Senior Delivery Lead; Cognitive Automation Ecosystem

Senior Delivery Lead (Cognitive Automation Ecosystem)

6‑Month contract – Inside IR35 – market rate

Heathrow based – hybrid working – up to 3 days a week onsite

The Cognitive Automation Ecosystem team turns agentic automation and AI from isolated initiatives into a safe, scalable, enterprise capability. It provides the platform, guardrails, and shared services that agentic delivery and run teams rely upon to scale safely and effectively across the business.

This is a hands‑on delivery role for someone who genuinely enjoys bringing order to complexity. You'll lead delivery across multiple technology programmes, where competing priorities, shared resources, and fast‑moving timelines are the norm, not the exception.

You'll work through influence rather than authority, earning trust quickly, pushing back when needed, and keeping the squad moving without creating bureaucratic drag. There is no dedicated product lead, so you'll work closely with the Technical Lead to shape priorities and turn requirements into clear, sequenced delivery outcomes.

• Lead a small team of contract engineers, setting clear direction and keeping delivery on track
• Create a high‑performing, psychologically safe, delivery‑focused culture with clarity of ownership and high standards
• Communicate credibly with senior stakeholders and step in quickly when things wobble

• Own integrated plans, milestones, dependencies, delivery cadence, and estimation across concurrent work streams, using delivery data to maintain realistic forecasts
• Run governance that protects the organisation without creating drag, keeping teams aligned to guardrails and standards
• Keep RAID, decisions, and reporting up to date; anticipate potential issues early

• Own a clear, prioritised roadmap and delivery‑ready backlog, balancing strategic value, capacity, and stakeholder demand
• Ensure delivery artefacts, decisions, and requirements are maintained at source, current, and audit‑ready with minimal manual effort
• Push back on vague, low‑value, or poorly defined work; if it is not clear, it is not ready
• Ensure teams generate accurate, timely delivery data as part of day‑to‑day working, with strong Jira discipline and minimal reliance on manual reporting

• Operate as the connective tissue across Product, Tech, Engineering, Architecture, and business stakeholders, keeping dependencies and sequencing visible
• Influence peers and senior stakeholders through credibility, judgement, and consistency rather than formal authority
• Hold teams to commitments with clarity and follow‑through, driving a culture of accountability, delivery discipline, and early escalation

• Help shape the agent ecosystem around reusable enterprise capabilities, shared services, and orchestration patterns
• Spot duplication early and work with technical leads so teams do not build the same thing twice

• 10+ years leading technology delivery in complex, high‑accountability environments with multiple senior stakeholders
• Strong track record of delivering applied AI, automation, data, or API‑led products from ambiguity to measurable business value
• Experience turning business priorities into clear roadmaps and sequenced delivery plans
• Strong delivery leadership across concurrent initiatives with shared resources, tight dependencies, and competing deadlines
• Experience raising delivery standards in environments that needed more structure, pace, and accountability
• Understanding of modern cloud and enterprise technology environments, with enough technical fluency to challenge, prioritise, and make sound trade‑offs

• Excellent at bringing structure to ambiguity and turning complexity into clear, executable plans
• Confident making tough calls, challenging constructively, and holding teams and stakeholders to commitments
• Strong judgement on priority, pace, and trade‑offs; knows when to push, when to simplify, and when to escalate
• Influences through credibility, clarity, and consistency rather than relying on hierarchy
• Communicates effectively across engineering, product, and executive audiences
• Experience in complex operational environments where reliability, coordination, and governance matter

• Experience in platform‑led or enterprise capability teams rather than single‑product delivery
• Exposure to agent frameworks, orchestration patterns, or AI operating models in enterprise settings