Job Description
Position Details
IT Services
Location: University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham UK
Full time starting salary is normally in the range £36,130 to £45,413 with potential progression once in post to £48,149
Grade: 7
Full Time, Fixed Term contract up to October 2028
2 positions available
Closing date: 31st July 2025
Please note we reserve the right to close this vacancy early should suitable candidate(s) be found
UK travel may be required for this role
This role requires hybrid working from both onsite and from home
Our offer to you
People are at the heart of what we are and do.
The University of Birmingham is proud to have been a part of the City of Birmingham and the wider region for over 100 years, and we are equally proud to be recognised as a leading global university. We want to attract talented people from across the city and beyond, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success.
We are committed to helping the people who work here to develop through our sector-leading Birmingham Professional programme which provides all professional services staff with development opportunities and the encouragement to reach their full potential. With almost 5,000 professional services jobs in a wide-range of functions in Edgbaston and in our campus in Dubai, there are plenty of opportunities for you to be able to develop your career at the University.
We believe there is no such thing as a typical member of staff and that diversity is a source of strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation, and debate. We warmly welcome people from all backgrounds and are committed to fostering an inclusive environment where diversity is at the heart of who and what we are, and how we work.
Supporting our people to achieve a healthy work/life balance is important both to our employees and to the success of the University and, depending on the role, we offer a variety of flexible working arrangements. We therefore welcome discussions on all forms of flexible working. In addition, you will receive a generous package of benefits including 40 days paid holiday a year, one paid day a year for volunteering, occupational sick pay, and a pension scheme. We also have three high quality subsidised day nurseries.
The University is situated in leafy Edgbaston and there are excellent transport links to our beautiful campus, including main bus routes and a train station on site. On campus we have a state-of-the-art sports centre with pool, shops, places to eat and drink, our own art gallery, museum and botanical gardens.
Find out more about the benefits of working for the University of Birmingham
Background
Over the next decade, our aspiration is to establish Birmingham in the top 50 of the world's leading universities. That's a big aspiration, and high-quality digital services and infrastructure are crucial to achieving it. In recognition of that, our Digital Strategy combined with significant investments in technology mean this is an exciting time to join IT Services,
‘making IT happen’ at the University of Birmingham.
We are looking to maximise the benefits of the full range of readily available automation tools to further innovate and enhance service efficiency and effectiveness across Professional Services, as well as in academic administration and teaching delivery. This long-term investment aims to deliver the following benefits:
- Identify early adopters of automation solutions and support their growth.
- Explore opportunities of services areas where the use of such tools can be expanded or introduced.
- Develop principles for the use of automation and innovation tools.
- Champion the wider adoption of automation tools.
- Consider the cultural dimension change to service innovation and automation, including changes to ways of working and communicating the benefits of these forms of service innovation to support wider adoption.
- Define how the benefits of automation will be measured consistently and can realise identifiable cashable savings.
We want to attract outstanding, inspirational, and talented people, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success. It's our role to ensure that our community has access to accessible, responsive, resilient, and secure systems and support. What we do enables our students, staff, researchers, visitors and partners to confidently and creatively use digital services, technology and data for the benefit of their learning, teaching, research or work.
The culture of IT Services is one of innovation, collaboration, excellence, and inclusivity, and we apply the principles of customer focus and continuous improvement to everything we do. We have an active People and Culture network, Equality, Diversity and Inclusion and Women in IT group, bi-annual making IT happen awards recognition programme, and a superb Social Committee which arranges regular activities and events.
Role Summary
In this role, you will maximise the value of the discovery, design, development and delivery lifecycles in a Business Analysis Practice designed to provide prospective and current University of Birmingham students and staff with high quality, personalised pathways and services.
The BA will ensure that all changes are in line with the mission, objectives and strategy of the University. They will either already know or learn about techniques that allow this context to be the key foundation for understanding and evaluating all ideas, issues, proposals, projects, programmes and problems put forward by the University.
The BA will be supported by the wider practice (Senior BA and BA Manager) and will endeavour to deliver a professional service often at an early point to advise the University on an effective course of action.
Applicants should have exposure to Business Analysis Practice and / or significantly aligned transferable skills that you will use to influence and secure beneficial changes for the University. You will have been exposed to a variety of delivery styles, including but not limited to, Waterfall and Agile.
Main Duties
- Establish requirements for the implementation of change in organisational mission, business functions and process, organisational roles and responsibilities, and scope or nature of service delivery.
- Maintain a solid foundation of knowledge in Business Analysis approaches, applying them to situations encountered.
- Be a proactive problem solver who looks for intelligent and innovative ways to streamline processes, remove duplication and hand off and increase quality or productivity.
- Analyse qualitative and quantitative data and will be able to visualise the data clearly (e.g. personas, golden path, user journey maps).
- Conduct stakeholder mapping through effective analysis of users and stakeholder groups and maintain effective and appropriate communication to the group once identified.
- Strive to spot new opportunities, methods, trends, capabilities and products to the advancement of the organisation. You will share these with the team and with relevant support aid the business in articulating potential benefits of change delivery and timelines for these to be realised.
- Apply your knowledge to resolving complex problems working towards the wider strategy set by IT Services and the University.
- Assess feasibility and support the business in identifying appropriate approaches; typically seeking to exploit technology components.
- Understand the business problem and from this elicit business requirements to provide scope and success criteria. You will work with the business to understand priorities, minimum viable product (MVP) and definition of done. You will recognise there should always be a “do nothing” solution option and will understand how this will impact the business to determine strength of the business case for change.
- Describe the user/ stakeholder objectives for the system, and identify the roles of affected stakeholder groups. You may be able to define the required behaviour and performance of the system in terms of the total user experience (e.g. in the form of scenarios of use), understanding potential conflicts between user requirements (e.g. between accuracy and speed).
- Specify measurable criteria for the required usability of the system (non-functional requirements).
- Practice modelling and analysis tools, methods, techniques and standards, giving special consideration to business perspectives.
- Identify aspects where challenge is appropriate and look to engage the business and stakeholders over the same.
- Work collaboratively with the wider practice, colleagues and external parties to secure, develop and implement a fit for purpose solution that meets (or exceeds) business needs within timeframes agreed and budget outlined.
- Supports the University’s sustainability agenda through resource-efficient working.
- Actively manages equality, diversity and inclusion through monitoring and evaluation and actively challenging unacceptable behaviour.
- Any other duties commensurate with the grade.
Required Knowledge, Skills, Qualifications, Experience
- Educated to Degree level (or equivalent qualifications), where no equivalent qualification is held substantial practical relevant experience and expertise in a series of progressively more demanding roles will be required.
- Evidence of literacy and numeracy, with the ability to write clearly for a variety of audiences.
- Authoritative knowledge of the work practices, processes and procedures relevant to the role, including broader sector/commercial awareness.
- Experience of working with a multitude of stakeholders/ customers.
- Skilled in conflict resolution techniques dealing with disagreements early and positively.
- Experience working across multiple creative, technical, software, or business unit teams to develop solutions.
- Ability to understand business and technology concepts quickly and able to facilitate those conversations.
- Experience of championing Equality, Diversity and Inclusion.
- Ability to monitor and evaluate the extent to which equality and diversity legislation, policies, procedures are applied.
- Ability to identify issues with the potential to impact on protected groups and take appropriate action.
- Familiar with a variety of delivery styles, including but not limited to, Waterfall and Agile.
- An inquisitive and curious outlook that is always looking for continuous improvement opportunities.
- A good appreciation of the Higher Education sector is desirable.
To apply for this role please attach your current CV / Resume to your online application.
Informal enquiries to Alastair Henbrey, email:
[email protected]View our staff values and behaviours here
We believe there is no such thing as a 'typical' member of University of Birmingham staff and that diversity in its many forms is a strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation and debate at the heart of University life. We are committed to proactively addressing the barriers experienced by some groups in our community and are proud to hold Athena SWAN, Race Equality Charter and Disability Confident accreditations. We have an Equality Diversity and Inclusion Centre that focuses on continuously improving the University as a fair and inclusive place to work where everyone has the opportunity to succeed. We are also committed to sustainability, which is a key part of our strategy. You can find out more about our work to create a fairer university for everyone on our website . 
