We're seeking an experienced Solution Architect to join a leading Higher Education institution on a high-impact programme aimed at enhancing IT service delivery and system resilience. This is a great opportunity to shape the future of digital services in a complex, integrated environment.

Role Details:

• Contract Length: 6 months (strong potential for extension)

• IR35 Status: Inside IR35

• Rate: Competitive / Market-aligned

• Location: Hybrid (weekly on-site presence required - North West England)

• Start Date: ASAP / negotiable

The Role:
You'll join a specialist Strategy & Architecture team responsible for design governance, architectural best practice, and aligning IT systems with long-term strategic goals. The initial focus will be on two key areas:

• Colleague & Student Compute - improving PC cluster environments, enabling flexible & remote access to teaching software, and enhancing the academic IT experience

• Environments - delivering on-demand, stable, automated environments and implementing Privileged Access Management (PAM)

You'll take the lead in high-level design, stakeholder engagement, service design, and ensuring scalable, sustainable IT solutions are embedded across the organisation.

Key Responsibilities:

• Create and review High-Level Design (HLD) documentation

• Conduct product fit/gap analysis and engage with business stakeholders

• Support delivery of automated, secure environments and improve release management processes

• Align architecture with enterprise design principles, governance, and standards

• Improve collaboration between IT Services and the Teaching & Learning community

Key Skills & Experience:
✔ Solid experience as a Solution or Technical Architect
✔ Strong background in enterprise IT environments and service design
✔ Familiarity with DevOps, release automation, and secure environment builds
✔ Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills
✔ Higher Education or Public Sector experience (desirable)