Job opportunities with
University of Leeds
View opportunitiesAbout the University of Leeds
The University, established in 1904, is one of the largest higher education institutions in the UK. We are renowned globally for the quality of our education and research. The strength of our academic expertise combined with the breadth of disciplines we cover, provides a wealth of opportunities, and has a real cultural, economic, societal, and environmental impact.
It is an exciting time to join the University as Professor Simone Buitendijk became the new Vice-Chancellor from September 2020, and a new institutional strategy has recently been launched. Watch Professor Buitendijk’s personal welcome video and find out more about the University and our journey.
Our strategy identifies three core areas of focus:
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Culture – recognising that collaboration rather than competition is fundamental to yielding excellence in research, education, and societal impact.
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Community – recognising the importance of diversity, partnership, and innovation in forging strong communities internally and externally.
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Impact – recognising the need to develop the next generation of global citizens and to focus our research efforts on areas in which we can be truly globally leading, while harnessing the potential of digital innovation to enhance both.
The University strives to achieve academic excellence within an ethical framework informed by our values of integrity, equality and inclusion, community, and professionalism. Leeds is truly a community, with more than 38,000 students from 170 different countries, over 9,000 staff of 100 different nationalities and we are in touch with more than 281,000 alumni in 190 different countries. A member of the Russell Group of universities, we are one of the UK’s top ten research institutions and one of the UK’s most prestigious and diverse universities.
The University’s core values are as follows:
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Collaboration: We work together to achieve our goals and ambitions
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Compassion: We are caring and considerate in our words and actions
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Inclusivity: We are a community where everyone is welcome and belongs
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Integrity: We are open and honest in our words and actions
Our campus
We’re proud of our beautiful campus. Just a ten-minute walk from the city centre, it offers fantastic green spaces and a range of world-class facilities, which include:
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The Edge sport and fitness centre
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Libraries
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Theatres
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An art gallery and art trail
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Leeds University Union
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Onsite shops, bars and cafes
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Take a look around campus with our 360 Virtual Campus Tour
Digital Transformation / IT Services
Digital Transformation is a fundamental, strategic priority for the University of Leeds. Our ambition is to become a global leader in the use of digital technologies, data and digital approaches to support student education, global lifelong learning, research and innovation and ways of working, and as a centre for the digital transformation of education and research.
Our aim is to become an innovative leader in the use of digital technology, data and digital approaches, working in effective partnerships with other universities, businesses and organisations to solve global challenges. We already have a great track record in digital transformation, but there are many more opportunities for us to embrace an exciting journey ahead.
By digital transformation, we do not just mean technology or data, but critically encompassing culture, people, processes, and impact. For our University, digital transformation will be crosscutting across our core business of education and research, and our ways of working.
Digital Transformation Strategy
We have committed a significant investment in the digital transformation of the University. We have created the new post of Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Digital Transformation to drive this agenda, along with several academic leads, to support ongoing digital education projects and initiatives, and emerging priorities in digital transformation across education and research. We are also investing in new and emerging technologies to enhance our digital capabilities and to support us to improve our students’ learning opportunities.
As a vital part of the new University strategy, the Digital Transformation Strategy provides an over-arching view of the University’s vision and aspiration in relation to digital transformation of the University’s core activities; student education, research and innovation, and internationalisation, and describes how we will embrace the use of digital technologies, data and digital approaches to achieve our mission. It explains how we will work with our staff, students, alumni, partners, and our local and global community to harness digital technologies and digital approaches to improve our society, contribute to global challenges, and reduce inequalities. It will move the University from a conventional higher education institution, where digital technologies support traditional methods of teaching and research, to one where existing activity is transformed and new activities are made possible.
IT Modernisation
Our IT Service will play a critical part in the delivery of the Digital Transformation. In recognition of this, the University has made a major investment of £76m over the next 5 years to deliver two programmes of work within the IT Service: Digital Enablement and Be Safe. These are far reaching, and significant programmes aimed at modernising our legacy technology stack, addressing our technical debt and improving our cyber security capability. This scale of investment will enable new ways of working amongst the university community and critically, a major investment in our digital infrastructure, our staff skills and our digital processes.
The IT organisation itself will also need to evolve its structure and culture to become fully service-oriented and aligned with the needs of the business. Specifically:
Rapid transition to a complete digital education ecosystem, including routine enhancements of teaching such as virtual and augmented reality; virtual classrooms (within and between institutions); personalisation services to support provision and tracking of personalised learning journeys; digitally-enabled education spaces; use of artificial intelligence in tools such as chat bots; on-demand services to support learning such as libraries, incorporation of multi-media to enhance learning; full digital life-cycle for provision, submission and marking of assessments; enabling infrastructure to support fully online degree provision.
Fast paced and scalable provision of large-scale data storage and compute power with access to short-term, on-demand intensive compute power; easy, secure and reliable intra and inter institute collaboration nationally and internationally; provision of infrastructure to store highly sensitive data that are available to approved users wherever they are located; access to code libraries; provision of large scale, secure data archives.
A secure infrastructure that allows provision of online education to international students outside of the UK; device-independent engagement for international stakeholders, an environment that supports communication and collaboration across national boundaries in a way that is secure (where the individual comes to the data, rather than data crossing national boundaries) and is compliant with international legislation.
Use of off-the-shelf services and software configured to deliver the best outcomes defined by the needs of the University’s core activities; reliable, scalable and on-demand access to IT services, and an IT environment that can quickly and cost effectively integrate specialist applications required by student education, research, international and operational activity; a cyber security posture that maintains the integrity of data and services without making use by approved users unduly difficult; a service culture that works in partnership with academic and service colleagues to provide a rapid and responsive service to routine needs, and provides trusted and specialist input into more technical initiatives; a robust approach to sourcing managed services, identifying transactional activity that can be provided more efficiently and responsively by service partners; tools for the efficient use by approved users of data that are current and accurate; support for digitisation and automation of administrative tasks; ability for users to use a trusted toolset to deliver change.
Our campus facilities are increasingly digitally enabled. The growth of Internet connectivity and the Internet of Things (IoT) will provide many opportunities for more efficient and effective use of our physical estate and to operate a smart campus. Through continued investment, we can enhance the facilities we provide in our education spaces, libraries, research laboratories, offices and other campus spaces, to enable effective learning, working, and collaboration - making our campus a safe, appealing and sustainable location. The aspirations of the Digital Transformation Strategy will only be deliverable when they are underpinned by a flexible and secure IT infrastructure, an integrated and extensible set of core application platforms, and a consistent, underpinning data model all supported within a modern operating approach with service excellence and innovation at its heart.
About the Cyber Security Function
The Cyber Security Function is undergoing significant transformation to implement modern security tooling, known as the Be Safe programme, and tripling in size to support these new security services and features. Therefore it is an extremely exciting time to join our team and help shape the future security strategy for our University!
Our team’s ambition is to deliver a cyber security capability fit for a world leading higher education and research institution. To reach this ambition, we will define, build, and deliver key security services that the University recognises and needs as well as build a multi-disciplinary team of people capable of growing and improving the defined services.
Adam Toulson is the University’s first ever Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) and has an extensive background in the security field. Adam finds the education sector interesting as it is an unsolved, greenfield industry to explore in terms of security. At most organisations there are staff and customers whereas at Universities, customers are replaced by students. Students engage more with IT and the line between staff and customers becomes blurred which creates a huge 65,000 person organisation. Previously attackers did not target Universities due to the lack of potential reward compared to other industries such as finance. More recently attackers have started targeting Universities as they have understood the noise and significant disruption they can cause if students are unable to access their IT systems. Through these attacks, the hackers are engaging with people who are not security aware leading to ransomware becoming increasingly common. With this increased risk, organisations are focusing more time and money to improve their security posture.
Here at the University we have the opportunity to build a function that enables people to learn, conduct research and work securely in an easy manner. With the support and investment from leadership we are able to quickly implement a world class security landscape that directly mitigates the increasing security threats. Our Be Safe Programme has begun this process with projects such as the Security Operations Centre, Endpoint Detection and Response, Identity and Access Management and Privileged Access Management all underway to strengthen our security posture.
Come and join our team to be a part of this exciting journey to implement new tooling, develop our security strategy and be a leader for security within the education sector!
Benefits
There are a range of benefits available to staff together with supportive policies which lends to us being an employer of choice:
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33 days paid holiday every year, including bank holidays plus a further 7.5 days off when the University is closed (including Christmas)
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Access to one of three competitive pension schemes, with generous employer contributions.
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Commitment to helping you achieve a work life balance including generous family leave packages, including maternity, paternity, and adoption/surrogacy leave with parental/partner leave and Carers Leave.
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Flexible working opportunities
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IT provision and support when working from home
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Personal Development: Access to courses run by our Organisational Development & Professional Learning team, and self-development courses including languages, Creative Writing, Wellbeing Therapies and over 16,000 courses on LinkedIn Learning
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Access to technical skills and knowledge via a suite of free accredited Microsoft courses and training via the Enterprise Skills Initiative (ESI)
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Extensive self-development programme, including courses run by our Logik Centre and the IT Training Unit
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Competitive pay structures and reward policies
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Health and Wellbeing: Discounted staff membership options at The Edge, our state-of-the-art Campus gym, with a pool, sauna, climbing wall, cycle circuit, and sports halls. Discounted healthcare services including insurance.
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Several offers for shopping and leisure including access to a Totum Card which is a student discount card for hundreds of exclusive online and in store discounts
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Travel discounts and sustainable Cycle to Work scheme
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On-Campus childcare facilities
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Free software for home use
For a full list of benefits available, please visit our website
Location
Walking
The University campus is a pleasant 20-minute walk from Leeds city station. Just follow the directions below and you'll be with us in no time at all:
Come out of the station into City square; with the Queens Hotel behind you, walk straight up Park Row. Continue up Park Row until the first major junction. Cross straight over The Headrow and continue up Cookridge Street. At the next set of lights go straight on passing Millennium Square on your left and Leeds City Museum on your right.
Turn left on to Woodhouse Lane, a busy main road. You'll pass Leeds Beckett University on your left and our University campus begins in another 50 metres or so, on your left. To reach the Parkinson building, carry on up Woodhouse Lane to the clock tower building. You'll be able to look at a map of campus there and plan where to go next.
By Train
Leeds train station connects us with all major UK cities and has a fast and efficient London service. For train information and timetables visit the National Rail Enquiries website.
By Bike
If you're thinking about cycling to the University, we have secure bike racks and showers. For bike routes and information about cycling in the city visit the Leeds City Council cycling pages.
If you are visiting us by bike and have any questions or mechanical issues, the University bike hub can help. It also offers bike hire to staff and students.
By Bus or Coach
Leeds coach station is where most long-distance coaches arrive into and leave the city. Main operators are National Express and Megabus. The coach station is right beside Leeds city bus station, where you can get local buses, including to the University.
For local bus information and timetables, visit the West Yorkshire Metro website and First Leeds and Arriva Yorkshire. There is also a Leeds CityBus that stops at the bus and train stations and the southern end of campus (near the back of Leeds General Infirmary A&E) every 10 minutes from 6.30 am to 7.30 pm Monday to Saturday.
There is a taxi rank outside the bus and coach station. A taxi to the University takes about 10 minutes.
By Car
If you are using satellite navigation our address details for the main entrance to our site are as follows. Please note, street listing can appear as Cavendish Road in some navigation systems:
University of Leeds
Woodhouse Lane
Leeds
LS2 9JT
Leeds is linked to the M1 and M62 motorways. Parking on campus is limited, and we are also committed to reducing our carbon emissions, so we encourage staff and visitors to walk or cycle where possible.
To avoid disappointment, visitor parking during core hours (7am to 5pm Monday to Friday), must be pre-booked by a University staff member, and costs £7 for the day. You will need to contact the department you're visiting to book a space. If your parking is chargeable you'll be issued a code so you can pay at the end of your stay. Find directions to our car parks by using our Google Maps interactive campus parking map.
Outside core parking hours the orange zone visitor car parks are open to the public, and you can pay at a pay station before you leave. For more information, visit:
Blue badge spaces are located throughout the visitors' car parks. Our map of the visitor car parks includes the location of accessible bays. Blue badge holders are not exempt from payment for parking.
If you are travelling to Leeds by car you can use and would like to avoid parking in the city centre, you can use park and ride.
There are sites at Elland Road and Temple Green, providing easy access by bus into the centre of Leeds.
If you would like to car share when visiting Leeds, search for others planning the same journey using the Liftshare website.
By Air
Leeds is served by two major airports: Leeds Bradford Airport and Manchester Airport.
Regular flights are available from a huge number of European and International cities. Leeds Bradford airport is approximately seven miles away from the University, so easily commutable by taxi.
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