About us

Vida Bank provides competitive savings products through Vida Savings and specialist mortgage solutions through Vida Homeloans.

Our mortgage business supports Buy to Let (BTL) and residential borrowers (ROO) who find themselves underserved elsewhere. Our mortgage customers range from Buy to Let investors, to the self-employed and customers with multiple jobs.

Our savings proposition is delivered online via our website, and is focussed on providing savers with fair, transparent and competitive rates. Our typical customers are active savers, who tend to look beyond their current account provider for savings accounts.

Our business model and strategy are underpinned by our core purpose to ‘Help More People Find a Place to call Home’.

We are here to help the under-served, especially those with more nuanced personal circumstances or borrowing needs who are not able to access a mortgage from a mainstream mortgage lender. Working exclusively with intermediary partners, we combine cutting-edge technology with skilled and caring underwriting expertise to solve complex customer problems.

As a fully regulated UK based bank with ambitious growth aspirations, we recognise the importance of having a clearly articulated culture strategy and the need to actively manage how it embeds in the business together with the behaviours which exemplify it.

As a recognised Best Companies Top 100 mid-sized company to work for in the UK and a finalist at the Financial Reporter Women’s Recognition Awards, we take pride in our diverse workforce, championing both ethic and gender diversity through our EDI commitments.

Having met the target set by being a member of the HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter we have 50% of senior management roles filled by women.

With offices in London, Newcastle and Skipton, we bring our teams together regularly to collaborate and empower our colleagues to have more choice around when and where they work on the days they are not in the office, with colleagues working remotely in various locations across the UK.

Our Culture

We are proud to have built a culture founded on an ethos of caring, and that sits at the heart of our Vida Values, driving the way we run our business, support our customers and other stakeholders on a daily basis.

We genuinely care about delivering the right outcomes for all our stakeholders who we consider through the cultural framework as our customers, colleagues, company and communities that we operate in.

By Joining Vida you will have a sense of belonging in what is a diverse and collaborative environment, where you will be empowered to take responsibility for driving delivery.

We embrace a diversity of backgrounds and experiences in our people, in the deeply held belief that better outcomes are achieved for customers when our colleagues are better placed to empathise with and understand their unique circumstances. From application to interview, we place inclusion at the heart of all we do.

Role Overview:

The Head of Technology Systems role is responsible for the strategic oversight, operational management, and continuous improvement of the bank’s core technology platforms, systems, and services. This role will collaborate closely with the Director of Technology providing appropriate support across strategic planning, operational delivery, and stakeholder engagement.

This role blends deep technical expertise with strong leadership, collaboration and influencing skills, ensuring that technology systems are secure, scalable, and aligned with business objectives. The role will collaborate closely with teams across infrastructure, cybersecurity, data, and technology operations to deliver integrated technology solutions.

The ideal candidate will have 8+ years of experience in financial services, with a strong analytical background and deep expertise in technology systems. They will be adept at understanding the unique needs of different business functions and translating those into effective, technical solutions. A solid grasp of system architecture, reporting, and cross-functional collaboration is essential.

Key Responsibilities:

• Contribute to developing functional strategy and prioritise operational deliverables to support overall business targets, collaborating closely with the Director of Technology and COO.
• Proven leader in driving high-performing, technically strong teams to deliver strategic outcomes and provide appropriate BAU support on critical systems.
• Experienced in setting clear strategic direction and overseeing a broad range of internal and external support services, including business inline applications, infrastructure, and security, within a fast-paced organisation.
• Help to deliver and execute the technology systems strategy in alignment with the bank’s overall technology roadmap.
• Lead system and service architecture planning and ensure alignment with regulatory, security and operational requirements.
• Work cross-functionally with teams across the technology, change and wider business to ensure cohesive system design and delivery.
• Function as the key liaison between technology and business units to translate business needs into technical solutions.
• Own the lifecycle of core banking systems, including upgrades, integrations, and vendor management.
• Ensure systems are resilient by design, secure and compliant with industry standards and regulations.
• Effective collaboration with the Head of Technology Systems to ensure appropriate governance frameworks and processes such as Change Management and Incident Management are consistently followed and aligned to internal policy and regulatory expectation.
• Proactively and intelligently manage stakeholders of all levels (including Exco), ensuring that any issues are managed with effectively, and the stakeholder are kept updated of progress.
• Contribute and help to coordinate on annual and one-off audits, working with both the Director of Technology and the internal Audit Function.
• Develop and build strategic relationships with external parties (software vendors, research companies, industry bodies, and strategic partners) to ensure the management of our technology capability is future-proofed and in line with industry best practises as well as meeting supplier oversight requirements.

Requirements:

• Prior relevant industry experience within the banking and /or financial services sector in a Head of IT or Head of Technology Systems role.
• Detail-orientated with strong time management skills combines with the capacity to lead and work on multiple initiatives, as well as dynamically priorities and pivot based on changing business needs.
• Proven ability in identifying and solving complex technical problems, translating technical issues into non-technical terms and providing clear strategic direction to teams.
• Proven ability to lead cross-functional technology strategy and enterprise architecture.
• Experience and understanding of transaction processing, payments, and customer data platforms.
• Aligning systems architecture with business goals and regulatory requirements.
• Background of working within third party providers; demonstrable track record of delivering supplier engagement and ensuring delivery to contract.
• Understanding of cloud computing concepts and their impact on service and change delivery
• Knowledge of regulatory controls, customer conduct & successful outcomes, mortgage products.
• Experience working in a hybrid in-house/outsourced IT environment.

Our Values

Our values are well established and recognised throughout our organisation. They provide a frame of reference for the behaviours expected from our colleagues every day.

We find ways to break old conventions, especially those which cause exclusion or customer harm. We look for these qualities when hiring new talent into the organisation, and they underpin our approach to personal development and performance management for all our people. At the heart of this is the fact we care about our Customers, Our Colleagues and our Communities. We are:

Visionary- We innovate and break old habits, thinking big and pushing boundaries together as one team

Inclusive - We value each other’s differences and work to see people for who they really are

Dynamic - We are flexible and fast, cutting through complexity and never accepting second best

Authentic - We are honest and genuine, what you see is what you get

Benefits

We offer a comprehensive benefits package to support our employees’ professional and personal needs. Further details can be provided upon application.