Senior Solution Designer

Job Name

Brief description

The EL1 Business Solution Designer delivers a practical business outcome while creating a balance with design that is strategically aligned with the intent.
The EL1 Business Solution Designer is expected to provide high level guidance, design assurance and review of project activities. The role is largely self directed and enjoys relative autonomy within project guidelines and parameters, with staff escalating 'hot spots' and blockers to managers. (ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

Business Solutions staff focus on:

Aligning business outcomes and IT work.
Providing assurances that administrative and IT design delivers business outcomes while producing better client & staff experiences.
Ensuring that integration of designs occurs across all change projects.
Documenting the emerging design.

(ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

Duties & responsibilities of this role

Taking a leading role in driving and developing practical design solutions, you will consult with business owners to deliver initiatives that meet business needs. You will analyse and improve business processes, evaluate the financial impact of proposed business and IT designs and create design artefacts that adhere to industry standards. You will be highly skilled in identifying business intent, assessing the impacts of change on existing processes as well as adept at
identifying opportunities for business improvements. Your ability to innovate solutions to complex problems along with high level oral and written communication skills will ensure your success in this role. (PS Gazette, 19/07/07)
A more detailed description of this was provided in the ATO Job Kit and was provided online at the ATO Careers site or by request from the contact officer. As follows:

1. Provide a leading role in working with Business and IT project managers to develop design solutions that are practical and are strategically sensible. Specifically:

Work within a defined design methodology
Consult with the business owners to understand and deliver the business intent of the initiative
Analyse the enterprise business processes, looking for opportunities to build upon existing processes
Perform an impact analysis of proposed business and\or IT designs to ensure that it is cost beneficial for the ATO
Work with IT architects & teams to develop the technical options to meet the business needs
Ensure the design is in line with Tax Office strategic outcomes

(ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

2. Contribute to assuring that Tax Office design solutions are practical and sensible from both a Business and IT perspective. (ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

3. Produce design artifacts that:

Document the emerging design, conforming to proven techniques and industry standards
Communicate the solution in a way that accurately reflects the business intent and is suitable for presentation to senior executive forums or IT teams to develop an IT system product

(ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

4. Develop relationships with key stakeholders to ensure a shared understanding of the business intent, the proposed solution and its implications across the organisation. (ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

Selection Criterion
1. Create and Deliver Innovative Solutions

Highly developed ability to understand the business intent and to assess the impacts of change on existing processes
Highly developed ability to gather, organise, analyse, and process information to identify opportunities to improve business and IT practices and formulate design solutions
Strong practical experience and understanding of relevant business analysis methodologies and tools
Translate high-level goals and outcomes into appropriate tasks for others

2. Build and Sustain Strong relationships

Proven experience in nurturing internal and external relationships facilitating cooperation
Proven capacity to develop credibility and trust with internal and external stakeholders
Well developed consultative skills

3. Communicate Skilfully
Demonstrated very high level oral and written communication skills including:

Proven experience in nurturing internal and external relationships facilitating cooperation
Proven capacity to develop credibility and trust with internal and external stakeholders
Well developed consultative skills

4. Exemplify Personal Drive and Integrity

Highly developed leadership skills, including the ability to ensure outcomes are achieved
Demonstrated ability to meet deadlines and work under pressure, whilst managing client expectations and priorities
Demonstrated ability to handle changing priorities and circumstances
Possess a high level of enthusiasm and the ability to recognise opportunities, be innovative and flexible in solving problems

(ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

Job requirements

The occupant of this position may be required to travel, as required, to meet operational requirements. (ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)
This position requires a "Highly Protected" Security classification. (ATO Careers Website 19/07/07)

Salary

Executive Level 1 $79,960-86,343,
The Senior Solution Designer job is not reflected in other sector industries as commonly solution designers and business analysts are primarily concerned with the implementation of IT based systems, including their design and development. The Senior Solution Designer with its focus on business with the additional capability to recommend (though not implement) IT based solutions. The Solution Designer job currently used by another wiki space (CareerJet, Solution Designer, Retrieved 12 August, 2007 from http://www.careerjet.com.au/job/fe1e18b64d11ff9fc8b12ef74557f339.html&nbsp) Has a higher pay rate yet the duties and tasks are not analogous. Therefore a direct judgment on the pay rates is unlikely to yield any valuable information for a job seeker as it is unlikely that they will be interested in both jobs. Other analysis of Solution Designers roles confirms this (Links in references sections)

On a general comparison between private and public sector pay rates at this level of experience required and the complexity of tasks within the role an EL1 (public sector) is slightly behind in terms of raw pay rates though it is in some way compensated with generally superior conditions (Flex time, greater employer super contributions and so on)

Industry/Organisation

Government - Public Sector - Business Design

Job listings

PSGazette (Distributed 19 July 2007 Australian Tax Officer; Senior Solution Designer) from http://www.apsjobs.gov.au/downloads/PS28%20-%2019%2007%202007.pdf (Page 135)

ATO Careers Website (Last Modified 19 July 2007) Senior Solution Designer http://atogovau/careers/pathway.asp?pc=001/058/001

Differences observed

A solution designer within the Tax Office is significantly different from that required within the private sector. Analysis of the required skills of the private sector advertisements listed above determine that the roles require strong and specific knowledge on the design and implementation of IT based systems, this includes experience in coding languages and software design and development methodologies.
The Tax Office role on the other hand requires strong business analysis methodologies and an ability to liaise with business stakeholders to ensure business outcomes. It should also be noted that the term "Business Analysis" has different meanings between private and public sector and even between industries. Business Analysis in the Tax Office is used to refer to the in depth analysis of the business with respect to its people, processes and technology in order to provide appropriate business outcomes and achieve the organisations' goals. Often the term "Business Analysis" is used within the private sector (and also commonly with the IT business line of the Tax Office) to reflect the role of analysing a business requirements for IT systems and then ensuring the successful design and implementing of those systems (Including System requirements etc)

Arguably the Tax Office Senior Solution Designer and the Senior Solution Designer of the private sector share little in common. Whilst the underlying core competencies in terms of personal drive, integrity and basic communication skills are shared the technical skills and required interactions of the jobs differ greatly. This is in part to a lack of agreed naming conventions between industries and private/public sector as well as the accuracy with which "Solution Designer" describes both roles despite their differences.

Other References used

CareerJet, (last modified 14 August, 2007), Solution Designer, Retrieved 14 August, 2007 from http://www.careerjet.com.au/job/fe1e18b64d11ff9fc8b12ef74557f339.html&nbsp

Seek.com (Listed 14 August 2007) Solutions Designer (Retrieved 14 August 2007) From http://it.seek.com.au/users/apply/index.ascx?Sequence=57&PageNumber=1&JobID=10196403&

Seek.com (Listed 17 August 2007) Senior EAI/SOA Solutions Designer,(Retrieved 17 August) From http://it.seek.com.au/users/apply/index.ascx?Sequence=48&PageNumber=1&JobID=10237702&
Seek.com (Listed 15 August 2007) Senior EAI Solutions Designer (Retrieved 17 August 2007)From http://it.seek.com.au/users/apply/index.ascx?Sequence=56&PageNumber=1&JobID=10208648&