Principal Technical Architect

We’re recruiting Principal Technical Architects acrossfour digital portfolios:
Migration and Borders Technology, Police and Public Protection Technology, Data Services and Analytics and Automation and Innovation
. They require strong technical leadership, the ability to work across complex technology landscapes, and the capability to drive meaningful transformation through secure, user‑centred and scalable solutions.

MBTP delivers the technology, data and cyber services that protect the UK border, support legitimate travel and trade, and enable people to prove their status to live and work in the UK. They manage high‑volume systems that handle people, passports and passenger movements, serving hundreds of thousands of users daily.

PPPT supports critical national policing and public safety systems, including Law Enforcement Data Service; the Police National Database;
Automatic Number Plate Recognition; offender and safeguarding systems; and key homeland security and international data‑sharing capabilities. PPPT designs, builds and operates modern, secure digital services at national scale that underpin millions of daily operational decisions across UK policing and help protect the public and manage risk.

DSA is one of government’s leading data analytics centres, central to the Home Office’s data transformation. It provides strategic value by delivering innovative data insight services that help solve real government challenges, including the design and adoption of modern data architectures and medallion patterns.

This portfolio turns emerging technologies into practical, high‑impact solutions by prototyping and deploying automation and advanced technologies to deliver significant efficiency savings.

Working with the Digital Innovation Lab, you will operate at the forefront of public sector innovation, translating complex technologies into business outcomes through strong full‑stack architecture knowledge and a strategic, forward‑thinking approach. They deliver integrated, resilient services that support national security and public service transformation.

Where business needs allow, some roles may be suitable for a combination of office and home‑based working. Where this is the case, employees will be expected to spend a minimum of 60% of their working time in the office
. Applicants can raise any queries to the email address at the bottom of the advert.

Watch this short video to hear from members of Home Office Digital talking about the projects they work on and their experience of working here:
Working for Home Office Digital.

• Own and deliver the overarching technical strategy, guiding architectural decisions that balance risk, complexity, and delivery timelines.
• Lead governance and assurance processes, ensuring solutions remain secure, robust, and aligned with enterprise architecture principles.
• Collaborate with senior stakeholders to advocate for digital transformation initiatives, influencing decisions through clear, data‑driven insights.
• Mentor and guide architects and engineering teams, nurturing a culture of excellence, innovation, and continuous learning.
• Oversee integration of new systems, developing detailed plans that align with broader organisational and cross‑government strategies.
• Assess current systems to identify areas for improvement, analyse potential risks, and promote emerging best practices in the field.
• Facilitate stakeholder discussions, serving as the key escalation point for complex or high‑risk design challenges.
• Drive continuous improvement, incorporating lessons learned into future strategies and ensuring consistency in architecture across multiple domains.

The essential skills are used to assess your demonstrable passion for Technical Architecture, with the following skills or shown experience expected to be highlighted in your CV and personal statement
:

• Significant experience of designing cloud platform and applications architectures, across CSPs such as AWS and MS Azure, ideally…