Solutions Architect - Working for Essex

About the role

Solutions Architect

Permanent

Full Time, 37 hours per week

£51,563 to £60,662 per annum

Contractual Location: Chelmsford

Closing Date: 28th October 2026 (23:59)

Work Flexibly, Stay Connected

This role offers flexible hybrid working, with attendance at our Chelmsford office typically required around 2 to 3 days per month, depending on business need. Enjoy the flexibility of remote working while maintaining regular in-person collaboration with colleagues.

Join a Council Shaping the Future of Public Services

Essex Digital Service is working to improve how Essex County Council delivers services, making it easier and safer for residents and colleagues to get things done.

Our work supports services ranging from social care and education to transport and the environment. You will work across a broad and varied technology estate that includes cloud and SaaS platforms, data, integration, identity and established systems. Some areas are more mature than others, so the role offers the opportunity both to support delivery now and to help strengthen how we modernise services over time.

As a Solution Architect, you will turn complex service needs into clear, deliverable solutions. You will support work at different stages, from early exploration through to implementation, bringing together user needs, technology, data, security, cost and operational considerations. You will collaborate with delivery teams, specialist architects, service colleagues and suppliers, helping to make pragmatic decisions and improve the way architecture supports delivery. Your work will contribute to simpler, more secure and sustainable services for residents, staff and partners.

Key Responsibilities:

Lead and support the design of end-to-end solutions, working with business, data, security, service and technical specialists to translate user and service needs into deliverable technology.
Work with services and delivery teams at different stages of maturity, providing proportionate architecture support from early exploration through to implementation where needed.
Produce clear solution designs, options and roadmaps that show how services, information, applications, integrations and technology could work together.
Help teams make pragmatic trade-offs between user need, cost, risk, technical quality and delivery constraints, documenting decisions and recommendations clearly.
Apply and help develop ECC’s architectural principles, technical standards and strategic direction, encouraging greater simplification, reuse and sustainable support.
Assess technology and supplier options and present their strengths, limitations, costs and risks through clear, evidence-based recommendations.
Support commercial activity and business cases, helping colleagues select products and suppliers that fit ECC’s direction and operating environment.
Build trusted relationships across services, delivery teams and suppliers, influencing decisions, constructively challenging approaches and helping architecture become more consistent and accessible.

The Experience You Will Bring:

Substantial practical experience in solution architecture, or an equivalent combination of relevant experience and qualifications.
A strong track record of designing and guiding complex solutions through delivery, ideally in a large, diverse or public service organisation.
The ability to understand service and user needs, explore options and turn ambiguity into clear, proportionate and deliverable designs.
Experience applying recognised architecture frameworks and modelling approaches, such as TOGAF or equivalent, pragmatically and in environments where ways of working are still developing.
Broad technical understanding across areas such as cloud and SaaS platforms, integration, data, identity, security and legacy modernisation.
Confidence using architecture, modelling or design tools to communicate current and future-state services, capabilities and technology landscapes.
Experience working flexibly with delivery teams and applying relevant digital service, accessibility, data protection and cyber security principles.
Strong communication and stakeholder engagement skills, with the ability to explain complex choices clearly to technical and non-technical audiences.
A collaborative and curious approach, with the judgement to challenge constructively, work through uncertainty and help improve architecture practice over time.

Why join ECC?

Essex is one of the UK’s largest and most varied local authority areas, covering more than 1,420 square miles and serving 1.8 million residents. That scale creates meaningful architecture challenges and the opportunity to influence services that people rely on every day.

You will join a developing architecture and design community, working across a wide range of public services and helping to shape how ECC uses technology to improve outcomes and value. We have useful foundations in place, but there is more to do to make our standards, patterns and ways of working consistent across the organisation. This role gives you the opportunity to support delivery, influence that development and broaden your experience through work with visible public impact.

Ready to help turn complex public service needs into solutions that work?

Apply now and help shape practical, sustainable digital services for Essex.

What else do you need to know?

Essex County Council is proud to be a Disability Confident Leader. We’re committed to interview all disabled applicants who choose to apply under our Job Interview Scheme if they meet the minimum requirements of the job. Please speak to our Recruiters if you require any reasonable adjustments during the process. We’re also committed to interview all veterans and care leavers, who meet the minimum requirements of the role for which they are applying.

Once you’ve secured your role within Essex County Council you will receive many great employee benefits, including support for unpaid carers and flexible working arrangements to accommodate their needs.

In March 2026, Greater Essex was accepted on to the devolution priority programme, where we will work towards establishing a Mayoral Combined County Authority. You can read more about these changes, and what this may mean for this role, on our careers site.

At Essex County Council, we value integrity and ethical behaviour. We kindly ask that you embrace our code of conduct and the Nolan principles, including throughout the recruitment process. Your commitment to these standards helps us maintain a positive and respectful workplace for everyone.

As part of employment with Essex County Council (ECC) should your role require a DBS check you will be required to register with the DBS update service. The DBS update service ensures all registered DBS certificates are kept up to date and allows authorised parties to view the status of your certificate. This is an annual subscription, and you will be responsible for ensuring this is maintained. For further information on the DBS update service please go to https://www.gov.uk/dbs-update-service

Essex County Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults, and expects all employees and volunteers to share this commitment.

If you would like to be kept up to date on other relevant opportunities, blogs, news, events and industry related news at Essex County Council, please join The Essex Talent Community

If you have queries on this role or require anything further, please email [email protected]

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