Principal Technical Solutions Architect

Principal Solutions Architect - AI customer facing products
£875-£900/day Inside IR35
6 Month Contract
London (preferred) | Bristol or Manchester considered

Up to 2 days per week on site

I'm supporting a search for a senior technical leader to head Technical AI Solutions Architecture for a major UK Government AI programme, responsible for shaping and delivering AI-powered digital products used by millions of citizens.

This role would suit a Principal Solutions Architect, Senior Technical Architect, AI Solutions Architect, Head of Technical Architecture, Head of Solutions Architecture with a strong background delivering large-scale digital products.

Key Requirements

• Extensive experience as a Technical Architect or Solutions Architect (not Enterprise Architecture focused).
• Proven track record designing, building and launching user-facing digital products, apps and web services.
• Experience leading architecture functions and managing teams of architects (4-8+ people).
• Strong experience delivering AI-enabled products, ideally where AI functionality has reached end users rather than purely internal/back-office use cases.
  • Example: website and mobile application chat bots
• Deep AWS expertise, including:
  • AWS Serverless technologies
  • AWS Bedrock
  • Cloud-native architecture
• Strong software engineering and application architecture background.
• Experience defining technical strategy, governance, standards and best practice across complex organisations.
• Knowledge of modern engineering practices including DevOps, CI/CD, TDD and Agile delivery.
• Experience building secure services, ideally aligned to NCSC Secure by Design principles and/or Cyber Assessment Framework (CAF).
• Ability to operate at organisational leadership level while remaining technically credible.

Ideal Background

• Delivery of products at national or enterprise scale.
• Multiple major product launches/releases with clear ownership of technical architecture decisions.
• AI, machine learning or data-intensive product delivery experience.
• Public sector experience is welcome but not required.
• AWS certifications, Computer Science degree or postgraduate qualifications are beneficial but not essential.

Additional Details

• Active SC Clearance preferred (transferable SC acceptable).
• Can start on BPSS while clearance transfer is completed.
• Typically 2 days onsite per week, with flexibility available.
• Candidates based outside London should expect quarterly travel to London.

This is a high-impact leadership role responsible for the technical architecture strategy behind some of government's most visible AI-powered citizen services, including the next generation of GOV.UK digital experiences.