Technology Lead - Data Ops

• Fixed term for 2 years

  • Secondments considered for internal applicants — please discuss with your line manager before applying.

• Hybrid working – County Hall, Taunton, TA1 4DY
• 33 days' annual leave, plus Bank Holidays.

This senior specialist role sits at the centre of our data and applied AI transformation. You won’t be writing code — instead, you’ll be the person who makes sure the right people are doing the right work, in the right way, at the right time. You’ll coordinate delivery across technical teams, maintain discipline across our DevOps and CI/CD practices, and ensure DataOps runs smoothly day‑to‑day. You will lead agile ceremonies, acting as a scrum master while also owning delivery through CI/CD and environment promotions.

Working under the strategic leadership of the Chief Data & Analytics Officer, you’ll be responsible for keeping our data delivery engine aligned, organised and moving forward.

Own day‑to‑day DataOps delivery

• You will coordinate the work of data engineers, AI engineers, data scientists, ICT and wider colleagues to ensure DataOps activities run smoothly. You’ll handle scheduling, task tracking, risk management, and ensure blockers are identified and resolved quickly.

Maintain DevOps discipline

• You will ensure our DevOps principles are actually being followed: backlog hygiene, release readiness, environment planning, versioning discipline, and operational documentation.

Oversee CI/CD and Git practices

• You’ll support teams to follow agreed branching strategies, release processes, testing steps, approvals, and audit controls so change flows reliably from development to production.

Keep cross‑team alignment

• You will be the glue that connects data engineers, AI engineers, data scientists, master data management, data platform development and more. Ensuring everyone understands priorities, deadlines, dependencies and impacts.

Support project delivery

• You will support technology projects by maintaining delivery plans, tracking milestones, coordinating specialist input, and ensuring artefacts, risks, and actions are kept up to date.

Champion standards and good practice

You will reinforce agreed patterns, processes and documentation expectations — helping the teams stay organised, compliant and delivery‑focused.

You don’t need to be a data engineer or an AI Engineer — but you do need to understand how technical teams work.

We’re looking for someone who can demonstrate:

• Experience coordinating complex technical or digital delivery
• Strong project management skills
• Certification in agile and scrum delivery would be preferential
• Familiarity with DevOps‑style working (Scrum/Kanban, stand‑ups, sprint cycles, release checklists)
• Understanding of how CI/CD and Git workflows operate
• Ability to drive discipline across teams
• Confidence to challenge specialists kindly but firmly
• Excellent organisation, communication and stakeholder management skills
• Experience working in matrixed environments
• Ability to turn strategy into practical, organised delivery steps

A background in ICT, digital, data, cloud, or transformation would be beneficial — but depth of technical skill is not required.

We are proud to offer an environment that is supportive and rewarding, working as part of a team who are passionate about the work they do to improve the lives of people in Somerset.

We offer great training and development opportunities, with supportive management. As well as this, we have some fantastic employee benefits available:

• We promote a healthy work-life balance and offer flexible working arrangements wherever possible, including working from home.
• Generous annual leave allowance, with the opportunity to purchase additional leave
• Staff discounts in gyms.
• Employee Assistance for the times you may need some support and a variety of employee wellbeing services.
• Auto enrolment onto our generous Pension Scheme and optional pension enhancement through our Additional Voluntary Contribution scheme.
• A Flexible Benefits Scheme via salary sacrifice to obtain a cycle for work and health screenings.
• My Staff Shop offering discounts in shops, online shopping, restaurants, cinema tickets, insurance benefits and more

The salary for this role is Somerset Grade 8 - £49,282 per annum

For an informal chat about the role, you can contact Josh Pimm, Chief Data & Analytics Officer, josh.pimm@somerset.gov.uk

If you have everything you need, just hit the apply button. We can’t wait to hear from you.

This role requires a check via the Disclosure procedure.