Salary: Circa £33,000 per annum negotiable depending on experience 
Contract: Permanent 
Hours: 35 hours per week 
Reports into: Principal Data Steward
Location: Hybrid - A blend of working from home and your nominated hub office, we have hubs in London, Bristol, Manchester and Oxford.   Specific patterns for working in the office are not mandated, and the frequency of time worked in the office is agreed with your manager. Meeting in person is something we value so you may need to travel on occasion to any of our hub offices.

About the role:

We have a great opportunity for a strong Data Steward to join a high performing and forward-thinking team supporting both the DCS directorate and wider Jisc stewardship.

The Data Stewards within Data Management are responsible for management and maintenance of the data and metadata relating to statutory data collections within the Data Collections and Statistics directorate at Jisc. Data Stewardship is becoming an essential role in any organisation that needs to manage their data efficiently and effectively to derive value for the business.

This is a small specialist team who are continually innovating in their approach and looking to better support their customers’ needs. These customers may be other teams within Jisc or external customers within the sector. The team works closely with colleagues across the directorate in crafting and managing specifications as well as publishing them on the Jisc website.

Data Stewards are also responsible for supporting other teams in their own data management activities, helping to drive efficiency and adopt good practise. Upon gaining necessary experience, you will be involved in the work of other projects and teams to act as a champion of good data management in support of the organisation’s data strategy. 

About Jisc:

Jisc is the UK digital, data and technology agency focused on tertiary education, research, and innovation. We are a not-for-profit organisation with a big ambition to improve lives through education and research by providing hardware, software, and networking solutions. Our talented people bring their own unique skills and experience to empower our members and customers with the technology they need to succeed. Take your next career step with us and you can make a real difference to the education and research sector.

Some of your key responsibilities are:

• Contributing to the management of the metadata relating to the data HESA holds that is used to support the specification, collection, storage, analysis and publication.
• Taking a role in implementing changes to the data specification model using data modelling tools.
• Being responsible for the maintenance of HESA’s reference data store to act as a single source of this information for usage across the agency and the HE sector.
• Maintaining content of HESA’s reference data store via the use of SQL scripts as part of defined data management processes.
• Responding to requests from users for reference data outputs utilising script library.
• Creating/Quality assurance of new SQL scripts where required for management of ref data or in response to user requests in accordance with data management procedures.

Key Skills and Experience

• An understanding of good data and metadata management practice and principles.
• An understanding of data governance requirements and practices.
• Knowledge of technical specifications and an understanding of their use in the development of systems.
• Good understanding of database concepts and data structures coupled with experience of SQL for querying and manipulating data.
• Ability to write and interpret technical specifications.

We are constantly changing and evolving at Jisc, so this job description just gives a flavour of what the role involves. It will change as our operations develop.

Don’t meet every single requirement?

We know that sometimes people can be put off applying for a job if they think they can’t tick every box, so we encourage you to apply even if you do not meet 100% of the requirements, but you feel this role is perfect for you. You may be just the right candidate for this or other roles!

Why work for us?

At Jisc, everyone plays a key role and gets the chance to feel part of it, that to us is the definition of a meaningful career. We want to create a culture of lifelong learning. You can look forward to a rewarding job with opportunities to develop and make a real difference to the education and research sectors.

We believe a balance between your personal and professional life is essential to your happiness and fulfilment. We work flexibly at Jisc and focus on outputs rather than presenteeism and are open to a whole range of ways of working.

It isn’t about how many hours you spend at home or at work; it’s about the flow you establish that brings energy to both parts of your life. Our hybrid working policy is flexible, and the frequency of time spent in your nominated office will vary across teams and job roles.

Take a look at our fantastic benefits!

We offer:

• Flexible work pattern, which can adapt to suit your schedules and personal commitments
• 31 days annual leave (plus bank holidays) that includes an additional three closure days over Christmas plus the opportunity to buy up to an additional 5 days
• Generous flexible pension schemes
• Protection benefit – life cover
• Annual Jisc performance award
• A range of wellbeing lifestyle benefits including company paid health care cash plan, employee assistance programme, mental health first aiders and support
• A generous budget to support you with external learning and Continuous professional development
• Allocated allowance of up to £250 to equip your home office
• Financial well-being support including access to preferential loan and savings plans, mortgage advice, will writing tools and support and resources to help you make the most of your money
• The opportunity to donate to charity tax-free with our Payroll Giving benefit
• Electric Car Lease Scheme and option to purchase SmartTech – spreading the cost of your everyday white goods and technology
• A wide range of discounts from retailers and big-name high-street stores and CSSC membership
• Family friendly policies including enhanced parental, maternity and paternity leave and opportunity for career breaks
• Support your volunteering with up to 3 days volunteer leave
• Cycle to work scheme and eye care scheme including free eye test vouchers and £70 towards new glasses for VDU use
• Free flu vaccinations
• Employee recognition awards and travel loans
• A company culture which supports and promotes personal learning and development, including access to thousands of courses on LinkedIn Learning

Equality, diversity and inclusion

At Jisc, we don’t look for ‘sameness’, but to truly include people who can add unique perspectives and experiences to our culture, and we are working hard to achieve progressive change. ‘Always inclusive’ is one of our six guiding principles which actively encourages us to bring our whole authentic selves to work. We believe that our commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion is fundamental to our success.

Jisc believes our people make all the difference in cultivating an inclusive culture that welcomes ideas, encourages innovation, and values belonging. We work with passionate colleagues to strengthen knowledge and awareness, provide learning and development opportunities, and foster multiple employee networks which create a sense of community and influence our policies and practice.

We work hard to create an equitable experience for our candidates and workforce which embraces all aspects of their identity including race and ethnicity, religion and belief, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, trans identities, age, class, disability, neurodivergence, or veteran status.

Application process

We want you to showcase your talent throughout the recruitment process. Please let us know how we can best support you to do that; for example, if there are any reasonable adjustments we may be able to put in place. We will be happy to help you.

Just so you know, we review CVs as soon as we can and aim to provide an update on your application within 4 weeks of receiving it. However, you may hear from us a lot sooner, so please keep an eye out for our emails or calls.

We advertised this role on 16/10/24.

Jisc has an active sponsor licence to recruit on a Skilled worker visa basis. Candidates wishing to apply who require sponsorship should determine the likelihood of obtaining a Certificate of Sponsorship for the role by assessing their circumstances against the relevant Home Office criteria. Jisc does not offer any financial re-imbursement towards the applicant costs, such as re-location, skilled worker visa and dependant costs or the immigration health charge.