Platform & Infrastructure Engineering Manager (Contract)

Please note that holding a current Security Clearance is not essential at the time of application, but eligibility is required.

This is an experienced engineering management role that combines people leadership, technical understanding, operational oversight and delivery management.

Working closely with the Head of Platform & Service Delivery, you'll provide day-to-day leadership across the Platform team, helping engineers and technical leads work effectively, manage competing priorities and deliver reliable outcomes.

You won't need to be the person with every technical answer. Instead, you'll create the conditions for experienced engineers and technical specialists to take ownership, make informed decisions and deliver high-quality work.

You'll remain close enough to the technology to ask the right questions, challenge constructively and support technical discussions, while ensuring specialists have the autonomy to lead within their areas of expertise.

A key focus will be improving how work moves through the team, strengthening planning and prioritisation, managing dependencies, reducing unnecessary delays and ensuring risks and progress are clearly communicated.

If you're passionate about developing people, improving engineering delivery and making a positive difference in a technically diverse environment, we'd love to hear from you.

You'll join our Platform team, responsible for operating and supporting TIG's core technology platform across three closely connected areas: Wintel, Networks and Infrastructure.

The team supports business-critical services and customer-facing products, combining day-to-day operational ownership with project delivery, lifecycle management and continuous improvement.

You'll work alongside engineers and technical leads with a broad range of specialist knowledge and experience.

The team values practical problem-solving, shared ownership, clear communication and learning from one another.

Your role will help bring these areas together, strengthen technical leadership across the team and create a more effective flow of work from initial priority through to successful completion.

• →As our Platform & Infrastructure Engineering Manager, you'll provide leadership and support across the Wintel, Networks and Infrastructure teams, creating clarity around priorities, responsibilities and outcomes.
• →People Leadership & Development
• →Leading and supporting engineers and technical leads, setting clear expectations and encouraging a collaborative, high-performing team environment.
• →Coaching and developing colleagues through regular 1:1s, constructive feedback and development conversations.
• →Supporting capability planning, identifying development opportunities and helping strengthen technical leadership across the team.
• →Encouraging engineers and specialists to take ownership of decisions and outcomes within their areas of expertise.
• →Promoting an inclusive and supportive team culture where colleagues can share ideas, challenge constructively and continue developing their skills.
• →Engineering Leadership & Technical Collaboration
• →Providing credible technical leadership across Wintel, Networks and Infrastructure without becoming the default technical decision-maker.
• →Facilitating technical discussions and supporting teams in reaching informed, evidence-based decisions.
• →Promoting pragmatic engineering practices, appropriate automation, standardisation and maintainable technical solutions.
• →Supporting the reliability, security, scalability and performance of the organisation's core technology platform.
• →Working closely with technical specialists to ensure decisions balance immediate operational needs with longer-term service resilience and maintainability.
• →Delivery Management & Continuous Improvement
• →Managing priorities across the Platform teams, balancing project delivery with operational resilience, security and lifecycle requirements.
• →Improving the flow of work by identifying and removing blockers, unnecessary hand-offs and avoidable delays.
• →Coordinating planning, sequencing, dependencies, risks and delivery communication.
• →Helping teams make realistic commitments and ensuring progress, priorities and potential issues remain visible.
• →Using delivery and operational metrics to identify constraints, support predictable delivery and drive continuous improvement.
• →Operational Management & Stakeholder Engagement
• →Supporting effective service ownership, operational stability and continuous improvement across the Platform environment.
• →Acting as a senior technical and operational escalation point for major incidents, problems and delivery risks.
• →Ensuring changes are assessed, planned, communicated and implemented effectively.
• →Building strong working relationships across Service Delivery, Security, Architecture, Product, Development and Cloud teams.
• →Managing dependencies and working collaboratively with colleagues, suppliers and partners to resolve challenges.
• →Communicating technical risks, priorities, decisions, trade-offs and progress clearly to technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Here at TIG we are committed to equal opportunities and value diversity, equity and inclusion at our company. We do not discriminate based on race, religion, colour, national origin, sex, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

As a Group, we seek to ensure that individuals with disabilities receive reasonable accommodation throughout the hiring process and ultimately within the job itself. Please contact us to request any accommodations.

More than anything, we're looking for an experienced, approachable Engineering Manager who combines strong technical credibility with the ability to develop people, improve delivery and support effective decision-making.

You'll be comfortable working with experienced engineers and technical leads, asking informed questions, challenging ideas constructively and helping teams work through complex technical and operational issues.

You don't need to be the deepest technical expert in every area. We're looking for someone who understands enterprise infrastructure, can engage confidently with technical specialists and knows how to enable others to succeed.

Success in this role is about more than overseeing technical work or being the person with every answer.

You'll help create an environment where engineers have the clarity, autonomy and support they need to perform effectively, where technical specialists are trusted to lead and where important work progresses reliably from priority through to completion.

You'll demonstrate the ability to balance people leadership, operational priorities and delivery commitments while ensuring risks, dependencies and challenges are identified and addressed early.

Over the course of the assignment, you'll help strengthen collaboration across the Platform team, improve the flow of work and support the delivery of secure, reliable and sustainable technology services.

Ultimately, your success will be reflected in the capability, ownership, collaboration and outcomes of the teams you support.

• Experience leading infrastructure, platform or operations engineers as an Engineering Manager, Team Manager, Technical Lead or comparable technical people leader.
• Experience managing, coaching and developing technical teams, including supporting performance, development and individual progression.
• Previous hands-on technical experience at a mid-to-senior engineering level.
• Strong technical judgement, with the confidence to challenge constructively while empowering specialists to make decisions.
• Ability to build effective working relationships, encourage collaboration and create clarity around team priorities.

• Broad knowledge of enterprise infrastructure technologies, including areas such as Windows Server, Active Directory, virtualisation, storage, networking, cloud or hybrid infrastructure, security and monitoring.
• Understanding of how different infrastructure technologies and services interact.
• Strong operational understanding, including service ownership, incident and problem management, change management, capacity, resilience and continuous improvement.
• Ability to engage confidently in technical discussions and support well-informed engineering decisions.

• Demonstrable project and delivery management experience, including planning, prioritisation, resource coordination, dependency management, risk management and stakeholder communication.
• Experience improving delivery flow, reducing blockers and addressing delays between teams or hand-offs.
• Ability to balance competing operational and delivery priorities while maintaining focus on service reliability and security.
• Experience managing suppliers, partners or cross-team delivery dependencies.
• Experience using delivery and operational metrics to identify constraints and improve outcomes.

• Strong stakeholder management and communication skills across technical and non-technical audiences.
• Ability to facilitate discussions involving different perspectives and strongly held technical opinions.
• Confidence communicating technical risks, decisions, progress and priorities clearly.
• A collaborative leadership style that encourages shared ownership, accountability and continuous improvement.

Relevant technical or service-management certifications would be beneficial, including qualifications in areas such as:

• Microsoft technologies
• VMware or virtualisation
• Networking
• Cloud technologies
• Information security
• ITIL or service management

These certifications are advantageous rather than essential. We're particularly interested in relevant hands-on experience, technical credibility and effective people leadership.

This opportunity is available on an initial six-month basis, with the potential to extend depending on business requirements.

Our preference is to engage an experienced professional on a day-rate contract, assessed as inside IR35. However, we are also open to considering suitable candidates seeking a six-month Fixed-Term Employment Contract (FTC) directly with TIG.

The two potential engagement arrangements are:

• Day-Rate Contract (Preferred): An initial six-month assignment, assessed as inside IR35, with the applicable payroll and contractual arrangements confirmed during the recruitment process.
• Fixed-Term Employment Contract (FTC): An initial six-month period of direct employment with TIG, with an agreed salary and applicable employee benefits.

The appropriate arrangement will be discussed with shortlisted candidates, taking into account experience, candidate preferences and business requirements.

The role is based in Liverpool, with hybrid working arrangements requiring three days per week on-site.

Please note that the talent acquisition team is managing this vacancy directly and we do not require agency support.

Candidates who are successful will be required to undergo relevant security checks.