Job Description
Position Details
IT Services
Location: University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham UK
Full time starting salary is normally in the range £33,002 to £35,608 with potential progression once in post to £39,906
Grade: 6
Full Time, Permanent
Closing date: 23rd September 2025
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 is 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 want to attract outstanding, inspirational, and talented people, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success. It is 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
The University of Birmingham is seeking to appoint a talented Portfolio Support Officer to join the University’s Portfolio Delivery Assurance Team. Based in IT Services, the Portfolio Delivery Assurance Team delivers strategic and complex IT and non-IT projects across the University. The team acts as a central resource providing professional portfolio and project management, process mapping expertise, and supporting project and portfolio managers across the University in the delivery of their projects. As part of the team, you will be an integral part with responsibilities including supporting project and portfolio governance, committee/meeting servicing, liaising with stakeholders, and supporting the University’s Project Community. The responsibilities of the role will include:
- Providing advice and cascading expertise on portfolio management governance to staff across IT Services and the University, to enable the successful delivery of projects and portfolios.
- Providing Portfolio Manager and relevant stakeholders with the necessary support to enable successful delivery of the portfolio on time, on budget, and to the agreed quality standards.
- Assisting the development and delivery of portfolio management methods.
- Assisting with the creation of proposals to the the relevant senior management team or authority groups and collating feedback.
The successful candidate should have experience of supporting portfolios, programmes and projects and working with key stakeholders to successfully deliver initiatives on time and to budget.
Main Duties
The Portfolio Support Officer will play a key role in supporting the management of the ITS portfolio, guiding stakeholders through the governance processes necessary to ensure the successful delivery of change initiatives. This role requires providing timely and effective project management assistance in collaboration with Project Support Officers. The postholder will be expected to work proactively, build strong stakeholder relationships, apply analytical and planning skills, and exercise initiative in setting priorities to maintain steady progress.
- Arrange, facilitate, and manage portfolio delivery meetings and local governance boards to ensure effective oversight and decision-making.
- Support the development and maintenance of a comprehensive overview of current and upcoming activities within IT Services, as well as broader institutional initiatives that may impact IT Services.
- Support may include some or all of the following:
- Carrying out portfolio planning activities.
- Assist definition of workload scope, goals, deliverables that support business goals, including timescales and budgets.
- Assist in establishing success criteria.
- Complete portfolio administration within ITS project management toolset.
- Identify and assist in managing interdependencies.
- Data collection and analysis, preparing progress and performance data and reports for relevant boards, committees or other meetings.
- Milestone tracking/key performance indicator tracking.
- Developing and proposing solutions for any issues.
- Recommending improvements to portfolio management processes and ways of working.
- Budgetary monitoring and management, including reporting.
- Developing and maintaining regular contact with internal and external stakeholders to understand requirements.
- Assessing, resolving and escalating issues and risks as appropriate.
- Proactively managing portfolio changes and contingency plans.
- Assist in assurance that solutions are technically feasible, relevant and fit for purpose to achieve delivery goals.
- Meeting and workshop facilitation, drawing on key resources and knowledge where required.
- Assist, advise or coach staff in software, tools and specifically project methodology and provide support, guidance and expertise to staff in their project management duties.
- Compiling and maintaining portfolio documentation to support delivery and quality assurance to ensure a consistent level of portfolio management and documentation.
- Assisting in forward planning to ensure all areas are involved early enough to plan for resource requirements.
- Providing administrative support to the Delivery Assurance team.
- Contribute to developing communications plans, presentations, and promoting the portfolio and outcomes of projects/workstreams.
- Maintain an up-to-date knowledge of project and portfolio management methodologies.
- Determine short term priorities for own work, ensuring you maximise quality, efficiency and continuity.
- Assist in the evaluation and review of new work requisitions.
- Promotes equality and values diversity, acting as a role model and fostering an inclusive working culture.
- Supports the University’s sustainability agenda through resource efficient working.
- 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, significant practical relevant experience and expertise in a similar role will be required.
- Practical experience in a similar role, experience of using project or portfolio management tools.
- Evidence of literacy and numeracy, with the ability to write clearly, and to analyse information and data.
- Highly proficient IT skills, including the wider MS Office suite of programmes including Excel and PowerPoint.
- Ability to understand policy, processes and procedures, but also to recommend improvements and implement changes.
- Proficient organisational skills to manage resources, delivery timescales, scope and budgets.
- Experience of managing budgets and P&L’s.
- Experience of Service Delivery and transitioning systems into production ready state.
- Excellent analytical skills used to produce reports, identify issues and resolve them decisively.
- Outstanding interpersonal skills, with the ability to inspire confidence, build strong relationships across all levels, and consistently deliver exceptional customer service.
- Action oriented, capable of contributing to solving complex problems, drawing on expertise and knowledge within the wider IT Services organisation.
- A high degree of professionalism, tact, and diplomacy, and the ability to exercise discretion regarding the handling and management of sensitive information/issues.
- A high degree of initiative, personal judgement, resourcefulness, flexibility, and a self-motivating approach.
- Ability to work effectively in a large, complex organisation, and to develop a good understanding of how the University and higher education institutions work.
- Qualification in Project or Portfolio Management e.g. Prince 2, APMPFQ, Management of Portfolio.
- Knowledge of ITIL Service Management.
- Knowledge of the protected characteristics of the Equality Act 2010, and how to actively ensure in day to day activity in own area that those with protected characteristics are treated equally and fairly.
Informal enquiries to Dominyk Maggs, 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 . 
