About the Opportunity
We are seeking an experienced technology leader to head our Core Banking function, reporting directly to the Chief Information Officer (CIO). This is a strategic leadership role responsible for the technology platforms that underpin the organisation's core banking and business operations, including Core Banking, Payments, Cards, Enterprise Data Platforms, and other mission-critical services.
As the Head of Core & Data Platforms, you will own the end-to-end technology lifecycle—from strategy and architecture through engineering, operations, modernisation, and continuous improvement. You will be responsible for ensuring the resilience, security, scalability, and performance of the Bank's most critical platforms while driving its long-term technology transformation agenda.
This role requires a leader who can balance operational excellence with innovation, modernise legacy platforms, strengthen engineering capabilities, and enable data-driven business outcomes through modern architectures and cloud technologies.
Key Responsibilities
Platform Strategy & Engineering
- Define and execute the technology strategy for Core Banking, Payments, Cards, Enterprise Platforms, and Data Platforms.
- Provide end-to-end ownership for platform architecture, engineering, delivery, operations, and lifecycle management.
- Ensure platforms remain highly available, resilient, secure, and capable of supporting evolving business demands.
- Drive platform standardisation, simplification, and continuous service improvement.
Enterprise Data & Digital Enablement
- Lead the strategy and evolution of enterprise data platforms, including modern data warehouses, data lakes, and analytics capabilities.
- Enable enterprise-wide adoption of data, advanced analytics, AI and machine learning by delivering scalable and trusted data platforms.
- Strengthen enterprise data governance, quality, lineage, and accessibility in collaboration with business, risk, and data governance teams.
- Champion modern cloud-native and real-time data architectures that support digital transformation initiatives.
Technology Transformation
- Lead large-scale platform transformation initiatives across Core Banking, Payments, Cards, and Enterprise Data.
- Accelerate the adoption of cloud technologies, API-led architectures, automation, DevSecOps, and engineering best practices.
- Partner with Enterprise Architecture to define and execute the target-state technology roadmap.
- Deliver measurable improvements in platform resilience, operational efficiency, scalability, and cost optimisation.
Technology Risk & Operational Resilience
- Establish and maintain robust technology governance, risk, and control frameworks across the platform estate.
- Ensure compliance with regulatory requirements and internal technology standards.
- Strengthen disaster recovery, business continuity, production governance, change management, and incident management capabilities.
- Provide executive leadership during major incidents and drive remediation of audit findings and technology risks.
Financial & Vendor Leadership
- Own technology investment planning, budgeting, financial governance, and cost optimisation across the platform portfolio.
- Drive disciplined investment decisions aligned with strategic business priorities.
- Develop and manage strategic relationships with technology vendors, service providers, and system integration partners to maximise business value.
Executive Stakeholder Management
- Partner closely with Business, Digital, Operations, Risk, Compliance, Architecture, and Group Technology teams to align technology capabilities with business strategy.
- Provide executive-level reporting on platform performance, transformation progress, technology risks, and strategic initiatives.
- Build trusted relationships with senior leadership and external stakeholders to support enterprise-wide technology outcomes.
People Leadership
- Lead, mentor, and inspire high-performing engineering, platform, and data teams across multiple disciplines.
- Build a culture of accountability, innovation, continuous improvement, and engineering excellence.
- Develop leadership capability, succession planning, and technical talent to support long-term organisational growth.
- Champion Agile delivery, platform engineering, DevSecOps, and modern software engineering practices.
Requirements
- Minimum 15 years of technology leadership experience within banking or financial services, with significant responsibility for enterprise platforms and technology delivery.
- Deep expertise across Core Banking, Payments, Cards, Enterprise Platforms, and Data Platforms, with a strong understanding of modern platform architectures.
- Proven success leading large-scale platform transformation, modernisation, cloud adoption, and engineering excellence initiatives.
- Strong experience managing large technology organisations, complex delivery portfolios, and mission-critical production environments.
- In-depth knowledge of technology governance, operational resilience, regulatory compliance, cybersecurity, and enterprise risk management.
- Demonstrated commercial acumen with experience managing technology budgets, investment portfolios, vendors, and strategic partnerships.
- Exceptional leadership, communication, and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to influence executive leadership, regulators, and business partners.
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering, or a related discipline. Postgraduate qualifications are advantageous.
