Lead Security Consultant

Join us at Barclays as a Lead Security Consultant. At Barclays, we are committed to building secure, resilient, and innovative technology solutions that protect our customers, colleagues, and business operations. We are looking for a talented and forward-thinking Security Consultant to join our growing cybersecurity team and play a key role in shaping secure enterprise platforms and services across the organisation. As a Security Consultant, you will work closely with engineering, architecture, and business teams to embed security into the design and delivery of strategic initiatives, ensuring that security is integrated from concept through to implementation.

Critical Skills:

• Secure by Design – Strong understanding of embedding security principles into solution architecture and system development lifecycles, ensuring security controls are proactively integrated rather than retrofitted.

• Threat Modelling – Experience identifying potential threats, attack vectors, and security weaknesses across applications, infrastructure, and data platforms, with the ability to recommend effective mitigations.

• Security Assessment Scoping – Ability to define and scope security assessments, penetration testing engagements, and risk reviews to ensure appropriate coverage and alignment with business and regulatory requirements.

Desirable Skills:

• Big Data Platform Experience – Exposure to modern data and analytics platforms such as Databricks, Snowflake, or similar technologies, with an understanding of associated security considerations and controls.

• Software Defined Data Centres (SDDC) – Knowledge of virtualised infrastructure, software-defined networking, storage, and compute technologies within enterprise environments.

• Generative AI (Gen AI) – Awareness of emerging Gen AI technologies, associated security risks, governance considerations, and secure adoption practices within large organisations.

This role is based in Knutsford. 

You may be assessed on the key critical skills relevant for success in role, such as risk and controls, change and transformation, business acumen strategic thinking and digital and technology, as well as job-specific technical skills

Purpose of the role

To enable ‘secure by design’, supporting the bank’s change programmes, design and implement a secure systems and architecture across a broad set of security domains. These include data security, security risk management, asset security, security architecture and engineering (incl. cloud security), communications and networks, security operations, software development, security assurance testing, identity and access management (IAM). 

Accountabilities

• Control function or security guild responsible for technology change oversight and governance.
• Execution of security risk assessments and building threat models during the change & development lifecycle in order to identify vulnerabilities within the banks IT systems, applications and infrastructure, ensuring that compensating security controls and countermeasures are embedded in order to enhance security posture and resilience against cyber threats provision of timely communication of key findings and recommendations to stakeholders.
• Enablement of DevSecOps (and shift left), by providing engagement channels for customers and stakeholders who wish to engage early seeking security advice and input into their business plans and opportunities, or technology change designs, influencing key stakeholders in COO and CSO to create security strategies to enable business and technology evolution.
• Support and guidance to CISO, CIO and Product Team functions providing security reviews for prospective 3rd party technology products and services.
• Transfer of residual risks to the business/customer as required by the bank’s enterprise risk management framework.
• Collaboration with stakeholder and IT teams to support incident response and investigations using their knowledge of the banks technology systems sharing security insights.
• Participation in the development and maintenance of security policies, standards and procedures aligned to the banks risk tolerance, regulatory requirements and industry best practice.

Vice President Expectations

• Advise key stakeholders, including functional leadership teams and senior management on functional and cross functional areas of impact and alignment.
• Manage and mitigate risks through assessment, in support of the control and governance agenda.
• Demonstrate leadership and accountability for managing risk and strengthening controls in relation to the work your team does.
• Demonstrate comprehensive understanding of the organisation functions to contribute to achieving the goals of the business.
• Collaborate with other areas of work, for business aligned support areas to keep up to speed with business activity and the business strategies.
• Create solutions based on sophisticated analytical thought comparing and selecting complex alternatives. In-depth analysis with interpretative thinking will be required to define problems and develop innovative solutions.
• Adopt and include the outcomes of extensive research in problem solving processes.
• Seek out, build and maintain trusting relationships and partnerships with internal and external stakeholders in order to accomplish key business objectives, using influencing and negotiating skills to achieve outcomes.

All colleagues will be expected to demonstrate the Barclays Values of Respect, Integrity, Service, Excellence and Stewardship – our moral compass, helping us do what we believe is right. They will also be expected to demonstrate the Barclays Mindset – to Empower, Challenge and Drive – the operating manual for how we behave.