Senior software developer

Band 7 · Software developer · 477 job evaluation points

UK GDaD PCF level: Senior developer

Most often performed at Civil Service grade SEO or G7.

A senior developer delivers and integrates software to form a complete service.
At this role level, you will:
plan and lead development on sets of related stories
have an understanding of the whole system and take responsibility for teaching this to others
work with other disciplines to understand what needs to be built
coach and mentor more junior colleagues
operate the production services you build
find ways to improve system robustness, resilience and stability
There are 2 different roles at this level - a technical role and a management role.

Contains public sector information from the UK Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework (https://understand-digital-data-roles-skills.service.gov.uk/), licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. © Crown copyright.

Responsibilities

Lead the technical design and delivery of significant features and services.
Set and maintain engineering standards for the team, including testing, security, and accessibility.
Make technical decisions that balance user needs, clinical safety, security, and cost.
Lead incident investigation for the team's services and drive the fixes.
Work with clinical safety officers to make sure safety controls are designed in and tested.
Coach and develop developers in the team.

Skills

Skill	Expected level	What this level means
Availability and capacity managementUK GDaD PCF	Working (2)	You can: manage service components to ensure they meet business needs and key performance indicators (KPIs)
Development process optimisationUK GDaD PCF	Working (2)	You can: work under guidance to identify process optimisation opportunities contribute to the implementation of proposed solutions
Information securityUK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: design solutions and services with security controls included, specifically engineered to mitigate security threats
Modern development standardsUK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: apply modern development standards and support others in applying them
Programming and build (software engineering)UK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: collaborate with others when necessary to review specifications use the agreed specifications to design, code, test and document programs or scripts of medium-to-high complexity, using the right standards and tools
PrototypingUK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: approach prototyping as a team activity, actively soliciting prototypes and testing with others establish design patterns and iterate them use a variety of prototyping methods and choose the most appropriate
Service supportUK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: identify, locate and fix service faults
Systems designUK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: design systems characterised by medium levels of risk, impact, and business or technical complexity select appropriate design standards, methods and tools, and ensure they are applied effectively review the systems designs of others to ensure the selection of appropriate technology, efficient use of resources and integration of multiple systems and technology
Systems integrationUK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: define the integration build co-ordinate build activities across systems understand how to undertake and support integration testing activities
User focusUK GDaD PCF	Practitioner (3)	You can: collaborate with user researchers and can represent users internally explain the difference between user needs and the desires of the user champion user research to focus on all users prioritise and define approaches to understand the user story, guiding others in doing so offer recommendations on the best tools and methods to use
Understanding health and care servicesThis reference	Working (2)	You can: explain the clinical and care workflows your work supports use common health care terms correctly with clinical and care colleagues recognise when a change could affect patient care and raise it
Clinical risk managementThis reference	Working (2)	You can: take part in hazard workshops and contribute to a hazard log follow the clinical risk management process for your work provide evidence for a clinical safety case, such as test results
Information governance and data protectionThis reference	Working (2)	You can: apply data protection principles to your work contribute to data protection impact assessments handle information requests and records correctly
Health data interoperabilityThis reference	Practitioner (3)	You can: design and build integrations using FHIR, HL7 version 2, and messaging patterns write and profile FHIR resources and implementation guides resolve complex mapping and data quality issues between systems
Medical device software regulationThis reference	Awareness (1)	You can: explain that some health software is regulated as a medical device know who to ask when a product might be a medical device

Typical qualifications and experience

Substantial experience of designing, building, and supporting production software, at a level equivalent to a master's degree.

Band 7 outline

Knowledge: Highly developed specialist knowledge, typically to master's level or equivalent experience.
Autonomy: Works to organisational policy; decides how results are achieved; is the expert others consult.
Scope: Several products or services, or a specialist function.
Leadership: Leads a team or a professional practice area.
Accountability: Delivery of a service or specialist function, and its budget if held.

Job evaluation (illustrative)

Factor	Level	Level summary	Points
Communication and relationship skills	4	Gives complex, sensitive, or contentious information needing persuasion, negotiation, or training skills, or highly complex information.	32
Knowledge, training, and experience	7	Highly developed specialist knowledge across the range of the specialism (master's level or equivalent).	196
Analytical and judgemental skills	4	Judgements on complex facts or situations needing analysis, interpretation, and comparison of options.	42
Planning and organisational skills	3	Plans several complex activities, adjusting plans as needed.	27
Physical skills	3	Developed skills needing speed or accuracy, such as advanced keyboard use.	27
Responsibility for patient and client care	1	Helps patients, clients, or relatives during incidental contact.	4
Responsibility for policy and service development	3	Implements policies for own area and proposes changes that affect other areas.	21
Responsibility for financial and physical resources	1	Takes personal care of equipment and resources used in own work.	5
Responsibility for people	2	Supervises or coordinates staff day to day, trains others regularly, or gives basic HR advice.	12
Responsibility for information resources	5	Designs and develops major information systems, or runs information systems for several services as the main duty.	34
Responsibility for research and development	2	Regularly does research, development, trials, or equipment and system testing as part of the job.	12
Freedom to act	4	Results are defined, but the job holder decides how to achieve them, within broad policy.	32
Physical effort	1	Sitting, standing, and walking, with little physical effort.	3
Mental effort	4	Frequent prolonged concentration, or occasional intense concentration.	18
Emotional effort	1	Rare exposure, or occasional indirect exposure, to distressing circumstances.	5
Working conditions	2	Occasional unpleasant conditions, frequent travel or outdoor work, or near-continuous screen use on most days.	7
Total (Band 7: 466 to 539)			477