Head of Engineering

• Define and deliver Valpak’s engineering strategy aligned to Comply and Reconomy objectives.
• Own and maintain a multi‑year technology roadmap.
• Ensure technology investments enable scalability, efficiency and innovation.
• Continuously evolve strategy in line with market and technology trends.

Engineering Excellence

• Establish and uphold engineering, architectural and coding standards.
• Embed modern development practices including DevOps, CI/CD and automation.
• Improve delivery speed, quality and productivity through standardised tooling and AI.
• Ensure consistency and maintainability across all software products.

Data Strategy

• Define and deliver a multi‑year data strategy aligned to Reconomy’s Data Strategy.
• Support enterprise data architecture, governance, security and quality standards.
• Implement a Data as a Product approach, enabling reuse and potential monetisation of data assets.

Data Engineering & Platforms

• Set data engineering standards and governance across Valpak.
• Enable trusted self‑service analytics via Reconomy’s Datastream platform.
• Oversee the design, optimisation and scalability of Azure‑based data platforms.

Quality Assurance

• Implement Reconomy’s engineering quality strategy, standards and testing frameworks.
• Enforce quality gates across the full development lifecycle.
• Champion a culture of shared ownership for quality and continuous improvement.
• Provide assurance on product quality, release readiness and risk.

Cloud Engineering & Platform Operations

• Implement Reconomy’s cloud strategy across Valpak systems.
• Embed modern DevSecFinOps and shift‑left ownership within engineering teams.
• Ensure cloud platforms are secure, resilient, scalable and cost‑optimised.
• Drive automation and infrastructure‑as‑code adoption.

Delivery Enablement, AI Agentic Coding & Productivity

• Drive adoption of agentic AI across the software development lifecycle.
• Ensure AI‑assisted development is safe, secure and aligned to engineering standards.
• Track and improve engineering performance metrics and delivery predictability.

Valpak Technology Business Partner

• Act as the Technology Business Partner for Valpak senior leadership.
• Align engineering delivery with business priorities and growth objectives.
• Communicate strategy, progress and outcomes to technical and non‑technical stakeholders.
• Lead resourcing, prioritisation and delivery of high‑impact initiatives.

Risk, Security & Resilience

• Ensure compliance with enterprise security, resilience and ISO27001 requirements.

• Embed secure‑by‑design principles into engineering practices.

• Support operational resilience through robust system and reliability engineering.

• Partner with security and infrastructure teams to manage and mitigate risk.

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Data Science or a related field.

• 10+ years of experience in data engineering, with at least 4–5 years in a leadership or managerial role and experience of managing multiple teams.

• Expertise in building and scaling data platforms, with a strong focus on Azure Cloud technologies (e.g., Azure Data Factory, Azure Synapse, Azure Data Lake, Azure SQL Database, Databricks, Apache Spark).

• Proven experience leading the implementation of data platform strategies and managing large-scale data infrastructure initiatives using Azure.

• Demonstrated experience implementing modern engineering practices such as DevOps, CI/CD, automated testing, and platform engineering.

• Experience building and scaling cloud-native platforms in large enterprises.

• Strong background in enterprise architecture, integration patterns, and API-driven architectures.

• Experience operating within complex organisational structures, balancing centralised technology governance with business unit autonomy.

• Experience leading distributed engineering teams, including offshore or near-shore development centres.

• Experience managing major technology transformation or modernisation initiatives.

• Dual Location / Hybrid worker Status

• Participation in our annual Incentive Plan (VIP) - up to 15% bonus

• 25 days annual leave plus bank holidays, volunteering day and your birthday off!

• Option to buy and sell up to 9 days annual leave

• Access to voluntary benefits including private medical insurance, cycle to work scheme, and subsidised gym membership

• Automatic inclusion in Life Assurance, Critical Illness and Disability Income protection schemes

• Pension scheme up to 8% employer contribution

• Access to reward & discount platform

• Wellbeing initiatives