Site Reliability Engineering Lead

Willis Towers Watson; Ipswich; On-site; GBP 100,000 - 125,000; Full time

Job summary

A global consulting firm in Ipswich is seeking a Platform Operations Manager to lead the operational excellence of its Azure-based production platform. This role involves ensuring service reliability, managing services, and driving continuous improvement initiatives. The ideal candidate has extensive experience in platform operations and DevOps practices, strong communication skills, and a focus on security best practices. Join a dynamic team that values diversity and inclusivity, fostering an environment where everyone can thrive.

Qualifications

• Proven experience in platform operations, DevOps, or SRE leadership roles.
• Strong expertise in Microsoft Azure PaaS services.
• Solid understanding of Agile methodologies and cross-functional collaboration.

Responsibilities

• Own the cost, health, and performance of the production environment.
• Lead incident response, root cause analysis, and postmortem processes.
• Drive initiatives to reduce toil and improve system resilience.

Skills

Platform operations leadership

DevOps processes

Microsoft Azure PaaS services

Agile methodologies

Incident management

Tools

Azure DevOps

Monitoring tools

CI/CD pipelines

Job description

Description

The Client Technology team own the technology roadmap that supports the Willis Client journey. The team has several inter-related delivery and operations workstreams across client portal capabilities and client records management.

Within this globally distributed team this role will be lead the operational excellence of our Azure-based production platform. This is a key role responsible for ensuring service reliability, secure-by-design practices, and continuous improvement across our DevOps and service management functions. Reporting to the Head of Client Technology within CRB Business Technology you will work closely with cross-functional teams in an Agile environment to accept into production scalable, secure, and high-performing services.

We are seeking a detailed oriented, process minded experienced Platform Operations Manager to lead our service management and DevOps practices to strengthen our production acceptance, proactively monitor and fix, improve customer satisfaction and to drive continuous improvement across our platform operations.

The Role

Service Management & Reliability

• Own the cost, health and performance of the production environment
• Lead incident response, root cause analysis, and postmortem processes
• Monitor SLAs, SLOs, and KPIs for platform services

DevOps & Release Management

• Oversee CI/CD pipelines and ensure smooth and secure build acceptance into production
• Collaborate with engineering teams to improve deployment processes
• Champion automation and infrastructure-as-code practices
• Partner with security teams to ensure compliance, threat modelling, and secure deployments
• Drive adoption of secure coding, scanning, and monitoring tools across the platform

Continuous Improvement

• Identify and implement improvements in operational workflows
• Drive initiatives to reduce toil and improve system resilience
• Foster a culture of learning and operational excellence

Reporting & Communication

• Produce regular reports on KPIs, platform performance, incidents, and improvements
• Communicate effectively with stakeholders across engineering, product, and leadership
• Maintain clear documentation of operational procedures and standards

Team Leadership

• Manage and mentor a cross functional team
• Support career development and performance management
• Promote collaboration and knowledge sharing across teams

Qualifications

The Requirements:

Experience: Essential

• Proven experience in platform operations, DevOps, or SRE leadership roles
• Strong expertise in Microsoft Azure PaaS services (e.g., App Services, Azure Functions, AKS, Azure DevOps)
• Solid understanding of Agile methodologies and cross-functional team collaboration
• Experience with monitoring, observability, and incident management tools
• Strong grasp of security best practices and secure-by-design principles
• Excellent communication, leadership, and stakeholder management skills
• Proven experience in end-user management

Experience: Preferable

• Experience with ITIL or other service management frameworks
• Background in software engineering or systems architecture
• Knowledge of security and compliance in production environments
• Certifications in Azure (e.g., AZ-400, AZ-305) or ITIL
• Experience with compliance frameworks (e.g., ISO 27001, SOC 2)
• Background in software engineering or systems architecture
• Knowledge of General Insurance (London Market / Lloyd’s and Industry) products and services

Skills/other

• Excellent interpersonal skills, including listening, verbal, and written communication with the ability to communicate effectively with all levels of the Company

At WTW, we believe difference makes us stronger. We want our workforce to reflect the different and varied markets we operate in and to build a culture of inclusivity that makes colleagues feel welcome, valued and empowered to bring their whole selves to work every day. We are an equal opportunity employer committed to fostering an inclusive work environment throughout our organisation. We embrace all types of diversity.