Senior Manager, Delivery Lead

Aker Systems was founded in 2017 by a team of experienced technology professionals who recognised an opportunity to provide highly secure enterprise data platforms to large organisations.  We build and operate ground-breaking, ultra-secure, high performance, cloud-based data infrastructure for the enterprise. Our proprietary technology solutions drive performance and reduce costs while helping our clients to improve the management and sharing of data across their organisations.

In 2024, Aker Systems won the Breakthrough Culture Awards highlighting growth companies putting culture first. In 2020 Aker Systems was recognised as a ‘One to Watch’ on the Sunday Times Tech Track.  The Company was also recognised at the Thames Valley Tech Awards 2020; winning the Thames Valley Tech Company of the year, the Emerging Tech Company and High Growth Tech Business categories.  We encourage people of all different backgrounds and identities to apply.  We are committed to maintaining an inclusive, and supportive place for you to do your very best work.

The Senior Manager, Delivery Lead, serves as the bridge between strategic vision and technical execution on a specific project or projects.  Reporting to the Director, Programme Delivery, you lead multidisciplinary teams to deliver complex initiatives. In this role, you will build and maintain teams, including managing and mentoring a team of Delivery Managers, fostering a highly collaborative environment where execution meets human-centric leadership. In this role, you will be the 'manager of managers,' responsible for unblocking complex dependencies across multiple workstreams and ensuring our technical teams have the clarity and momentum they need to deliver excellent results to our clients.

A UK Government Security Check (SC) clearance is required for this role.  If you don’t hold SC clearance, we will support you to apply assuming you have lived and worked in the UK for a minimum of 5 years.

Duties & Responsibilities

• Lead the end-to-end delivery of complex projects
• Work closely with internal and external stakeholders and external delivery partners to deliver high quality cloud & data solutions for our clients
• Proactively identify and manage technical or operational dependencies across multiple workstreams to reduce delivery risk
• Act as the primary point of escalation for delivery teams, rapidly resolving impediments and unblocking problems to maintain pace
• Identify areas for improvement and contribute to the wider growth of Aker’s delivery capability and processes
• Work with other departments (Sales/Finance/HR) to ensure that projects’ budgets are estimated, costed and resourced appropriately
• Collaborate with architecture, infrastructure and security to ensure Aker delivery teams are fully aligned to the client’s outcome
• Provide effective reporting of project delivery, timelines, milestones and budgets to senior business stakeholders
• Work with Account Managers, participate in client commercial reviews and support creation of SoWs for future deliverables
• Take responsibility for the quality of the team’s output and ensure the client satisfaction is of a high standard

• Translate technical progress and risks into clear, non-technical updates for the Director and other senior business stakeholders
• Manage a mentor a multidisciplinary team including engineers and analysts, fostering a high-performance culture and continuous improvement. including performance management, mentoring, engagement and team building

• Provide constructive and real-time feedback through goal setting, regular 1:1s, personal development conversations and annual appraisals
• Encourage team camaraderie and collaboration. Resolve any conflicts within the team promptly and effectively thus ensuring a positive and productive working environment
• Successfully onboard and train new hires, complete probation milestones and processes, create robust inductions and provide career development support and guidance

Core Competencies

• 7+ years of experience in a delivery management role with a proven track record of leading complex, large-scale projects required
• Experience of Public Cloud Services and technologies (AWS, GCP, Azure)
• Previous experience leading cross-functional teams, including the management of managers, strongly preferred
• Have a good understanding of technical solutions and data integration
• Deep expertise in Agile (Scrum, Kanban) and traditional Waterfall frameworks, with the ability to blend them based on the context
• Familiarity with software delivery pipelines, Jira, Azure DevOps, or other digital delivery tools for real-time tracking
• Strong team management ability, with emotional intelligence to manage conflict and motivate diverse teams
• Vendor or offshore management experience a plus
• Advanced stakeholder management, negotiation and conflict resolution skills including being comfortable in dealing with challenging and pressurised situations
• Ability to understand complex organisational structures and multi-supplier landscapes
• A driven leader who can shape a team and bring them on the journey to success for our clients
• Vendor or offshore management experience preferred

• ITIL v3 Foundation and /or SAFe Agile preferred
• UK Government project experience preferred

Aker Systems Attributes

At Aker we work as a team; we are collaborative, hardworking, open, and delivery obsessed. There is no blame culture here: try things, and take responsibility for the outcomes. You are always part of the wider Aker. We help our colleagues and take pride in successfully achieving difficult tasks. We run towards problems and help to solve them. Communicate always, do so accurately and in a timely fashion.

In return, we offer a competitive salary, 25 days holiday plus bank holidays, company paid medical insurance and life assurance, pension scheme, annual training allowance, wellbeing allowance, virtual GP, Employee Assistance plan and more.

Equal Opportunities

Aker Systems fosters a diverse environment that encourages openness in its communications and is committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all people regardless of race, religion, gender or sexual orientation, age, marital status, national origin, citizenship status, disability, veteran status or other personal characteristics. We embrace differences of opinion and diversity because they help challenge us and find new groundbreaking technical solutions.