Gravitas is delighted to be supporting a forward-thinking financial services organisation seeking their first-ever Head of Data Engineering. This is a rare opportunity to take full ownership of a modern Azure-based data estate and transform a reactive function into a proactive, value-generating capability.

You’ll lead a team of engineers within a business that recognises data as a strategic differentiator. You won’t just “build to spec”, you’ll be expected to deeply understand business problems, shape solutions, and drive engineering excellence across a rapidly maturing data environment.

If you’re looking for a genuine meritocracy where you can define the vision, elevate standards, and own the roadmap end-to-end, this is an outstanding next step.

The Opportunity

• Lead, develop, and mentor a team of 5 Data Engineers (note: BI is being separated into its own function).
• Own and evolve a modern Azure data ecosystem including Data Lake, Synapse Analytics, and Databricks.
• Build robust, scalable data pipelines, ensuring high governance, strong documentation, and engineering discipline.
• Translate business problems into engineering solutions, not just deliver against tickets.
• Create the blueprint for turning data engineering from a reactive support function into a strategic growth driver.
• Partner with the CDAO, analytics specialists, and ML teams to ensure the platform enables modelling, insight, and product innovation.
• Maintain high standards around regulation, data governance, and FCA expectations.
• Oversee platform integrity: security, access controls, audit trails, and compliance workflows (e.g., DSARs, sanctions screening).
• Shape engineering best practice and guide the implementation of modern patterns, frameworks, and tooling.
• Provide architectural and infrastructure insight, this is a hands-on role with no dedicated Azure infrastructure team.

What You Bring

Core Technical Expertise

• Proven experience leading a data engineering team
• Hands-on experience with Databricks (Delta Lake, Notebooks, Workflows, Unity Catalog).
• Proficiency in SQL, Python, and PySpark.
• Experience across Azure Data Lake, Synapse Analytics, and cloud-native architectures.
• A strong track record building scalable, high-quality pipelines and lakehouse structures.

Additional Valuable Experience

• Understanding of hybrid on‑premise/cloud patterns and SQL Server integrations.
• Exposure to ML engineering, feature stores, or analytics-ready data assets.
• Familiarity with FCA requirements, data governance frameworks, or credit/debt management environments.
• Financial services experience is highly advantageous.
• Collaborative, empowering people leader who sets high standards.
• Able to communicate clearly with both technical and non‑technical audiences.
• Thinks strategically, balancing delivery with long-term capability building.
• Comfortable diving into detail when needed; leads by example in code quality.
• Energised by solving complex problems with a practical, solutions-first mindset.
• Resilient and driven, capable of maintaining momentum in a fast-paced, evolving environment.

What You’ll Get

• Discretionary annual bonus
• 25–30 days holiday (depending on service) + birthday day off
• Pension scheme with up to 5% matched contributions
• Manchester-based during probation; 3 days hybrid working thereafter