Business Architect

Water Utility Company based in Yorkshire region of England.

Business Architect

Salary: £45,454 – £67,338 + car allowance + bonus + enhanced pension + hybrid (Mostly work from home)

Wider benefits include discretionary bonus, private health care, life assurance, enhanced maternity and adoption packages (note: some are non-contractual).

Location: Bradford and hybrid work arrangement

At Yorkshire Water we believe technology holds the key to making the most of this precious resource, and taking care of it, now and in the future. We have a five-year plan that will see us investing heavily in our Technology. Enabling us as a department to focus on our capabilities, increase our delivery and responsiveness for our customers and develop skilled technical and data experts.

We are now looking for a Business Architect to join us on this journey, the purpose of your role will be to:

Support the business in defining its’ Target Operating Model aligned to the overarching business strategy, and working closely with other architecture disciplines, ensure that the routes for delivering change (such as strategic business programmes) effectively move us towards the desired target state.

Support senior decision making by a wide range of senior business representatives within Yorkshire Water by presenting viewpoints of the business with supporting optionality and recommend suitable directions to meet the business need in the most effective way.

Bring best practice approaches from within the Business Architecture discipline and will look to tailor those approaches so that they can be applied at Yorkshire Water. This will require excellent negotiation and influencing skills to make progress. This will also include definition and adherence to architectural standards and governance approaches relative to Business Architecture artefacts.

You’ll be accountable for the following:

Maintain big picture focus and delivery whilst managing the depth across key areas of transformation

Strong stakeholder management across the breadth of the business at Exec and senior leadership level

Demonstrate relentless drive, energy, and determination to deliver sustainable outperformance for YW that rigorously achieves against demanding competitive industry benchmarks

Develop and implement strategic plans to ensure the capability will meet the business needs and is aligned with all relevant technical roadmaps, business targets and architectural principles

Support the wider organisation to drive business improvements

Provide specialist advice and challenge for schemes and change programmes

Ensure quality management and change control procedures are followed

Be resilient when being challenged over the value of a structured, governed approach

Responsible for adherence to Company standards, policy and procedure and following Business Process Management ethos, to ensure regulatory and legal compliance and maintenance of ISO accreditation.

Produce and maintain Business Architecture artefacts to ensure that current and target states are well documented and understood (such as target operating model, business capability models, business process models, organisational maps, value stream maps)

Develop a network of contacts within external organisations to enable sharing of ideas and best practise

Working with wider architecture disciplines, keep abreast of emerging development technologies and architectures, assessing them for strategic importance, suitability and fit with the Business

Contribute towards Architecture Review Boards and other forums as necessary

Work with 3rd parties as appropriate to lead and direct activities, validate and sign off outputs at suitable quality level, and ensure skills and knowledge transfer from partners to YW

Work with other functions within technology (such as Business Analysts) to develop and define future state requirements for the organisation

What skills are we looking for?

Essential

Demonstrable experience performing Business Architecture / Strategic Business Analysis

Strong stakeholder management and communication skills

Ability to absorb complex information and communicate effectively to all levels, both technical and non-technical audiences

Experience of developing and maintaining effective internal and external relationships at senior levels within an organisation

Understanding of wider architectural roles, domains, methodologies and design strategies

Proven track record of large-scale delivery, preferably in the utilities sector, undertaking a senior architectural/change role

Highly motivated and self-reliant with a personal drive for continuous development and demonstrates a strong customer service ethos.

Ability to recognise functional inter-dependencies and cross-silo redundancies.

Proven analytical and problem-solving abilities.

Extensive knowledge of the software development lifecycle

Ability to understand enterprise solutions

High standards of integrity & ethics

Desirable

Qualified in Business/Enterprise Architecture (e.g. TOGAF, BCS diploma or equivalent)

CASE tool experience e.g. LeanIX, Enterprise Architect

ARIS Process Designer experience

Although you will have a permanent friendly office to inspire collaborative thinking, and there may be occasions when there is a business need to attend the office we do offer flexible hybrid working arrangements. We appreciate that we all live busy lives and crave now more than ever a good work/life balance, so together we can discuss what this might look like for you as an individual.

Apply now to find out what a career in tech with Yorkshire Water could offer you!