Sprinting to success
Jon is a Senior Delivery Manager in Core Digital Services (CDS), one of the biggest work areas in DWP Digital.
If you want to know what it’s like to work on products that keep critical digital services running smoothly, and the skills you need to succeed as a Delivery Manager then read on.
Enabling teams to deliver their best
As a Senior Delivery Manager in Core Digital Services, I have lots of experience working on a variety of crucial products and projects. I’ve recently moved from being the Delivery Manager for one of our legacy products (large and Cobol-based) to the Closed Benefit Refactoring projects (micro services and modern technologies). My current team is made up of a combination of both DWP colleagues and contractors who are located all over the country.
My role is very much as an enabler. By owning areas such as reporting, metrics and wider stakeholder engagement, facilitating meetings and events, and working with the wider community to remove blockers and impediments, I enable my teams to do what they are best: creating value for our end-users.
It’s the result that matters
While the Agile methodology is key to my work, I consider myself an agilist with a little ‘a’. Delivering in Core Digital Services is all about using a variety of frameworks such as Scrum, Kanban and even Waterfall as tools to deliver value.
I’m a firm proponent of the principle that “Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.” It’s the result that matters rather than adherence to any methodology!
A day in the life of a Delivery Manager
While no one day is the same as a Delivery Manager in Core Digital Services, there are some things that remain consistent in our approach. In my team, we work in 3-week Sprints. The project is overall a Waterfall one, but we look to enhance that through using the Scrum Framework on a day-to-day basis. We have a daily Scrum where the team touch base and look at what we’re working on today. Every 3 weeks we have our Sprint Reviews, Retros and Plannings session – keeping ourselves aligned on our immediate goals while having one eye on the next work needed to complete the product.
I’ll typically be working with the team to try and remove any blockers or impediments outside their immediate control and generally looking at how I can enable them to focus on their work with minimal interruptions.
As the DWP is such a large organisation and we also have other departments such as HMRC we need to work with, I’ll work with the Product Manager to engage with the teams we need to work with, to build relationships and a shared understanding of each other priorities.
Collaborating for our customers
The best thing about working in Core Digital Services is the people. Working with incredibly talented and knowledgeable teams is very satisfying as is getting the results of their hard work into the hands of the users.
The systems we work on can certainly be regarded as Safety Critical. If they go wrong, there is a real danger vulnerable people will not receive the benefits they are entitled to. CDS is an exemplar in making sure that any changes are correct and safe. This is not that easy with the legacy tech stack we have to work with.
I also feel really supported by our leadership team. They support, enable and trust me to get on with the job with minimal interference.
Essential skills for Delivery Managers in the DWP
If you’re looking to join Core Digital Services, there are 3 key skills every Delivery Manager should bring to the table.
Communication: As a Delivery Manager in the DWP, I engage with many teams beyond my immediate colleagues. Clear, consistent communication is essential to ensure everyone understands priorities, risks, dependencies and progress. Listening is key too!
Leadership: As a “Leader who serves”, my role is to create the right environment for the team to deliver effectively. This might mean coaching teams in agile practices, working on how to remove blockers, facilitating events, and seeing how we can iterate based on feedback. Good delivery leadership ensures we maintain momentum, forecast realistically, manage risks early, and continually improve our ways of working. Ultimately, this helps us deliver high‑quality services that meet policy and user needs and offer the best possible value for the public.
Project Management: DWP deliveries involve multiple teams, policy dependencies, technical constraints, and fixed deadlines driven by legislative or operational needs. Strong project management skills are needed to develop realistic delivery plans, manage risks, coordinate resources, and keep stakeholders aligned.
By structuring work into clear milestones and tracking progress against them, we help ensure that large, complex initiatives remain on schedule and help manage expectations and deliver the outcomes expected for our users and wider stakeholders.