Technology Solutions Manager

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The Company

We are proud to be the largest independent merchant in the South of England, operating through five core divisions (Build, Timber, Plumbing & Heating, Roofing and Electrical), primarily serving trade customers with an extensive range of products. Our combined group serves our customer base through 178 branches extending from Penzance to Margate, with revenues in excess of £600 million and employs over 2,200 colleagues.

With strong investment in place, we're transforming our business to optimise each and every step in serving our customers, built on a firm footing. With an updated technology roadmap to support this, we're focused on further improving our transactional systems, and accelerating our data and digital strategies.

The Role

As the successful candidate in this role, you will be reporting to the Group IT Director and working Hybrid and at our Polegate office where necessary.

Your prior experience of shaping and delivering technology solutions means that you will be IBMG's senior technical authority, overseeing and providing solution architecture and design across core operational systems, integrations and data solutions. The role includes line and vendor management and will play a critical role in strengthening IBMG's technology and digital capabilities to support delivery of our roadmap.

You will be responsible for outlining technology solutions to support a range of key business initiatives within a dynamic business environment. Having outlined solutions, you will lead internal engineering resources, and work closely with partners, to ensure deliverables are aligned and can be adequately tested and implemented to achieve requirements.

Working closely with IT colleagues and partners, you will lead IBMG's transition to new data and automation platforms, whilst establishing controls for data integrations across operational systems. You will also ensure that standards, controls and plans for cyber security are built into design and engineering procedures, helping to ensure that IBMG's systems and data are adequately protected from cyber risks.

You will have a strong appreciation of a distribution business environment, and an excellent understanding and rich experience of integration and data architecture principles in practice.

Key Responsibilities

Solution Architecture

• Set, update and ensure adherence to solution architecture direction for IT.
• Ensure that technical solutions are not limited by design and are able to support business requirements and anticipated future growth.
• Manage design elements of tactical and strategic initiatives to ensure they don't become limitation factors.
• Involvement in technology selection processes, considering architectural fit and integration design.
• Develop an architectural approach which can be communicated to non-technical stakeholders.

  Data & Integration

• Ownership of IBMG's data engineering through a mix of internal and partner resources, overseeing the design of and adherence to defined principles.
• Lead the design, development and technical support of IBMG's Business Intelligence and Reporting platform.
• Develop, implement and support data integrations that improve business efficiency, and support the business growth roadmap through new projects.
• Lead the design, development and technical support of automation tools and platforms that support IT's roadmap.
• Collaborate with IT colleagues, partners and SMEs to implement Cyber Security by design, and close remedial gaps to defined standards.

  Process Improvement and Solution Design

• Support the development of process improvement through technical solutions.
• Support requirements elicitation processes taking into consideration solution architecture.
• Work with project and product teams to outline technical solutions and present back to stakeholders.
• Determine and document high level solution design to meet requirements, including application components and integration approach where applicable.
• Support detailed design activity across applications and ensure adherence to design and architectural principles.

  Technology Leadership

• Play a leadership role in the development of IBMG's IT strategy and roadmap by seeking out and providing rich insight into technology opportunities.
• Work with colleagues to maximise the benefits which can be achieved from new and existing technology products.
• Lead the development of solutions that add demonstrable business value and support business priorities.
• Shape, develop and manage a high-performing team by setting a clear and aligned vision, role modelling behaviours, and demonstrating personal and team growth.

Essential Attributes, Skills & Experience

• Able to maintain objectivity under pressure, in order to assess and understand the needs of stakeholders.
• Inspires colleagues and partners to form an aligned team and agreed working practices.
• Intuitively identifies, assesses and closely manages risks.

  Desirable Attributes, Skills & Experience

• Worked in a retail/wholesale/distribution environment, with a track record of aligning and improving solutions with key business processes.
• Experience of working on full lifecycle implementations of ERP implementations.
• Experience working with Agile methodologies and in DevOps environments.

• Experience in working in a retail or wholesale business, with a track record of owning application architecture and solution design.
• Involvement in project and business change delivery in a customer-facing commercial organisation (i.e. project planning, requirements gathering, design, development, testing and implementation).
• Ability to map existing architecture, identify strengths and weaknesses and act on this initial analysis.
• Experience in data engineering and automation projects, with an understanding of AI principles.
• Good understanding of cyber security risks and standards, with experience in building security-by-design solutions into software platforms and practices.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills including technical writing skills.
• Generates high quality architectural mapping and process documentation.
• Structured planning, organisation and time management skills.
• Good interpersonal and engagement skills across all functions and levels.

The Rewards

Joining us means joining the leading and largest independent merchant in the South of England. We provide training, support, and opportunities for career progression through our commitment to creating a great work environment where you're encouraged to be and do your best.

You'll be joining a friendly and welcoming team. We offer an excellent benefits package which includes a competitive salary, pension, bonus scheme, employee assistance programme, perks membership and staff discount.