About us

dxw works with the public and third sectors to create user-focused services and products that improve lives.

We’ve been around since 2008 and worked on lots of projects that have made a real difference – things like helping a government department to track aid spending and how to improve digital collaboration between local authorities.

We’re looking for a Technical Architect to join us and help us build software and services to achieve this mission. We think it’s important to have diverse teams and aim to create an environment where everyone is supported to do their best and be themselves.

About the role

This is a technical leadership and architectural design role. As a member of the dxw technology team, you'll be bringing technical and non-technical parts of our delivery teams together and ensuring our public and third sector clients and stakeholders have a clear understanding of what we are building and why. You'll help teams set their strategy for projects, making sure work aligns with technical principles and other projects.

We try to use the right technology for the problem at hand. Some of the things our teams typically work with are Ruby and Ruby on Rails; PHP and WordPress; PostgreSQL; Git and GitHub; and AWS, Docker, and Terraform. Sometimes we need to work with different technologies as chosen by our clients such as TypeScript and React; Python and Wagtail; and Node.js and Express.

You won’t be hands on with everything, but you’ll need to be able to drop in and help teams solve problems when they need you, and pick up missing knowledge on the fly. Some examples of the problems you’ll need to help with are:

• Setting up the architectural approach, CI/CD, and infrastructure for new projects

• Integrating third party services like single sign-in

• Defining and sharing a technical strategy to help our clients get away from legacy systems

• Meeting our client's technology governance to give them confidence in the technology we’re building or proposing

You’ll need to make and guide effective decisions, clearly explaining and documenting how that decision was reached. You’ll look beyond the immediate technical problem and identify wider implications of the work we’re doing.

You’ll often work on multiple projects at once and will need to balance your time between them to deliver the best value to our clients. You’ll often need to help identify the highest value thing for you to work on and carry out that work without much direction.

As well as working on client projects you’ll have a couple of days reserved each week to support the development team. Some of the ways you’ll do that are by:

• Having regular 1:1s with developers you manage

• Running recruitment for new team members

• Leading discussions at our three-weekly technology team forums

At dxw, we have a culture of sharing our skills and knowledge, and you’ll advocate for that behaviour by leading by example.

About you

You have expertise in some of the technologies we use, an understanding of a range of technology stacks, and the ability to take a balanced approach to technology selection.

You have led others in the past, perhaps as a line manager or a technical lead.

You understand the importance of secure coding practices. All technologists receive security training when they join the team!

If you care about collaboration, continuous improvement, and building public services, then dxw is the right place for you.

Join us!

We're committed to building an inclusive environment and broadening diversity across our development team. We welcome non-traditional paths into the development profession and aim to hire the right person for the role, not the right combination of technical keywords. There is a high degree of flexibility for people looking for a part-time role or a role with flexible hours.

Our public sector work means that appointments will be made subject to a background check.

For more information about dxw, visit www.dxw.com or our Playbook where we document the ways we work, our values and our commitments to sustainable pace and openness.

Benefits include

• Annual £750 personal learning and development allowance

• Interest-free season ticket loans and cycle to work scheme

• Up to 12 weeks of paid parental leave depending on your situation

• 25 days holiday plus bank holidays

• Pension with up to 5% matching employer contribution