The Role and the Team

The engineering organisation at Blue Light Card has made real progress: a modern architecture, strong commercial foundations, and a genuinely collaborative, talented team. The next chapter is about building on those foundations: consistent delivery, AI transformation that sticks, and an engineering function that operates as a true strategic partner across the business.

This is where the Director of Engineering comes in. Reporting directly to the CTO, you'll own the day-to-day strategy and execution of the engineering organisation, leading six squads with plans to grow to eight. Your focus is the next twelve months of engineering performance and organisational maturity, freeing the CTO to set longer-term direction, engage at Board level, and build BLC's technical brand.

You'll work in close partnership with the Head of Engineering, who owns the technical layer: engineering standards, software development strategy, and the implementation of AI-first ways of working. Your domain is the organisational layer: team health, ways of working, cross-functional coordination, career development, and delivery accountability. The right candidate will be energised by a strong technical counterpart and focused on nurturing the organisational conditions for the team to do its best work. You'll also work closely with the Director of Product and Director of Information Security, and present engineering performance directly to the CEO and Executive Team.

What You'll Do

• Lead the engineering organisation's day-to-day performance, making sure the right initiatives are prioritised, tracked, and landing as intended

• Build the operating model, rituals, and accountability structures that give the team the consistency and discipline to deliver at a higher level

• Bring the engineering team with you on AI adoption, driving the culture and behaviour change needed to make AI-first ways of working the norm

• Set clear, observable standards for Engineering Managers at every level and develop them actively, giving the team the leadership maturity the next stage of BLC's growth requires

• Ensure every engineer has a meaningful development plan that is actively worked and that the team has a genuine culture of learning, craft, and mutual support

• Build trusted, collaborative relationships with Product, Design, Data, and key external suppliers including AWS, Sanity, and Cloudflare, moving engineering to a genuine strategic partner across the business

• Manage the engineering budget with CTO oversight, controlling costs and evaluating the return on investment of engineering approaches with commercial rigour

• Represent engineering with credibility at SLT, Executive Team, and Board level, and be genuinely prepared to stand in for the CTO when needed

What You'll Bring

• An established career leading engineering organisations through a meaningful maturity curve, with a track record in delivery outcomes, quality, and measurable impact

• Proven experience bringing an engineering team through AI transformation at scale, including the culture and behaviour change that makes it stick, backed by evidence of business impact

• A background inheriting partially-built engineering functions and fixing them systematically, with a clear playbook and the composure to see it through

• Commercial fluency at senior level: controlling costs, evaluating engineering ROI, and holding credible conversations with finance and executive stakeholders

• Strong people leadership, with a track record of developing engineering teams, building inclusive, high-trust environments where people are supported to grow and held to a high standard