Group Head of Data and Insights

About DFT Operator

Join Our Team at DFTO

DFTO is the government’s public sector rail owning group. Its purpose is to bring all currently privately‑owned train operators into public ownership in advance of the creation of Great British Railways in 2027 – and deliver improvements in the here and now by unifying and integrating train operations under common public ownership.

DFTO has over 30,000 employees, runs over 8,500 services a day and delivers over 640 million customer journeys across its networks every year. 7,000 people joined the railway family in the last year

Major improvements are being delivered by DFTO train operators (TOCs) that are already under public ownership – these are LNER, Northern, Trans Pennine Express (TPE), Southeast, South Western Railway (SWR), c2c, Greater Anglia and WM Trains.

We work closely with the DfT but operate independently with our own governance and leadership teams. Our priority is ensuring efficient, dependable rail services for everyone.

The Group Head of Data and Insights is responsible for setting and delivering DFTO’s group‑wide data and insight strategy, ensuring that high‑quality, trusted and timely data is used to inform decision‑making, improve performance, and deliver better outcomes for passengers, taxpayers and government.

The role leads the development of DFTO’s enterprise data capability across corporate and operating companies, embedding consistent standards for data management, analytics, insight and governance.

With the transition towards Great British Railways already underway, the role plays a critical part in bringing greater coherence to industry data and insight, influencing joined‑up approaches across organisational boundaries.

It is instrumental in shaping and guiding DFTO’s group‑wide data and insight strategy as public ownership expands, shared services mature, and the rail system moves towards a more integrated, whole‑system operating model.

The postholder will work closely with DFTO executives, TOC leadership teams, DfT, Network Rail and sector partners, acting as the senior authority on data and insight and championing a culture of evidence‑based decision‑making across the Group.

• Define, own and deliver the DFTO Group Data and Insights Strategy, aligned to DFTO’s business plan, government data strategy and preparations for G .
• Position data as a strategic organisational asset, balancing transparency, accessibility, innovation and control in a complex, public‑sector environment.

• Establish and maintain robust group‑wide frameworks for data governance, data quality, metadata, lineage, ethics and compliance, working closely with security, information governance and data protection leaders.
• Ensure consistent standards and assurance across DFTO and TOCs, enabling comparability, trust and auditability of data used for management, operational and policy decisions.

• Lead through influence a federated insight and analytics capability across DFTO and the TOCs, supporting and guiding embedded analysis functions to deliver high‑quality, decision‑ready insight for management and operational stakeholders.
• Coordinate and influence group‑wide approaches to forecasting, benchmarking and performance insight, working with multiple analysis teams to ensure consistency, comparability and practical use in decision‑making.

• Work in partnership with the CIO, Architecture and Technology teams to shape requirements for enterprise data services, integration, reporting and analytics tooling.
• Drive adoption of common, scalable approaches that reduce duplication, improve efficiency, and enable self‑service insight where appropriate.

• Build, lead and develop a high‑performing multidisciplinary data and insight function, including analytics, engineering, insight and data management roles.
• Improve data literacy across DFTO and TOCs, supporting leaders and teams to confidently use data and insight in their day‑to‑day work and strategic decisions.