Senior Project Manager – Active Directory Service Consolidation

Job summary

Defra is the UK government department responsible for safeguarding our natural environment, supporting our world-leading food and farming industry, and sustaining a thriving rural economy. Our broad remit means we play a major role in people's day-to-day life, from the food we eat, and the air we breathe, to the water we drink.

Digital, Data, Technology and Security (DDTS) is the trusted team for digital across the entire Defra Group.

We have around 1000 colleagues across DDTS and our ambition is to make it easier and faster than ever for people to interact with Defra. If you are ready to drive innovation and push boundaries, we want to hear from you. Join us and together we will create a great place for living, and a green and healthy future for all.

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Job description

Join us as a Senior Project Manager – Shape the Future of Defra’s underpinning Technology!

We’re looking for someone who thrives on variety, enjoys solving complex problems, and wants to make a real difference in how people work across the Defra Group.

Our Digital, Data, Technology and Security (DDTS) function is at the heart of delivering smarter, more connected workplaces across the Defra Group. We’re looking for a Senior Project Manager to join our dynamic GIO Delivery Portfolio Team and drive innovation in a fast-paced, high-profile portfolio. The proposed resource will operate in a Project Manager capacity, providing end to end accountability for delivery, managing interdependencies, proactively addressing risks and maintaining alignment across stakeholders and delivery teams.

This work requires a Senior Project Manager to be accountable for:

• Complex multi-supplier negotiation (removing rights from incumbent suppliers through commercial changes to contracts)
• Holding new AD Management Supplier to delivery outcomes and fixed price costs
• Withdrawal of privileged access across legacy contracts
• Designing and embedding Tiered Administration boundaries
• Ensuring readiness for live service (SDRB, SKMS, ServiceNow, CMDB)
• Co-ordinating Active Directory recovery rehearsals. Defra currently has no specific supplier responsible for Active Directory backup and restores. This work would place a responsibility on the new supplier to do this AND to evidence this on an annual basis
• Technical, security and operational leadership across a deeply federated supplier landscape

All of this forms part of continuous service lifecycle management within a complex, multi supplier environment.

To deliver success in this role the project manager will need to identify the dependencies across the existing supplier services and work across this complex environment, often with complicated relationships, challenging ownership externally as well as internally to define workable solutions whilst ensuring best value for Defra.

Benefits delivered by this role:

This role will deliver the establishment of Active Directory as a secure, governed and accountable enterprise service, with clear ownership, defined operating model and assured recovery capability.

• Establish Active Directory as a formal Defra service for the first time.
• Appoint a single Service Owner
• Transition to one accountable supplier
• Enforce a Tier0/Tier1/Tier2 administration model.
• Eliminate excessive privileged access across five suppliers.
• Implement consistent security patterns, immutable backups, and authoritative forest recovery
• Deliver 100% domain controller telemetry into SOC.
• Provide a secure and standardised operating model for AD.
• Ensure BAU readiness, CMDB/SKMS updates and ServiceNow integration.

Person specification

Responsibilities:

• Complex multi-supplier negotiation (removing rights from incumbent suppliers through commercial changes to contracts)
• Holding new AD Management Supplier to delivery outcomes and fixed price costs
• Withdrawal of privileged access across legacy contracts
• Designing and embedding Tiered Administration boundaries
• Ensuring readiness for live service (SDRB, SKMS, ServiceNow, CMDB)
• Co-ordinating Active Directory recovery rehearsals. Defra currently has no specific supplier responsible for Active Directory backup and restores. This work would place a responsibility on the new supplier to do this AND to evidence this on an annual basis

Delivery & Control:

• Lead delivery of complex IT infrastructure projects across multi-supplier environments
• Manage delivery to agreed tolerances, including formal exception and change control
• Ensure robust planning, scheduling, and critical path management

Governance & Reporting:

• Establish and lead project governance in line with Defra and Project Delivery Profession standards
• Produce high-quality highlight reports, RAID logs, and financial forecasts
• Chair or support Project Boards and governance forums, ensuring clear decision making and escalation

Risk, Issues & Dependencies:

• Proactively manage risks and issues using structured approaches (cause → risk → impact → mitigation)
• Identify and actively manage cross-project dependencies within the wider portfolio
• Escalate risks early with clear mitigation strategies

Commercial & Supplier Management:

• Act as an intelligent client, managing multiple suppliers and delivery partners
• Ensure alignment with contracts, Statements of Work, and change control processes
• Manage commercial risks, including cost pressures and scope changes

Service Transition & Operational Readiness:

• Ensure effective transition of solutions into live service
• Support operational readiness, service acceptance, and business continuity requirements
• Deliver change into live, business-critical environments with minimal disruption

Stakeholder Engagement:

• Build strong relationships with Domain Leads, Service Owners, Commercial teams, and suppliers
• Maintain clear, consistent communication with stakeholders at all levels

Leadership and Deputising:

• Act as a deputy to the Portfolio Lead (G6) when required, ensuring continuity of delivery and decision-making
• Provide oversight across multiple projects, supporting prioritisation, risk

Skills and Experience:

• Technical, security and operational leadership across a deeply federated supplier landscape
• Deep experience in identity/security delivery
• Delivery of AD domain remediation and decommissioning experience
• Experience ha