Job Advert
Flexible Location: Based throughout Scotland, NES is a remote friendly employer supporting office and hybrid working. We’re happy to talk about how you want to work.
Work Pattern: Full Time, 37 hours per week
Fixed-term or Secondment** until 31 March 2026
**For NHS applicants, an NHS secondment will be offered in the first instance. For non-NHS applicants, a fixed-term or secondment would be considered.
You must have eligibility and entitlement to work in the UK which is required to be maintained throughout your period of employment.
Who We Are
NHS Education for Scotland (NES) is the national health board with statutory responsibilities to effect sustainable change through workforce development, education and training across the health and social care system in Scotland, while working at UK level with partner organisations.
NES Technology Service (NTS) has created a strategic programme for the transformation of digital based services to allow NES to become a leading digital organisation in Scottish Health, digital by default and fully aligned with the Scottish Government’s technology strategies. It is in pursuit of this aim that NTS are working with partners to develop the National Digital Platform.
The National Digital Platform (NDP) is an open, standards-based platform, supporting technology for the health and care environment. It underpins our commitment to making health and care information and services more accessible. Working with those delivering solutions across health and social care to bring new and existing digital components onto the platform, for re-use.
Our Technology
We are in the business of providing safe, secure and innovative technology products and services that aim to improve outcomes across education, training, workforce, health and care in the public sector in Scotland. Using modern cloud-based technology we deliver sustainable products and services for the future.
The Opportunity
To enable delivery of the NES Strategy 2023-2026, and assist NTS in our contribution to delivering against the Scottish Government Digital Health and Care Strategy and Data Strategy, NTS is seeking a highly skilled Senior Platform Engineer to provide specialist support to the Digital Front Door (DFD) programme (https://www.digihealthcare.scot/our-work/digital-front-door)
This is an opportunity to define and drive innovation that will directly inform the development of digital services for health and care professionals, and the general public.
Do you want to play a key technical leadership role in the development of high quality, robust and scalable applications that will directly improve the working lives of NHS colleagues and help improve patient care?
Do you enjoy working in a multi-disciplinary team of software engineers, product and delivery managers at the edge of technological innovations? Liaising with supporting colleagues from disciplines such as design, clinical, information governance and security.
Do you want to work in a culture continuous improvement and development of best practices in areas such as application design patterns, cloud architecture, security, and test-driven development?
Do you want to play an important role in delivering the NES Strategy, Digital Health and Care Strategy and Data Strategy for Scotland?
Do you enjoy working at pace, on a modern technology stack, as part of a skilled and friendly team, in pursuit of better care for the people of Scotland?
Working within the NES Technology Engineering team you will have the opportunity to work directly on the Digital Front Door (DFD) as well as other National Development Platform (NDP) services and products.
Does this sound like you?
What We Love to See
Senior Platform Engineers offer a broad range of skills and experience, if you can offer some or all of these, we’d love you to apply:
Ability to provide expert hands-on technical leadership and develop complex software across the entire product lifecycle within a multi-disciplinary agile team.
Highly experienced in cloud native development using providers such as Azure and AWS, as well as at least one modern JavaScript framework, backend language and experience with databases (see Job Pack).
Able to work on your own initiative through complex challenges, understanding the users’ needs, breaking down the problem, planning an approach and delivering a solution.
Ability to collaboratively design, code, deploy, test, and document high complexity software using the right standards and tools.
A clear understanding and advocate of architectural principles, patterns, and security best practices.
Highly effective communicator knowing how to make complex technical information and language simple for a diverse range of senior internal and external stakeholders (both verbally and in writing).
An agent for continuous improvement; keen to understand non-functional requirements (e.g. security, performance) and team processes to find opportunities to improve.
Mentoring and support of other members of the team, driving knowledge sharing and adoption of best practices.
Demonstrate honesty, integrity, care and compassion when dealing with others, utilising tact and persuasion skills when necessary
Ability to work on own initiative, to organise and prioritise own workloads, to meet strict deadlines
Benefits Which Matter
As a valued employee of NHS Scotland, you can enjoy an extensive range of benefits including:
Life-work balance - with opportunities for flexible working and hybrid working
Generous NHS pension scheme
Annual incremental salary progression (up to the maximum of the salary band) plus annual NHS salary scale review
Annual Leave - 27 Days increasing in line with service plus 8 days public holiday
NHS discounts and more
Diversity and Inclusion
Developing a successful national service for Scotland is impossible without ensuring we consider the diverse needs, perspectives and backgrounds of everyone in Scotland in our work.
We are focused on hiring the very best talent available for NES, and actively encourage applications from candidates of all backgrounds and aim to ensure everyone is treated fairly, with respect and has a positive recruitment experience – regardless of the outcome.
It’s not essential to be in a Senior Platform Engineering role right now. You may be returning from a career break (e.g. maternity, paternity, caring for others) or returning after working in another field. Your experiences elsewhere can bring a fresh perspective to our work.
If you are considering applying and feel it would be helpful to discuss this initially, please contact Simon Maishman (Head of Service – Engineering) via simon.maishman@nhs.scot
Next Steps
**NHS candidates will be considered firstly on a secondment basis, and so are strongly encouraged to discuss this with their current NHS employer at the earliest opportunity, ideally prior to application.
Our recruitment process is currently 100% remote and if successful you would initially work remotely, working from our offices as operationally required.
All applicants who are shortlisted for interview will be contacted by e-mail.
Two rounds of online interviews (including a presentation) will take place between 6 December 2024 and 10 January 2024. The presentation topic will be sent to candidates selected for interview.
For further information please refer to the Job Information Pack below.
Unless otherwise stated the deadline for applications is 23:59 hours on the closing date. Please note, CV’s will not be accepted.
If you have any queries regarding the NHS Scotland National Recruitment Portal or the recruitment process, please don't hesitate to contact our recruitment partners, the East Region Recruitment Service, at: EoS.ERRS@nhs.scot