Want to solve impactful problems? Are you looking to make a positive impact in your work? Do you want to work in an environment where you can grow, while solving problems to help improve government, healthcare and private sector services? If so, Opencast could be the place for you. We’re a growing technology consultancy that creates user-centred solutions with purpose. The role As a Business Analyst (Consultant), you’ll bring a depth of experience and expertise from working in large, complex organisations. You’ll collaborate in multi-disciplinary teams with product managers, software developers, user researchers, designers and other specialists to tackle interesting problems and deliver meaningful solutions for clients. You’ll build strong relationships with client stakeholders, understanding their needs and translating them into clear, actionable requirements. You’ll also ensure that all work meets Opencast’s high standards, including quality, environmental and information security policies, as well as any applicable client requirements and standards.  Requirements This role involves weekly on-site working. Applicants should be able to travel, as part of their normal daily commute, to client sites in one of the following locations:  Newcastle, Leeds, or Manchester. As attendance at these sites is a routine part of the role’s working pattern and involves frequent local travel, travel expenses are not covered. Due to the nature of this role, you must either hold active Security Check (SC) clearance or be eligible and willing to undergo the clearance process.  SC clearance is granted in line with UK Government security vetting requirements. Typically, applicants are expected to have lived in the UK for at least five consecutive years prior to application to allow the appropriate background checks to be completed. Nationality and immigration status may also be considered as part of the vetting process.  If you are unsure whether you meet the eligibility criteria, we encourage you to review the guidance or discuss this with us before applying. Essential experience To succeed in this role, you’ll have experience as a Business Analyst and be able to demonstrate, with tangible examples, that you can: - Apply business analysis techniques (e.g. SWOT, 5 Whys) to understand business context, processes, and systems; analyse root causes, define problems, evaluate options, and make recommendations aligned with strategic goals. - Elicit, analyse, validate and prioritise business and user requirements, using techniques such as BPMN process flows, wireframing and data analysis. - Define epics, features, user stories, acceptance criteria and non-functional requirements; maintain traceability and facilitate prioritisation. - Use business modelling, process improvement and digital/data systems analysis to represent organisations, processes, relationships, and systems; identify gaps, recommend improvements, and support implementation and validation. - Build and maintain strong stakeholder relationships and cross-functional teams, communicating clearly, reaching consensus and adapting messages to different audiences. - Analyse and prioritise user experience needs, presenting insights in an accessible, data-informed way. - Support testing by defining business scenarios and acceptance criteria, reviewing prototypes, test plans and outcomes to ensure solutions meet requirements. - Deliver to the highest quality, adhering to recognised industry standards and frameworks (e.g. GOV.UK Service Standards), in large and complex organisations. - Work collaboratively in multidisciplinary Agile teams, validating process and system improvements and delivering project objectives effectively. - Present complex information in a way that is easy to understand, engaging both technical and non-technical stakeholders. With a significant proportion of our client base in the public sector, we are particularly interested in candidates with experience working in central or local government and/or the NHS. Experience working to the GOV.UK Service Standards, including passing service standard assessments at different stages is highly desirable. If you have this experience, please demonstrate this on your CV to discuss at interview. Essential consulting skills In addition to business analysis skills, there are essential core skills you’ll need to be an Opencast consultant. You’ll need to demonstrate how you: - Contribute to improving ways of working and driving continuous improvements within your teams. - Share knowledge and best practice with fellow business analysts and other disciplines, including proactively engaging in client and Opencast communities of practice. - Positively challenge decisions or solutions you don’t agree with, striving for the best client outcomes. - Create lasting value in the projects you work on, ensuring a user-centric, sustainable approach. - Engage with Opencast in a meaningful way, supporting the growth of your practice and wider capability. - Support Opencast's growth plans, by providing case studies and updates into the relevant forums of your project work. During the interview process, we’ll ask questions to explore your experience across these areas.  Salary Consultant salary range: £45,000 - £52,000 per annum What we offer A competitive package including a 7% employer pension contribution, share options and a discretionary bonus. You’ll also benefit from flexible working hours (aligned to client commitments), 25 days’ holiday, and access to 3 annual “life happens” days to support unexpected situations. We also offer wellbeing support, ongoing professional development, volunteering opportunities and the chance to be part of a genuinely supportive team.  Where you’ll work  This role requires regular on-site attendance across our HQ, hub offices, client sites and home. Applicants must be able to commute to offices and client sites as part of their normal working arrangements, as travel is essential to fulfilling the responsibilities of the role. We include you  We welcome candidates from all identities, attributes, ways of thinking and backgrounds to thrive in a career at Opencast. Our aim is for the diversity of our people to be reflected in the solutions we deliver, to help create a fairer society for all.    Interview  Interviews will be conducted via Microsoft Teams. We’re happy to make adjustments to support your needs. Want to know more?   Visit our website or email careers@opencastsoftware.com

Ready to work somewhere that cares more about how you build software than how fast you can ship it? At Opencast, we don’t measure developers by the number of tickets you complete. We care about engineering craft, clean design and thoughtful problem-solving. Opencast consultants deliver in complex environments, pairing often and working with others who take pride in doing things properly: TDD, emerging design, refactoring and leaving code better than they found it. We build software we are proud of, and our clients trust us not just to code but to think, challenge and guide. If you value simple and robust solutions and want a role where your judgment matters as much as your keyboard, you will fit right in. The role We’re looking for Contractors in Software Development (consultant level) to help our major clients transform. Software developers at Opencast care about building products right and combine their own experience and approach with our company values. They are tech agnostic, have expertise in agile methodologies, extreme programming practices and use industry-leading programming languages to deliver agile transformation. Our approach to software development is collaborative, focused on keeping things simple, and we use test driven development and pair programming as best practice. Working with clients and key stakeholders is a crucial part of a consultancy role. Our developers are inclusive team players that listen, collaborate, can positively challenge and manage expectations when needed but most of all are always willing to teach and help others. Leaving a client with improved ways of working, working technology and a good experience from discovery through to live is the priority. Contractors at Opencast follow the same principles as permanent consultants. The roles are varied, technical, and never confined to any one provider or solution. Requirements Due to the nature of this role, applicants must either currently hold active Security Check (SC) Clearance or be eligible to obtain it. Eligibility typically requires UK citizenship and continuous residence in the UK for the past five years, with no single absence exceeding 28 consecutive days. As attendance at client sites is a routine part of the role’s working pattern and involves occasional travel, travel expenses are not covered. Experience in delivering digital services for the UK government is highly valuable for many of our projects. Therefore, familiarity with the GDS toolkit will be beneficial. Technical Skills - Expertise in Java and/or Scala is required - Experience with Javascript, Typescript, Kotlin, Python or Ruby is also valuable - Understanding of Object Oriented Programming - In depth knowledge of concepts and uses of testing - Knowledge or experience of delivering complex services to Government Digital Service (GDS) standards - Being comfortable with new technology, t-shaped and comfortable with ongoing learning and development is key to success - Experience with agile methodology A contractor in software development at Opencast is responsible for: - Delivering in the upkeep of their team’s backlog - Collaborating with the teams testing effort - Leading on the implementation of user stories - Embracing mobbing and pairing - Working with others in a collaborative, multi-disciplinary environment Salary Up to £450 per day (working inside IR35) Where you’ll work This role requires regular on-site attendance across our HQ, hub offices, client sites and home. Applicants must be able to commute to offices and client sites as part of their normal working arrangements, as travel is essential to fulfilling the responsibilities of the role. We include you We welcome candidates from all identities, attributes, ways of thinking and backgrounds to thrive in a career at Opencast. Our aim is for the diversity of our people to be reflected in the solutions we deliver, to help create a fairer society for all. Interview Interviews will be conducted via Microsoft Teams. We’re happy to make adjustments to support your needs. Want to know more? Visit our website for more details.

Ready to keep quality at the heart of projects with impact?

Do you want to make a real impact by ensuring quality in services? Are you ready to grow your skills in a supportive, knowledge-sharing community where you can achieve your potential?

We’re a growing tech consultancy that creates user-centred solutions with purpose for our clients in government, healthcare and purpose-driven businesses. As a Quality Assurance consultant, you’ll ensure that quality assurance is considered from the start through testing, questioning and improving. You’ll apply your adaptability and communication skills across a variety of projects, working with a vibrant QA community that champions learning and knowledge sharing.

The role

You’ll work on public and private sector projects. You may be the sole software quality engineer on a project or work in a team.

Leading by example and promoting the Opencast approach, you’ll work in an agile environment across all testing types. You’ll collaborate with team members, clients and users to maintain quality and follow best practice. You’ll adapt to different tools and technologies, advising on the best and mentoring junior colleagues.

Applicants must either currently hold active Security Clearance (SC) or meet the eligibility criteria to obtain it.

Eligibility requires UK citizenship, continuous residence in the UK for the past five years, and no single absence from the UK exceeding 28 consecutive days.

Essential experience

To succeed in this role, you must have experience working as the sole software test engineer on a team.

In your CV and at interview, you’ll need to show experience of:

• writing, running and debugging functional automation tests on an integrated development environment (IDE) for front-end and API testing and frameworks like Cucumber BDD or Junit

• Recent hands on experience with Java and Selenium.

• presenting work to stakeholders

• managing defects and tasks through to resolution

• creating user stories and technical tasks from high-level requirements

• version control tools like git and peer review processes

• creating test plans and reports

• participating in E2E and UAT.

You’ll need a good understanding of:

• your working area and applying this to your role

• concepts and benefits of non-functional testing

• continuous integration tools like Jenkins, GitLab CI or CircleCI

• basic principles of programming paradigms, such as object-orientated and procedural programming

As well as QA skills, there are essential core skills you’ll need to be a great consultant.

In the interview, we will assess how you have:

• organised your workload to ensure you’re completing tasks efficiently to ensure quality is unaffected

• strong attention to detail

• a methodical approach to resolving complex problems

• respectfully challenged decisions or solutions

• communicated with technical and non-technical people

• been proactive and taken the initiative in seeking solutions to mitigate risk

• raised risks and issues through the correct tools.

Other helpful experience

Some areas of experience are not essential but relevant to the role:

• UK government service standards

• agile methodology.

If you don’t have experience, we can coach you if you join us.

Salary

Consultant salary range: £44,001 – £52,000 per annum

What we offer

A competitive package including a 7% employer pension contribution, share options and a discretionary bonus. You’ll also benefit from flexible working hours (aligned to client commitments), 25 days’ holiday, and access to 3 annual “life happens” days to support unexpected situations. We also offer wellbeing support, ongoing professional development, volunteering opportunities and the chance to be part of a genuinely supportive team.

Where you’ll work

This role requires regular on-site attendance across our HQ, hub offices, client sites and home. Applicants must be able to commute to offices and client sites as part of their normal working arrangements, as travel is essential to fulfilling the responsibilities of the role.

We include you

We welcome candidates from all identities, attributes, ways of thinking and backgrounds to thrive in a career at Opencast. Our aim is for the diversity of our people to be reflected in the solutions we deliver, to help create a fairer society for all.

Interview

Interviews will be conducted via Microsoft Teams. We’re happy to make adjustments to support your needs.

Want to know more?

Visit our website or email careers@opencastsoftware.com

We are not working with recruitment agencies on this vacancy. If you are interested in this position, please apply directly with Opencast.

Ready to grow your architectural expertise in a supportive team? Do you want to work alongside expert architects and grow your skills in a supportive, collaborative environment? Are you ready to take on projects to open new opportunities? If so, Opencast could be the place for you. We’re a growing tech consultancy that creates user-centred solutions with purpose for our clients in government, healthcare and purpose-driven businesses. As a Technical Architect you'll contribute to software development projects, ensuring that the applications are efficient, performant and user-friendly. You’ll broaden your experience while connecting with experts across the practice, gaining and sharing insights, and benefitting from opportunities to grow your career. The role You’ll use your experience of defining and implementing software architectures using patterns and best-practice approaches to define detailed designs that form part of large enterprise-scale applications to meet our clients’ business outcomes. You’ll collaborate with colleagues and take your solutions through architecture governance and generally contribute to the evolution of the assurance processes. You’ll use your expertise to confidently lead and guide delivery teams to bring your design to life. Requirements As attendance at these sites is a routine part of the role’s working pattern and involves frequent local travel, travel expenses are not covered. Due to the nature of this role, applicants must either currently hold active Security Check (SC) Clearance or be eligible to obtain it. Eligibility typically requires UK citizenship and continuous residence in the UK for the past five years, with no single absence exceeding 28 consecutive days. As a result, we are unable to progress applications from candidates who do not meet these requirements. Essential experience You don’t need to have had the job title of technical architect before – but we will want you to demonstrate experience of technical architecture. In your CV and at interview, we’ll ask you to show how you: • develop and implement technical designs for modern enterprise-scale applications, utilising or defining effective patterns and technologies • show ownership of designs and their evolution and transition into service • have an excellent working knowledge of software development, programming languages, modelling languages and methodologies and know how to apply them • identify and adhere to architecture quality attributes and/or non-functional requirements • evaluate and introduce innovative new patterns, approaches and technologies into project teams • can break down architectures into implemented components, utilising effective patterns and technologies that deliver business outcomes and address stakeholder needs As well as technical architecture skills, there are essential core skills you’ll need to be a great consultant. If selected for interview, we’ll ask you to show that you: • build strong relationships with both business and technical stakeholders to provide technical direction and build consensus for your technical designs • take a methodical and considered approach to solving problems • take a collaborative and consultative approach to leading and guiding teams • coach and mentor fellow team members • keep up to date with new and emerging technology trends and their practical application At the interview, we’ll ask you to describe how you approach architecture, deliver business outcomes and engage stakeholders. If you’re successful in your first interview, we’ll ask you back to develop and present a proposal from a case study and problem statement. Desirable experience Some areas of experience are not essential but relevant to the role: • Experience with architecture frameworks (e.g. TOGAF, Zachman, Open Agile Architecture) • Experience of delivering digital services and the GDS toolkit for the UK Government would be useful for many of our projects. It will be valuable (and essential for some contractor roles) if you are familiar with these activities and concepts: o the Service Manual o Agile delivery phases and o Service Assessments • A solid understanding of the benefit of user-centred design and understanding accessibility standards • Good understanding of DevOps and in-life service management If you have this experience, please show it on your CV and we can talk about it in the interview. If you don’t have this experience please do still apply, as we can coach you in these areas if you join us. Salary Senior consultant salary range: £70,001-£80,000 per annum What we offer A competitive package including a 7% employer pension contribution, share options and a discretionary bonus. You’ll also benefit from flexible working hours (aligned to client commitments), 25 days’ holiday, and access to 3 annual “life happens” days to support unexpected situations. We also offer wellbeing support, ongoing professional development, volunteering opportunities and the chance to be part of a genuinely supportive team. Where you’ll work This role requires regular on-site attendance across our HQ, hub offices, client sites and home. Applicants must be able to commute to offices and client sites as part of their normal working arrangements, as travel is essential to fulfilling the responsibilities of the role. We include you We welcome candidates from all identities, attributes, ways of thinking and backgrounds to thrive in a career at Opencast. Our aim is for the diversity of our people to be reflected in the solutions we deliver, to help create a fairer society for all. Interview Interviews will be conducted via Microsoft Teams. We’re happy to make adjustments to support your needs. Want to know more? Visit our website or email careers@opencastsoftware.com

Ready to grow your architectural expertise in a supportive team? Do you want to work alongside expert architects and grow your skills in a supportive, collaborative environment? Are you ready to take on projects to open new opportunities? If so, Opencast could be the place for you. We’re a growing tech consultancy that creates user-centred solutions with purpose for our clients in government, healthcare and purpose-driven businesses. As a Solution Architect, you’ll design strong but adaptable foundations for the people who use them – enabling robust, scalable and sustainable solutions. You’ll broaden your experience while connecting with experts across the practice, gaining and sharing insights, and benefitting from opportunities to grow your career. The role You’ll take end-to-end ownership of solutions for our clients, and align them to business outcomes, technology strategy, commercial/financial constraints, and architecture governance. You’ll create solutions blueprints with views that express business, data, application, and technology, to address stakeholder needs. You’ll effectively communicate the solution through governance boards, stakeholder groups, and delivery teams to bring the solution to life and assure effective delivery. Ensure that work is carried out in accordance with Opencast's quality, environmental, and information security policies and procedures, as well as applicable customer policies, standards, and procedures while working on client. Requirements Due to the nature of this role, applicants must either currently hold active Security Check (SC) Clearance or be eligible to obtain it. Eligibility typically requires UK citizenship and continuous residence in the UK for the past five years, with no single absence exceeding 28 consecutive days. As a result, we are unable to progress applications from candidates who do not meet these requirements. Essential experience We’ll want you to demonstrate experience of solutions architecture. You don’t need to have had the job title of solutions architect before. In your CV and interview, please show how you have: • built strong relationships with senior stakeholders to understand their views. • a strong foundation in software development, design, and delivery roles. • enabled and assured a delivery team’s implementation of your solutions architectures effectively. • worked with development life-cycle methodologies such as Agile software development, Scrum, and DevOps. • a good working knowledge of architecture frameworks and modelling languages. As well as solution architecture skills, there are essential core skills you’ll need to be a great consultant. In the interview, please show how you: • demonstrated the significant, tangible business benefits of the proposals you initiate for clients • take a methodical and considered approach to solving problems • take a collaborative and consultative approach to leading and guiding teams • keep up to date with new and emerging technology trends and their practical application In the interview, we’ll ask you to describe how you approach architecture, deliver business outcomes, and engage stakeholders. If you’re successful in the first interview, we’ll ask you back to present a proposal from a case study and problem statement. Desirable experience Some areas of experience are not essential but relevant to the role: • Experienced with Architecture Frameworks (e.g. TOGAF, Zachman, Open Agile Architecture) If you have this experience, please show it on your CV and we can talk about it in the interview. If you don’t have this experience please do still apply, as we can coach you in these areas if you join us. Salary Senior consultant salary range: £70,000 - £80,000 per annum What we offer A competitive package including a 7% employer pension contribution, share options and a discretionary bonus. You’ll also benefit from flexible working hours (aligned to client commitments), 25 days’ holiday, and access to 3 annual “life happens” days to support unexpected situations. We also offer wellbeing support, ongoing professional development, volunteering opportunities and the chance to be part of a genuinely supportive team. Where you’ll work This role requires regular on-site attendance across our HQ, hub offices, client sites and home. Applicants must be able to commute to offices and client sites as part of their normal working arrangements, as travel is essential to fulfilling the responsibilities of the role. We include you We welcome candidates from all identities, attributes, ways of thinking and backgrounds to thrive in a career at Opencast. Our aim is for the diversity of our people to be reflected in the solutions we deliver, to help create a fairer society for all. Interview Interviews will be conducted via Microsoft Teams. We’re happy to make adjustments to support your needs. Want to know more? Visit our website or email careers@opencastsoftware.com

Check out this brand new role!

Ready to turn curiosity into impact?

Do you want to use research to shape services that make a real impact? Are you ready to bring curiosity and insight to projects that improve people’s lives?

If so, Opencast could be the place for you. We’re a growing tech consultancy that creates user-centred solutions with purpose for our clients in government, healthcare and purpose-driven businesses. As a User Researcher, you’ll uncover the needs and voices of people, work in multi-disciplinary teams to feed these needs into design decisions shape impactful services, and bring curiosity, pragmatism and insight to projects. You’ll enjoy, a supportive community whilst working across public sector clients, to solve real problems that impact people’s lives.

What you’ll do within our teams

• Plan research approaches for complex projects that might have multiple research activities running at the same time whilst being delivered by other researchers
• Offer oversight of research conducted by other people, either formally or informally, to improve research practices
• Identify where research points to areas that need more investigation and, where necessary, help to re-define the project scope and priorities in response to this
• Produce the required documentation and materials for research activity, including discussion guides and consent forms
• Recruit participants in line with GDPR and MRS guidelines
• Use your excellent communication skills to clearly explain your approach to your team and stakeholders

You’ll suit this role if you:

• Use a wide range of quantitative and qualitative research methods, including things like interviews, surveys, workshops, focus groups, shadowing, diary studies, usability testing, eye tracking, A/B testing, and analytics
• Have a strong understanding of GDS and designing to government service standards, preferably on projects that passed assessment(s)
• Can identify key themes, user needs, business needs, and personas through analysis
• Can explain findings to a range of audiences and translate these into areas of the service that need design focus
• Can produce user research deliverables like personas and journey maps
• Make sure your research is inclusive and includes people with disabilities and those who need support to use digital services
• Can build strong relationships with clients and persuade stakeholders of the importance of research to a project
• Thrive in a multidisciplinary team and encourage teammates to shadow and take part in research
• Understand agile processes
• Enjoy working with clients as they evolve and adapt
• Are naturally curious and able to champion your own learning and development
• Are an advocate for user-centred design
• Are respectful and tactful in your approach to clients who perhaps aren’t as familiar with user-centred design
• Are proactive and will take the initiative to solve a problem rather than seeing it and ignoring it
• Are keen to share your knowledge and experience

If you have any of this experience, please show it on your CV and in the interview.

Check out this brand new role!

Ready to turn curiosity into impact?

Do you want to use research to shape services that make a real impact? Are you ready to bring curiosity and insight to projects that improve people’s lives?

If so, Opencast could be the place for you. We’re a growing tech consultancy that creates user-centred solutions with purpose for our clients in government, healthcare and purpose-driven businesses. As a User Researcher, you’ll uncover the needs and voices of people, work in multi-disciplinary teams to feed these needs into design decisions shape impactful services, and bring curiosity, pragmatism and insight to projects. You’ll enjoy, a supportive community whilst working across public sector clients, to solve real problems that impact people’s lives.

The role

UK Security Clearance (existing SC clearance or eligibility) is a requirement for our current permanent opportunities.

You’ll conduct research which supports the development of a user centred service. You’ll work closely with other user centred design roles, such as Service Designer, Content Designers, and Interaction Designers, to solve complex and interesting problems for our clients.

You’ll ensure that work is carried out in accordance with Opencast’s quality, environmental, and information security policies and procedures, as well as applicable customer policies, standards, and procedures while working on client.

If you take a leadership role in projects, have a variety of project experience and support more junior colleagues working in design and delivery research you may be better suited to our Senior User Researcher role.

Essential experience

To succeed in this role, you need experience of delivering user research to a delivery team.

· In your CV and interview(s), please show how you have:

· chosen from a range of research methods to design the right research approach for the project phase

· produced the required ethics and governance documentation and materials for research activity

· recruited a wide range of participants in line with GDPR and MRS guidelines

· identified key themes, user needs, personas, and design feedback through analysis

· produced clear and concise user research deliverables to meet the needs of different audiences

· worked to GDS standards

· worked in agile delivery teams

In addition to user research skills, there are essential core skills you’ll need to work effectively as a consultant.

In the interview, please show how you have:

· planned your own tasks to achieve the objectives of your project

· respectfully challenged decisions or solutions you don’t agree with

· collaborated well with your colleagues, teammates and clients

In your interview we’ll ask you questions based around these experiences. We’ll also ask you to present a piece of work which demonstrates these skills and experiences.

If you have any of this experience, please show it on your CV and in the interview.

Salary

• Consultant salary range: £42,001 - £56,000
• What our offer includes
• A competitive pension, health cash plan, share options and discretionary bonus.
• Flexible hours and 25 days’ holiday.
• People to support you every step of the way.

Where you’ll work

Your working time at Opencast will be split between multiple locations, including from our HQ and hub locations, client site or home. Travel is part of life at Opencast, and takes in account requirements of your work, our clients and your team.

We include you

We welcome candidates from all identities, attributes, ways of thinking and backgrounds to thrive in a career at Opencast. Our aim is for the diversity of our people to be reflected in the solutions we deliver, to help create a fairer society for all.

Interview

Job interviews are on Microsoft Teams. We’ll make any adjustments to help you.