Lead Architect

F5 Consultants; Manchester; On-site; GBP 104,000 - 127,000; Full time

Job summary

F5 Consultants in Manchester is seeking a Senior Architect to own the end-to-end architecture of a major managed-services estate, guiding infrastructure, cloud, networks, security and workplace domains.

You'll lead Domain Architects, govern designs, and advise senior client stakeholders. The role demands balance between technical depth and strategic oversight, with onsite work in Manchester and eligibility for UK SC clearance. Salary up to £115,000 plus bonus.

Qualifications

• Experience leading domain architects and governance of designs.
• Experience with large live-service environments.
• Strong strategy, roadmaps and debt management.
• Operational resilience and disaster recovery involvement.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end architecture of a major managed-services estate.
• Set technology strategy and future direction.
• Lead Domain Architects across multiple technology areas.
• Govern technical designs, changes and architecture decisions.
• Manage technology roadmaps, technical debt and obsolescence.
• Ensure new solutions are operationally supportable before live service.
• Balance modernisation with resilience, cost, risk and commitments.
• Provide senior technical leadership during major incidents and risks.
• Advise senior client stakeholders and the wider account leadership team.
• Drive continuous improvement across live services.

Skills

Infrastructure architecture

Governance

Stakeholder engagement

Disaster recovery

Technical leadership

Job description

This is a senior technical leadership role with responsibility for the architecture of a large, complex, live managed-services account.

You’ll be the overall technical authority across infrastructure, cloud, networks, security, workplace and other core technology services. Rather than owning one particular technology tower, you’ll maintain oversight of the entire estate and ensure its architecture remains resilient, supportable and aligned with the client’s long-term strategy.

You’ll lead and challenge specialist Domain Architects, govern technical designs and changes, and advise senior client and account stakeholders.

This role requires the right balance of technical depth and strategic oversight. You’ll understand infrastructure technologies well enough to challenge specialists on subjects such as networking, resilience and disaster recovery—but you’ll also know when to step back from the detail and consider the wider account, operational and commercial picture.

What you’ll be responsible for

• Owning the end-to-end architecture of a major managed-services estate
• Setting its overall technology strategy and future direction
• Leading and challenging Domain Architects across multiple technology areas
• Governing technical designs, changes and architecture decisions
• Managing technology roadmaps, technical debt and obsolescence
• Ensuring new solutions are operationally supportable before entering live service
• Balancing modernisation with resilience, cost, risk and contractual commitments
• Providing senior technical leadership during major incidents and operational risks
• Advising senior client stakeholders and the wider account leadership team
• Driving continuous improvement across live services

What we’re looking for

You’ll be an experienced Lead, Chief, Enterprise or Infrastructure Architect who has progressed into account-level technical leadership without losing your technical grounding.

Your experience should include:

• Broad infrastructure architecture knowledge across several technology domains
• Ownership or governance of large, complex live-service environments
• Leading architects and challenging specialist technical teams
• Strong architecture governance and design assurance experience
• Technology strategy, roadmaps, technical debt and lifecycle management
• Operational resilience, disaster recovery and major-incident involvement
• Ensuring solutions can transition successfully into live service
• Senior client and stakeholder engagement
• Commercial awareness gained within managed services, outsourcing or another complex operational environment

This is unlikely to suit someone who has worked solely within one technology tower, or a high-level Enterprise Architect who is no longer comfortable discussing infrastructure in meaningful technical detail.

Location and clearance

Due to the secure nature of the environment, you must be able to work onsite in Manchester five days per week.

You must also meet the requirements to obtain UK SC clearance.

Salary: Up to £115,000 + bonus and benefits