Senior Platform Engineer - Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency - SEO
Government Digital & Data -
Location
Bristol, Swansea, Leeds, Nottingham, Newcastle, Oldham, Birmingham or Yeading.
About the job
Job summary
We are seeking a Senior Platform Engineer to take a pivotal role in the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA). You will drive technical delivery for large-scale, public-facing digital services, ensuring they are resilient, secure and cost‑effective, with a mandate for continuous improvement.
This senior role focuses on delivering digital change and embedding a code‑first approach to infrastructure. You will contribute to and support the implementation of enterprise technical strategy and standards across a mixed‑discipline team operating key digital services. Your expertise in Infrastructure‑as‑Code (IaC) is essential for establishing consistent standards and an efficient path‑to‑live. You will ensure alignment with the Principal Cloud Engineer’s strategy while also helping shape delivery.
Our core platform relies on AWS, though knowledge across multiple cloud providers (Azure) and integrations (GitHub Actions etc.) is advantageous. We require an engineer with the leadership skills to guide teams with mixed maturity, elevating performance and embedding high engineering standards.
Can you... Champion and enforce DevOps principles and a code‑first approach to infrastructure design and automation. Provide technical direction and hands‑on implementation to the wider scrum team, ensuring alignment with the Principal Cloud Engineer’s strategy. Engage effectively with engineers, developers and testers across the delivery lifecycle, including those with varying technical maturity, to improve engineering practices.
Do you... Possess deep expertise in AWS and strong knowledge of wider technology stacks and practices, including Linux, CICD, Docker, GitHub Actions, AWS Landing Zone, Puppet (optional) and Jenkins (optional). Demonstrate exceptional leadership, pragmatism, analytical and influencing skills, with a track record of high‑performance Agile delivery in mixed‑maturity teams.
Have you... A proven background in driving excellence in digital delivery, standardisation and technical governance within a scrum team, explicitly leveraging IaC for infrastructure implementation and automation. Experience designing, implementing and maintaining cost‑effective, resilient cloud‑based digital infrastructure.
If so, we’d love to hear from you.
Joining our department comes with many benefits, including:
- Employer pension contribution of 28.97% of your salary. Read more about Civil Service Pensions here
- 25 days annual leave, increasing by 1 day each year of service (up to a maximum of 30 days annual leave), plus 8 bank holidays a privilege day for the King’s birthday
- Flexible working options where we encourage a great work-life balance.
Read more in the Benefits section below!
Find out more about what it's like working at Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency - Department for Transport Careers
Job description
Your responsibilities will include, but aren’t limited to:
As the Platform/DevOps Engineer, you'll be instrumental in building, designing and automating DVSA's large-scale cloud services, primarily on AWS. You'll be a core member of a product team, enforce code-first IaC standards, and be a key decision maker for the path-to-live for a critical digital services. You'll champion technical excellence, influence strategy, and collaborate across teams to ensure highly available, value-driven service delivery.
Your responsibilities will include, but aren’t limited to:
- Hands-On Technical Delivery & Strategic Alignment: Provide hands-on technical direction and influence in project teams, ensuring their work is consistently aligned with the Principal Cloud Engineer's technical strategy and Civil Service values.
- Standardisation & Governance: Adhere as well as continue to mature the definition, and enforcement of DevOps standards and procedures across the delivery lifecycle (IaC, CI/CD). Continuously review and provide hands-on assurance of the designs of others to embed security controls and high standards.
- Team Specialism Contribution: Act as a cloud and DevOps Subject Matter Expert to proactively collaborate and mentor other team members. This will include those with varying maturity levels, fostering a continuous learning environment and providing practical, technical support.
- Hands-On Cloud & Security Design: Contribute proactively to the design and architecture of highly available, cost-effective, and secure services on major cloud platforms (specifically AWS, with Azure awareness), ensuring solutions meet performance targets and business needs.
- Infrastructure Automation (IaC) Implementation: Drive the code-first implementation and hands-on automation of infrastructure using configuration management tools like Terraform and Puppet, prioritising and executing automation opportunities to improve delivery efficiency.
- End-to-End Delivery and Environment Ownership: Take hands-on technical ownership of the service journey from concept to live deployment, including the management, maintenance, and patching of pre-production environments to ensure a smooth, secure, and effective path-to-live. This should follow robust Agile and Scrum principles
- Live Service Resolution & Support: Act as a recognised Subject Matter Expert to provide technical guidance and work hands-on with Service Management functions, leading the resolution of complex live technical issues and managing maintenance programs.
- Process Optimisation & Stakeholder Engagement: Actively participate in Agile ceremonies and delivery processes, collaborating with senior stakeholders, Product Owners, and cross-functional stakeholders to align technical solutions with business goals and drive continuous process optimisation.
For further information on the role, please read the attached role profile. Please note that the role profile is for information purposes only - whilst all elements are relevant to the role, they may not all be assessed during the recruitment process. This job advert will detail exactly what will be assessed during the recruitment process.
Person specification
Required Experience:
To be successful in this role you will need to have the following experience:
- Experience showing leadership qualities within a scrum team to deliver technical excellence meeting the business requirements.
- Experience of cloud delivery and contributing to wider cloud maturity with mixed maturity teams.
- Experience delivering large scale, complex cloud deliverables in a highly regulated environment.
Additional Information
If successful you will be required to undergo BPSS, and may also be required to gain SC clearance once in post.
Government Digital and Data Allowance
The role is part of the Government Digital and Data (or Government Security Profession Career Framework) profession and utilises an enhanced Capability–Based Pay Framework which provides access to a Digital and Data allowance.
The base pay is £44,241. In addition to this the role includes a Digital and Data allowance of up to £14,756.
The value of allowance awarded will be based on an assessment of your skills and experience as demonstrated through the selection process. Here are more details on the pay framework.
