Platform Owner

The Multi-channel Digital Tax Platform (MDTP) is an award-winning Platform as a Service (PaaS) which hosts many of HMRCs Digital Services.

The MDTP is made up of 9 functional teams and PlatformUI (User Interface) is made up of both a development team and the Platform test Leads. The development team enable tenant teams to build accessible services aligned to GDS and HMRC Design systems, to prototype and maintain and support frontend libraries, tooling and guidance. The Platform Test Leads provide guidance and consultation on strategies for testing services running on MDTP, maintain libraries and tooling that aim to lower the cost of testing on MDTP.

The Platform Owner is responsible for developing an ambitious vision for the team, championing the voices of users and considering the long term strategy of both the products of the team and the Platform. They will be expected to establish a sound understanding of the team’s digital estate, be driven by delivering a better experience for service users, and deliver a robust roadmap that aligns with user needs and the objectives of the organisation.

This is a leadership role with the expectation to work collaboratively with a hands-on approach with the team and contribute to the wider MDTP Product and cross-team space, championing best practices and fostering a culture of continuous improvement and success.

Within the MDTP you will act as a key part of CDIO’s intelligent client function, ensuring that the Platform is secure and available at all times, advocating for and championing the MDTP as an opinionated platform. Ensuring that tenant service teams can deploy easily, efficiently and securely and fostering an innovative spirit on the Platform, where MDTP is at the forefront of the latest technology and standards.

As a Platform Owner:

• You will build and maintain the team vision, roadmap and backlogs, setting priorities whilst ensuring a focus on value and user needs and considering cross-platform objectives.
• You will build sufficient comprehension across the breadth of the team’s digital estate, with the ability to communicate the complexity to a variety of technical and non-technical audiences.
• You will work closely with Lead Platform Owner and other Platform Owners to deliver the strategic roadmap of the MDTP, establishing Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) that ensure the Platform as a whole remains secure, innovative and user-focused and meets CDIO strategic priorities.
• Within your team and across the platform community you champion product-focused and outcome based thinking, sharing best practices, tools and techniques and user-centred ways of working.
• You will be able to evaluate and clearly articulate the expected value, benefits, costs, risks and organisational impact of product initiatives, using evidence and data to support your decision making.
• You will identify and highlight dependencies, minimise blockers and support the integration of other platforms with the MDTP.
• You will manage the team’s products through multiple stages of the product life cycle; working with the Delivery Lead, Technical Lead and Development Team to determine the right approach and translating goals and user needs into user stories the team can deliver.
• With your hands-on and dynamic approach to working with the team, you will promote collective ownership of the team vision and how to achieve it, and foster a culture of transparency and openness.
• With your commercial and financial experience, you will confidently manage your team’s budget for delivery, tooling and infrastructure costs and relationships with supplier partners.
• With your strong communication skills you will confidently lead engagement with stakeholders, engage with wider CDIO teams and represent the interests of MDTP and HMRC on calls and during live incidents.
• You will regularly engage with teams to seek ways to improve the user experience, maintenance and delivery of high quality, cost-effective, added value service and functionality of the platform.
• You will demonstrate curiosity; seeking out knowledge and insight from wider government departments or across the industry, to pro-actively shape the team’s roadmap to meet user needs or highlight opportunities for innovation across the platform.
• You will work collaboratively with a wide range of internal and external stakeholders including complex supplier ecosystems to deliver end to end platform services, identifying and managing risks and escalating issues early.
• You will take an active role in making the MDTP a great place to work, embodying the civil service values and supporting the development of others through line management, mentoring or participating in cross-platform initiatives that promote a positive, collaborative environment.
• Significant experience as a Platform Owner with a proven track record of defining product strategy, prioritising roadmaps and backlogs and making decisions using evidence based trade-offs.
• Significant experience delivering user-centric outcomes within complex, digital environments, such as within Platform-as-a-Service offerings or Frontend service delivery.
• Ability to gather, evaluate and incorporate user insights to define and adapt product scopes.
• Demonstrated experience of leading teams, championing Agile ways of working, and promoting and sharing best practice from government or industry standards.
• Proven ability to understand technical concepts within complex environments and ability to communicate these to a mix of technical and non-technical audiences.
• Demonstrated experience of goal setting, capturing user needs/insights and distilling these into epics and user stories.
• Excellent communication and influencing skills, with the ability to build trust, manage senior stakeholder relationships and support effective decision-making.
• Experience of coaching, mentoring and line managing others across a digital team in product management roles or other GDaD roles.
• Experience in the delivery of frontend services or Platform team, within a multidisciplinary digital service team.
• Familiarity with the design standards, awareness of WCAG standards.