 78,517.
The maximum salary for the grade is 66,058, however a Digital Allowance of up to 12,459 per annum is available for exceptional candidates. Digital Allowance is non-salary, and non-pensionable, and is classed as a temporary allowance. It is reviewed annually where it could be retained, amended, or removed.
Our offer to successful candidates will be based on an assessment of your skills and experience as demonstrated at interview.
Existing Civil Servants who secure a new role on lateral transfer should maintain their current salary.
Existing Civil Servants who gain promotion may move to the bottom of the grade pay scale or 10% increase in salary whichever would be the greater.
Things you need to know
Selection process details
As part of the application process you will be asked to complete a CV and Personal Statement. Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.
Stage 1: Application
Your application will consist of three parts:
1. A Personal Details application form.
2. Your employment history detailing your responsibilities, skills, accomplishments, plus your qualifications and relevant training. Please copy this information into the box field provided.
3. Personal statement up to 1000 words. Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.
When giving details in your employment history and personal statement you should highlight your experience in line withessential criterialisted inthe Person Specification.
The sift panel will use the information in your employment history and personal statement to assess your experience, skills and knowledge against the essential criteria above.
Applications will be sifted at regular intervals from the date the posts are advertised. Please apply as soon as you can, do not wait until the end of the campaign.
You will receive one combined score for both your Employment History/CV and Personal Statement, which will be provided in your Personal Statement score.
Sift and interview dates to be confirmed.
Important Information
- You will be asked to complete your employment history any information that you would customarily share on a CV should therefore be entered onto the application form.
- Personal details that could be used to identify you including your name, contact details and address must be removed for your application to be considered.
- If your employment history/personal statement contains any personal details your application will be withdrawn.
Stage 2: Interview
If youre successful at sift stage you will be invited to a video interview via Microsoft Teams. There, you will be assessed against the experiences listed in the essential criteria.
You will be asked to do a (5 - minute) presentation on a specific topic. The use of visual aids such as PowerPoint is optional. There will be a further 5 minutes for questions Further details will be provided to candidates invited to interview.
Interviews will take place from early January 2025.
Further information
Find out more about Working for DWP
For Hints and Tips on completing your application visit Applying for jobs at DWP Digital.
A reserve list may be held for a period of 6 months from which further appointments can be made.
Reserve list candidates will be posted in merit order by location.
Security Clearance Requirement
For further information on National Security Vetting please visit the following page https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/demystifying-vetting
You must meet the security requirements before you can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check.
For meaningful checks to be carried out, you will need to have lived in the UK for a sufficient period of time, to enable appropriate checks to be carried out and produce a result which provides the required level of assurance. Whilst a lack of UK residency in itself is not necessarily a bar to a security clearance, and expectation of UK residency may range from 3 to 5 years. Failure to meet the residency requirements needed for the role may result in the withdrawal of provisional jobs offers.
The Civil Service values honesty and integrity and expects all candidates to abide by these principles. Please ensure that all examples provided in your application are taken directly from your own experience and that you describe the examples in your own words. Applications will be screened and if evidence of plagiarism or copying examples/answers from other sources is found, your application will be withdrawn. Internal DWP candidates may also face disciplinary action.
Reasonable Adjustment
At DWP we value diversity and inclusion and actively encourage and welcome applications from everyone, including those that are underrepresented in our workforce.
We consider visible and non-visible disabilities, neurodiversity or learning differences, chronic medical conditions, or mental ill health. Examples include dyslexia, epilepsy, autism, chronic fatigue, or schizophrenia.
If you need a change to be made so that you can make your application, you should: Contact Government Recruitment Service via DigitalRecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk as soon as possible before the closing date to discuss your needs.
Complete the Reasonable Adjustments section in the Additional requirements page of your application form to tell us what changes or help you might need further on in the recruitment process. For instance, you may need wheelchair access at interview, or if youre deaf, a Language Service Professional.
For further information on reasonable adjustments, terms and conditions and how we recruit visit the How We Recruit, page
Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.
Security
Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.
Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window) .
See our vetting charter (opens in a new window) .
People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.
Nationality requirements
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
Working for the Civil Service
The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.
We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window) .
The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.
The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.
Diversity and Inclusion
The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window) .
Location: Newcastle Upon Tyne, GB
Posted Date: 11/21/2024
Contact Information
| Contact | Human Resources Department for Work and Pensions |
|---|