Senior Data Engineer and Data Manager

Job summary

We’re responsible for Land Transaction Tax and Landfill Disposals Tax. Our work raises revenue to support public services, like the NHS and schools, in communities across Wales. But that’s not all, we're also involved with and support future tax design for Wales.

Join a place with purpose
You’ll join a team of 100+ talented people from across 14 different professions. Our culture is best described as innovative, collaborative and kind. By working together, we’ll deliver a fair tax system for Wales.

Our people
You’ll be working with people from a wide range of backgrounds and experience. From Operations, Policy, Digital and Data, HR, Communications to Finance – there’s a place for you in our friendly team.

You’ll be our greatest asset

You’ll be joining an inclusive organisation and be part of a team where you can thrive, be rewarded and heard.

We’re recognised as one of the top organisations for people engagement in the Civil Service People Survey. Inclusion and fairness are one of our strongest areas, as well as pay and benefits – our People Survey results say it all!

We’re also recognised for being innovative and a digital, ‘cloud-based’ organisation that supports hybrid and flexible working enabling a great work-life balance.

More about working for us, our roles and our Corporate Plan 2025 - 2028 .

Job description

This post provides the opportunity to work in a fast-moving area of work, innovatively using data to contribute directly to effective and fair management of devolved taxes in Wales.

The post is suited to an experienced data professional who understands the importance of delivering a coherent data landscape, with clear lines of data mastery, across the services that WRA uses and offers. That person will support and enable staff across the WRA to make the most of our data both operationally and analytically. Crucially they will ensure data and software dependencies are maintained and simplified as our services develop.

"This is chance to work in an organisation that uses data extensively to directly inform its work. As a key part of the data team, you will be supporting the organisation in that evidence based decision-making and working with colleagues who value that contribution. You'll be supported by friendly colleagues from the immediate team as well as other parts of the WRA, but also have the autonomy to make decisions relevant to your role."

Adam Al-Nuaimi, Head of Data Analysis

Person specification

Data engineering: extraction, loading, transformation and management

• Acquisition of data from internal and external WRA systems and third parties into the WRA’s data analysis environment
• Development of pipelines and automated processes to support data integrations and flows at low cost
• Maintenance and development of the data structures to store these data where required
• Ongoing data management including a level of preliminary analysis to present simplified views and aggregations of the data for use by the analysts
• Drafting and maintenance of documentation for the WRA data environment, including policies covering accurate data storage, appropriate data access and high levels of data security/confidentiality, user guides and key technical information
• Management of access permissions to the data in the data environment for user groups and by related systems
• Upkeep of software in the data analysis environment

Data engineering: integration between services

• Management of test and live versions of the WRA data architecture including development of new code and infrastructure in test, and deployment from test to live
• Development and management of APIs sharing data to and from the data environment to other internal (and possibly external in future) services in the WRA, in particular data supporting a single view of each WRA customer
• Advocating for clear lines of data mastery, especially for datasets flowing into and out of the data environment
• Being a point of contact for wider organisation colleagues and third-party support services for understanding the data integrations currently in use
• Providing a governance gateway regarding data integrations, including:
• Working closely with the Business Solutions Manager, business analysts, solutions architects, internal developers, testers and support contractors within the WRA change process to ensure that data considerations, data flows and data mastery is considered appropriately in change projects
• Challenging robustly and escalating where necessary in ensuring future integration work maintains coherence, versioning and retention/disposal of data, and keeps costs low
• Helping to ensure the continuity of existing operations
• Ownership and maintenance of documentation pertaining to the above
• Keeping abreast of developments in software as a service offerings, exploiting opportunities for simpler and better data integrations
• Supporting use of data including replication from all key systems into the WRA data environment for more detailed analysis

Skills development and sharing

• Self-driven development in technical skills in areas listed in section below
• Provision of support to other analysts and wider staff in the use of these tools
• Able to explain the data integrations, data flows and the importance of the mastery of the data to non-technical colleagues

Candidate information sessions

If this seems like a role you’d be interested in, join us for our virtual Candidate Information Sessions. You’ll meet the Line Manager, get an overview of the role as well a feeling for what it’s like to work at the WRA. We’ll also talk through our benefits and provide helpful tips for your application with us. Please register for one of the sessions below:

2 July 2026 – 12.30-13.00pm - Register here: https://uwchbeiriannydddataarheolwrdatasnrdataengineerdatamgr1230.eventbrite.co.uk

2 July 2026 – 4.00-4.30pm - Register here: https://UwchBeiriannyddDataaRheolwrDatasnrdataengineerdatamgr4pm.eventbrite.co.uk

Languages

We’ve undertaken an objective assessment of the Welsh language skills needed to undertake the duties of this role. For this role:

Welsh language skills - Welsh skills are not essential. This means that you do not need Welsh language skills to undertake this role and these skills won’t be assessed during the recruitment process. However, we actively encourage all staff to learn, or improve their Welsh language skills and offer a range of opportunities to suit everyone.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £47,675, Welsh Revenue Authority contributes £13,811 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

What we offer

• 31 days annual leave + Bank holidays, and 2 Privilege days
• Flexible and hybrid working
• Generous employer pension schemes with a contribution of up to 28.97%
• Tusker car scheme
• Vivup Cycle2Work and salary advances for season Travel Tickets
• Lifestyle Benefits offering discounts on shopping, restaurants and entertainment
• Wellbeing hour each week
• Access to subsidised sports groups
• Generous family-friendly leave policies
• Free Welsh language courses and time off to learn
• Access to a range of staff diversity networks
• Free counselling and support service via our Vivup Employee Assistance Programme and Your Care Health platform
• A thriving culture that’s described as innovative, collaborative and kind.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

We’ll always be clear about how we assess your application at each stage of the process. This will usually include:

• Assessment of your Application Form and CV against the relevant Success Criteria
• A panel interview (if you’re successful at the initial sift stage) Interviews will take place in person.
• If any additional assessments are needed for this role, such as a test or presentation at interview, we’ll let you know in advance.
• Should a large number of applications be received, an initial sift will be conducted using the lead behaviour, Data integration design (data engineering) - Select the most appropriate techniques for different integration scenarios

We’re proud to be a Disability Confident Leader so we’ll ask you if you need any adjustments at each stage of the recruitment process. So that we can support you in a way that works for you, we’ll offer a pre-interview accessibility chat to anyone that declares a disability, or needs any adjustments. This will take place with someone who is independent of the recruitment process and you won’t be placed at any disadvantage as a result of needing adjustments.

A reserve list may be held for this role for applicants that have scored above the appointable threshold at interview. This means that if a similar vacancy becomes available in the next 12 months we may contact you to offer you the role.

We recommend you review the job description (or candidate pack) under the 'attachments' section before completing your application.

Success criteria

Behaviours

Criteria

Assessed in personal statement and CV

Assessed during interview or assessment

Programming and build (data and analytics engineering)

Create automation to improve the software development life cycle

Yes

No

Data integration design (data engineering)

Select the most appropriate techniques for different integration scenarios

Yes

Yes

Delivering at pace

Ensure the most appropriate resources are available for colleagues to use to do their job effectively

No

Yes

Strengths

Criteria

Assessed in personal statement and CV

Assessed during interview or assessment

Analytical

You seek and analyse information to inform your decisions, based on the best available evidence

No

Yes

Precise

You concentrate on detail and make sure everything is accurate and error free

No

Yes

Problem solver

You take a positive approach to tackling problems and find ways to identify suitable solutions

No

Yes

Experience

Criteria

Assessed in personal statement and CV

Assessed during interview or assessment

Experience in management and manipulation of both large record level and aggregated datasets, including use of T-SQL and Python

Yes

Yes

Experience of Microsoft cloud-based tools automating extract, load and transform of data, specifically including examples around at least two of:
Azure Data Factory
Azure Synapse Link
Azure Data Lake
Microsoft Fabric
DBT (Data Build Tool)

Yes

No

Experience using Dynamics software as a service, with particular examples of how this experience has involved the Microsoft Dataverse and the Power Platform

Yes

Yes

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window).People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see theCivil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

Apply and further information

The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name : Luke Cox, Yolk Recruitment
• Email : luke.cox@yolkrecruitment.com
• Telephone : 07458 160 673

Recruitment team

• Email : luke.cox@yolkrecruitment.com

Further information

The law requires that selection for appointment to the Civil Service is on merit on the basis of fair and open competition. See the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles where this is set out.
If you feel your application has not been treated in line with the recruitment principles, and you wish to complain, you should contact the Head of HR.
Email: hr@wra.gov.wales
If you’re not satisfied with our response, you can contact the Civil Service Commission.

Attachments

Job description - Senior Data Engineer and Data Manager - (FINAL) Opens in new window (pdf, 323kB)Disgrifiad swydd - Uwch Beiriannydd Data a Rheolwr Data - (FINAL) Opens in new window (pdf, 325kB)