Bristol, London, Manchester
About the job
Job summary
The Government Digital Service (GDS) is the digital centre of government — we are responsible for setting, leading and delivering the vision for a modern digital government.
Our priorities are to drive a modern digital government, by:
1. joining up public sector services
2. harnessing the power of AI for the public good
3. strengthening and extending our digital and data public infrastructure
4. elevating leadership and investing in talent
5. funding for outcomes and procuring for growth and innovation
6. committing to transparency and driving accountability
We are home to the Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (I.AI), the world-leading GOV.UK and at the forefront of coordinating the UK’s geospatial strategy and activity. We lead the Government Digital and Data function and champion the work of digital teams across government.
We’re part of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and employ more than 1,000 people all over the UK.
The Government Digital Service is where talent translates into impact. From your first day, you’ll be working with some of the world’s most highly-skilled digital professionals, all contributing their knowledge to make change on a national scale.
This role is for the GOV.UK team, which runs the www.gov.uk website and the publishing system that powers it. GOV.UK is one of the most visited websites in the UK, with over 2.8 million unique visitors per day on average. Our purpose is to make it simple for everyone to interact with the government. We have a strategic ambition to deliver a personalised experience of government services through a new mobile app that involves different technical and infrastructure challenges to our existing GOV.UK website.
Almost all of GOV.UK's code is open source, developed in the open on GitHub. Most applications use Ruby on Rails running on Kubernetes in AWS. Teams work in agile ways, using best practices such as continuous delivery and test driven development. You can read more about our work on the Inside GOV.UK Blog.
Find out more about our teams and about what it’s like to be an SRE at GDS at the GDS Blog:
* A day in the life of a GDS Site Reliability Engineer (SRE)
* New recurring payments and webhook features available through GOV.UK Pay
* How GOV.UK Notify reliably sends text messages to users
Job description
We're looking for an experienced platform engineer to join our multidisciplinary team. You'll build resilient systems, mentor colleagues, and help shape our technical culture.
As a Senior Site Reliability Engineer you'll:
* design and maintain production Kubernetes clusters and CNCF ecosystem tools
* lead implementation of cloud-native practices and infrastructure as code
* build and optimise CI/CD pipelines focusing on developer experience
* participate in on-call rotation to develop operational awareness
* line manage 1-2 technologists, supporting their growth and development
* drive technical and cultural improvements across teams
Person specification
We’re interested in people who have:
* a deep experience with Kubernetes and the CNCF landscape
* a strong track record implementing cloud infrastructure (preferably AWS)
* experience improving technical practices and team culture
* proficiency in at least one programming language (we use Ruby and Python)
* an understanding of SRE principles and production operations
* experience leading technical initiatives and mentoring others
Benefits
The benefits of working at GDS
There are many benefits of working at GDS, including:
* flexible hybrid working with flexi-time and the option to work part-time or condensed hours
* a Civil Service Pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%
* 25 days of annual leave, increasing by a day each year up to a maximum of 30 days
* an extra day off for The King’s birthday
* an in-year bonus scheme to recognise high performance
* career progression and coaching, including a training budget for personal development
* paid volunteering leave
* a focus on wellbeing with access to an employee assistance programme
* job satisfaction from making government services easier to use and more inclusive for people across the UK
* advances on pay, including for travel season tickets
* death in service benefits
* cycle to work scheme and facilities
* access to children's holiday play schemes across different locations in central London
* access to an employee discounts scheme
* 10 learning days per year
* volunteering opportunities (5 special leave days per year)
* access to a suite of learning activities through Civil Service learning
GDS offers hybrid working for all employees. This means that everyone does some working from home and also spends some time in their local office. You’ll agree to your hybrid working arrangement with your line manager in line with your preferences and business needs.
Things you need to know
Selection process details
The standard selection process for roles at GDS consists of:
* a simple application screening process - We only ask for a CV and ask you to answer 3 application questions. Important tip - please ensure that your CV includes how you meet the skills and experience listed in the “person specification” section above
* a phone screening interview
* a technical interview (conducted over video conferencing)
* a civil service behavioural interview (conducted over video conferencing)
Depending on how many applications we get, there might also be an extra stage before the video interview, for example a phone interview or a technical exercise.
In the Civil Service, we use Success Profiles to evaluate your skills and ability. This gives us the best possible chance of finding the right person for the job, increases performance and improves diversity and inclusivity. We’ll be assessing your technical abilities, skills, experience and behaviours that are relevant to this role.
For this role we’ll be assessing you against the following Civil Service Behaviours:
* working together
* changing and improving
* making effective decisions
* leadership
* developing self and others
We will also be assessing your experience and specialist technical skills against the following skills defined in the GDAD Senior DevOps role:
* availability and capacity management
* development process optimisation
* information security
* modern standards approach
* programming and build (software engineering)
* service support
* systems design
* systems integration
Candidates that do not pass the interview but have demonstrated an acceptable standard may be considered for similar roles at a lower grade.
A reserve list will be held for a period of 12 months, from which further appointments can be made.
Security
Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.
Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check.
Nationality requirements
This job is broadly open to the following groups:
* UK nationals
* nationals of the Republic of Ireland
* nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
* nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
* individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
* Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service
Working for the Civil Service
The Civil Service Code sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.
The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.
Diversity and Inclusion
The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found.
#J-18808-Ljbffr