Job summary

Information Services objective is to provide data and analytics capabilities to support patient care, quality, performance, financial flows and service development. Enabling operational and clinical excellence, through data excellence.

To underpin these objectives, the Data Engineering Team's purpose is to firstly build, develop and assure the Trust's Data Platform and secondly to use modern technologies, tools & techniques to leverage this asset for the organisation.

The role will be responsible for developing and improving the data platform in Microsoft Azure, including the integration of artificial intelligence into the data warehouse and analytics. This involves managing data pipelines, databases, Azure cloud environment, system security, system planning and technical documentation.

You will provide strong technical leadership with the vision to grow the service and introduce new concepts that deliver data excellence. The role will require the ability to provide hands-on development as well as management.

Hybrid working would be supported for this role.

Main duties of the job

Successful delivery of the data warehouse for the Trust's clinical and non-clinical systems.

Adhere to and participate in the Trusts IT change management process.

To provide technical support as required to the Information Department teams.

Build a high achieving team that can deliver data excellence to support trust objectives.

Ensure value is unlocked from the growing volume of clinical data.

Support the New Hospital Programme data requirements.

Embed artificial intelligence into the data architecture to provide enhanced insight.

Use strong influencing skills to represent data engineering interests with colleagues at all levels within this organisation and with senior external colleagues.

Deputise for the Head of Information and Performance when required.

Derive, and ensure delivery of, an overall strategy of master data management that supports data exploitation for analysis, including linking/matching across diverse datasets.

Establish a strategy and processes for specialised data handling for example for unstructured data.

Lead on the design of a trusted secure research environment for collaborative research, which may be provider hosted or lean on regional/national resources.

About us

Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust provides a full range of local hospital and community services for people across East Cheshire (population 399K) and West Cheshire and Chester boroughs (population 357K).

The Trust provides high quality planned and unplanned/emergency care, cardiac and critical care as well as child health, maternity services, and intermediate care across our sites at Leighton Hospital in Crewe, Victoria Infirmary in Northwich, and Elmhurst Intermediate Care Centre in Winsford.

The Trust provides 500 beds and employs over 5,100 members of staff.

An extensive range of community services is provided across 26 medical centres and schools by our community arm, Central Cheshire Integrated Care Partnership, in collaboration with Cheshire and Wirral Partnership NHS FT and the South Cheshire and Vale Royal GP Alliance.

We have played, and continue to play, a proactive role in the development of Integrated Care plans across Cheshire & Merseyside and our local Cheshire East and Cheshire West Place-based systems. We believe, and it is the cornerstone of our five-year Trust Strategy, there is the opportunity to progress innovative, responsive and effective care in the best setting for the patient, be it in the hospital or out in the community.

At Mid Cheshire, our mission is to inspire hope and provide unparalleled care for the people and communities of Cheshire, helping them to enjoy life to the fullest.

Job description

Job responsibilities

For full details of the role, please read the Job Description and Person Specification. Summary points below.

Platform Environment Management

Provision and maintain on premise servers and SQL servers where required

Manage Azure data environment including system health monitoring.

Manage cloud service fees and optimise the environment to proactively manage cost reducing compute in line with usage or switching off services when not in use.

Respond to and manage any incidents and events which occur in the platform.

Database Management

Provision and maintain On Premise SQL databases and Azure SQL databases.

Ensure SQL upgrades are completed so services do not run on unsupported database technology.

Monitor and optimise SQL performance including database tuning.

Data Management

Design, develop and maintain an industry standard data architecture such as Data Vault

Develop, support and monitor data extraction methods to ensure data is extracted from core systems effectively with limited impact of live services, this may include API.

Review and implement a real time data extraction process which may includestandard ETL or integration methodologies (HL7, FHIR), allowing the Trust to move to real time reporting from the data warehouse.

Security Management

Configure, test and support data warehouse authentication arrangements.

Create and administer security group permissions.

Ensure the infrastructure, operating systems and database systems are patched in line with the Trust patching policy.

Data Warehouse Planning

Undertake system capacity management to ensure systems are not subject to capacity related incidents.

Plan upgrades to the data warehouse environment ensuring the warehouse remains modern and supported including test and release processes.

Pro-actively explore new tools and technologies, set direction for modernising data architecture, software and facilities and build business cases for technical investment that supports demands for onward uses

Take technical responsibility for all stages and/or iterations in development projects, providing method-specific technical advice and guidance to project stakeholders.

Documentation

Organisation lead on the development of Trust-wide policies, strategies and procedures related to the data warehouse and other database management systems impacting on wider DTIS sections and functional departments.

Create detailed documentation including diagrams of database infrastructure, data flow mappings and SQL code.

GOVERNANCE

Develop data architecture and software development policies and processes including BS 10012:2017 Data protection specification for a personal information management system and BS ISO/IEC/IEEE 12207:2017 - Systems and software engineering. Software life cycle processes.

Engage with the wider technical professions to ensure the data models and data engineering processes conform to best practice and data modelling principles.

Formalise and maintain a robust data warehouse change process and governance framework, aligning with the Trusts change management documentation and processes

MANAGERIAL/LEADERSHIP

Team manager for a small, high performing team

Develop and maintain systems and processes to ensure that activities are appropriately prioritised and allocated, and that effective supervision is in place to support work delegated to specific teams as part of the work.

EDUCATION/LEARNING

Remain up to date on data engineering best practices and data architecture technology through attendance at events, regional groups, blogs, community of interest groups, publications and through supplier relationships.

Investigate emerging trends in data-related approaches, perform horizon scanning for the wider technical community and maintain the currency of your own skills.

Person Specification

Qualifications

Essential

Educated to masters level in an Informatics related subject or equivalent experience Microsoft Certification (in SQL server/ Azure Data Engineering)

Desirable

Microsoft Certified: Azure Data Engineer Associate

Knowledge/Experience

Essential

Extensive knowledge of writing SQL and stored procedures and query tuning on high transaction systems Extensive data extract, transfer/translate and load experience for a large data warehouse Server management: Interpreting log files/system tuning/system security, back up and recovery Knowledge of database mirroring using processes such as change data capture Knowledge of Business Intelligence systems and reporting tools such as Power BI Extensive knowledge of Microsoft Azure and its data management offering

Desirable

Knowledge of NHS and acute and community datasets Experience of Meditech, EMIS, patient and data flows in an hospital setting Knowledge of programming languages including C# and PowerShell Knowledge of messaging technologies, API Experience of embedding AI into data platforms and warehouses.

Skills

Essential

Experience of working in an Information Management team of large organisation Able to effectively communicate difficult messages to stakeholders at all levels both internally and externally Highly numerate, articulate and able to assimilate, analyse, interpret and compare highly complex facts/situations Experience of working with Microsoft Azure, using the Azure portal to configure infrastructure Working knowledge of NHS Information Governance requirements Ability to produce good technical documentation including data flow maps Able to work independently and proactively Experience of assisting in hardware and operating system deployment for BI projects Experience of administering Microsoft SQL server databases

Desirable

Experience of working in an acute and community NHS trust Cloud technology management including platform as a service and infrastructure as a service models. Ability to solve problems & make decisions under pressure

Values and Behaviours

Essential

Values: A commitment to quality and safety. A recognition of the importance of showing respect, dignity and compassion to patients and colleagues. A listening, learning and leading approach. A commitment to work together to create the best outcomes. Must demonstrate the Trust's values around both raising concerns at work, and how to treat others who raise concerns. Behaviours: Must be willing to act as a role model. Must be willing to take personal responsibility. Must have the courage to speak up. Must value and appreciate the worth of others.