Delivery Flow & Time to Market Lead (6 Months'FTC)

Job description

Join us At Vodafone, we’re not just shaping the future of connectivity for our customers — we’re shaping the future for everyone who joins our team. When you work with us, you’re part of a global mission to connect people, solve complex challenges, and create a sustainable and more inclusive world. If you want to grow your career whilst finding the right balance between work and life, Vodafone offers the opportunity to help you belong and make a real impact. What you’ll do With us, you can accelerate how critical technology change moves from demand to delivery. As Delivery Flow & Time-to-Market Lead , you’ll take on a senior six-month contract role focused on accelerating Core IT change and improving flow across the full delivery lifecycle, from demand, design and build through testing, release, go-live and operational handover. You’ll bring senior engineering leadership, delivery discipline and business partnering to a complex enterprise IT environment. You’ll quickly assess delivery plans, milestones, dependencies, risks and constraints, identifying where bottlenecks, hand-offs, rework, capacity issues or delayed decisions are slowing delivery. Working across engineering, architecture, testing, deployment, operations, security, portfolio, finance, business teams and vendors, you’ll unblock priority initiatives and enable faster, clearer decisions on scope, sequencing, resources and trade-offs. You’ll improve how work flows by strengthening prioritisation, planning, dependency management and delivery readiness. You’ll help teams break work into smaller increments, reduce unnecessary process, challenge low-value or poorly defined demand and encourage a finish more, start less approach, while maintaining the quality, resilience, compliance, security and operational controls expected in a large enterprise environment. You’ll establish clear visibility of work in progress, blocked work, ageing demand, dependencies and capacity constraints, using measures including lead time, cycle time, throughput, WIP, flow efficiency, release frequency, delivery confidence and predictability. You’ll partner with Agile Delivery Owners, Scrum Masters, Programme and Project Managers and engineering leads to improve flow at team and portfolio level, using clear dashboards and outcome-focused reporting to drive continuous improvement. You’ll strengthen Core IT portfolio governance, working with IT Governance, Portfolio Management, Architecture, Finance, Operations and business stakeholders to align demand and delivery capacity with business value, customer impact, regulatory requirements and operational risk. You’ll create clear escalation routes, improve decision-focused governance and hold internal teams, vendors and delivery partners accountable for commitments affecting pace, quality and predictability. As a senior business and technology partner, you’ll translate technical complexity into clear choices and business decisions, facilitate difficult prioritisation conversations when demand exceeds capacity and strengthen alignment between business need, solution design, delivery capacity and operational readiness. Over the six months, you’ll establish a measurable improvement plan and baseline for priority delivery flows, targeting reduced time-to-market, cycle and lead times, bottlenecks, waiting time, rework and avoidable hand-offs. You’ll improve throughput, delivery predictability, portfolio visibility and prioritisation discipline, connecting priority initiatives to clear business outcomes, customer impact, risk reduction, operational improvement or cost and value contribution. Just as importantly, you’ll leave sustainable improvements behind. You’ll coach delivery leaders, build trust quickly and embed practical ways of working, metrics, reporting routines, decision forums, documentation, knowledge transfer and clear ownership that can continue beyond the contract. Who we are looking for You’re an experienced senior technology delivery leader who can quickly understand a complex environment, build credibility and turn delivery challenges into practical action. You’ll bring: Significant senior leadership experience across IT engineering, technology delivery, delivery transformation, programme or portfolio delivery in a large enterprise environment. A proven track record of improving time-to-market, delivery flow, throughput and/or predictability. Experience identifying and removing bottlenecks across demand, design, build, test, release and operational handover. Experience leading multidisciplinary teams spanning engineering, architecture, business analysis, programme/project management, testing, deployment, operations, security and vendors. Strong practical knowledge of Agile, Lean, DevOps, value-stream and/or product-centric delivery, applying these approaches pragmatically rather than dogmatically. Strong programme and portfolio governance capability, including prioritisation, planning, sequencing, RAID, dependencies, milestones, reporting and executive escalation. Experience managing complex portfolios with competing priorities, multiple dependencies and senior stakeholder expectations. Experience using delivery metrics including lead time, cycle time, throughput, WIP, blocked work, flow efficiency, release frequency, delivery confidence and predictability. Strong business partnering and stakeholder management skills, with the confidence to shape demand, challenge constructively, facilitate prioritisation and translate technical complexity into clear choices and trade-offs. Strong vendor and partner management experience where supplier performance affects delivery pace, quality or predictability. Broad knowledge of enterprise engineering, systems integration, legacy platforms, technical debt, architecture, security, testing, deployment, service transition and operational readiness. The judgement to simplify delivery processes without weakening appropriate quality, resilience, compliance, cyber/security or operational controls. A data-led approach, strong planning, dependency and risk-management skills, and confidence escalating issues early and constructively. The ability to operate effectively as an interim or contract leader, working with ambiguity, building relationships quickly and focusing on high-impact practical change. A commitment to coaching others and leaving sustainable improvements, documentation and ownership behind. Experience that would be beneficial includes: Telecommunications, financial services, utilities, technology or another large-scale regulated environment. Improving delivery across legacy, hybrid, complex or highly integrated IT estates. Agile at scale, value streams, product operating models, DevOps or Lean portfolio management. Jira, Confluence, portfolio tooling, delivery dashboards or flow/reporting analytics. Agile, Scrum, SAFe, Lean, Kanban, DevOps, ITIL, PMP, PRINCE2, MSP or portfolio management certification, or equivalent practical experience. Coaching delivery leaders, engineering managers, product owners, programme managers or senior stakeholders in flow-based delivery behaviours. Together we can improve how critical technology change is prioritised, delivered and sustained, creating clearer outcomes for our teams, stakeholders and customers. Not a perfect fit? Worried that you don’t meet all the desired criteria exactly? At Vodafone we are passionate about empowering people and creating a workplace where everyone can thrive, whatever their personal or professional background. If you’re excited about this role but your experience doesn’t align exactly with every part of the job description, we encourage you to still apply — you may be the right candidate for this role or another opportunity. What’s in it for you? The flexibility to work how you perform best, with hybrid ways of working and real focus on work-life balance A competitive package including salary, bonus and a strong pension to support you now and long-term ‘’Generous’’ flexible benefits allowance, plus access to comprehensive health and wellbeing support Access to our on-site wellness centre and gym, alongside a wider wellbeing programme Free mobile plan, device offers and exclusive discounts for you, your family and friends Market-leading family policies and flexibility to support you at every stage of life Real opportunities for career growth through learning, development and internal progression Who we are We are a leading international Telco, serving millions of customers. At Vodafone, we believe that connectivity is a force for good. If we use it for the things that really matter, it can improve people’s lives and the world around us. Through our technology, we empower people — connecting everyone regardless of who they are or where they live — and we protect the planet, whilst helping our customers do the same. Belonging at Vodafone isn’t a concept; it’s lived, breathed, and cultivated through everything we do. You’ll be part of a global and diverse community with many different minds, abilities, backgrounds and cultures. We’re committed to increasing diversity, ensuring equal representation, and making Vodafone a place where everyone feels safe, valued and included. Vodafone is committed to supporting candidates with disabilities during the recruitment process. If you require any adjustments, please let us know. Together we can. #LI-JB1