SVP Engineering
19 hours ago
Abingdon-On-Thames
The Senior Vice President (SVP) of Engineering is a pivotal executive role, reporting into our Chief Technology & Product Officer. The role is responsible for leading the globally distributed engineering organisations through a dual transformation: evolving the business from an academic publisher to a Knowledge Marketplace, while simultaneously pivoting the technology function toward AI-First Software Engineering. This role requires a leader who is a strategist, an expert in modern engineering, and is aware of how to embed AI across the entire software lifecycle. You will be responsible for the technology strategy that powers our marketplace, balancing the need for robust distributed systems with the agility required to experiment and grow. You will partner closely with Product leadership to co-create solutions that solve complex user problems. The role will work to bridge geographies and time zones, championing Distributed Agile practices that allow our global teams to collaborate seamlessly. You will embed AI-assisted development (e.g., Copilot, code generation, automated refactoring) into the core of our SDLC, amplifying the productivity of our global teams and defining the future of our engineering workforce. You will champion Distributed Agile practices that bridge time zones and instil a culture of technical excellence rooted in Test-Driven Development (TDD) and Continuous Delivery. This role demands a visionary leader who can balance technical innovation with business priorities to achieve sustainable growth and competitive advantage. The Academic Publishing industry and T&F are on an exciting growth agenda; from a portfolio of separate products to an integrated platform with a focus on leveraging emerging technologies to ensure advanced substantiated knowledge is accessible and can have real world impact. This role ensures that the company achieves its long-term goals and remains competitive in a dynamic business environment. Key Responsibilities and Accountability: Technology Strategy & Architecture • Define and execute a scalable engineering strategy to transition the business to a platform model, leveraging modern architectures like Event-Driven Architecture and Microservices., • Ensure systems support high-traffic marketplace scalability, balancing speed-to-market with long-term differentiation., • Build strong relationships with stakeholders, translating business vision into technical delivery while effectively communicating technical concepts to non-technical audiences. Modern Engineering Excellence • Embed AI-first engineering practices to enhance developer productivity and ensure secure, high-quality AI-generated code., • Drive Continuous Delivery and DevOps maturity using DORA metrics to achieve high-velocity, high-quality outputs., • Modernize legacy systems by migrating to cloud-native architectures without disrupting business operations. Product Engineering Partnership • Collaborate with Product leadership to align engineering with product discovery and commercial outcomes., • Shorten feedback loops to enable rapid testing and iteration, ensuring technical decisions enhance marketplace performance and customer satisfaction. Team Development & Culture • Build a cohesive, high-performing engineering team, fostering ownership, inclusivity, and continuous learning., • Lead AI upskilling programs and attract top-tier talent in modern stacks, distributed systems, and AI engineering., • Promote diversity, equity, and inclusion while mentoring leaders to balance technical expertise with people management. Stakeholder Collaboration • Act as a liaison between engineering and other departments, ensuring alignment across the organization., • Represent engineering in executive meetings and external engagements, providing strategic insights and recommendations. Creativity & Technology Leadership • Champion emerging technologies and foster a culture of experimentation to maintain a competitive edge., • Identify industry trends and opportunities to inform strategic decisions and align with customer aspirations. Experience & Knowledge • Modern Engineering Practitioner: Proven deep, hands-on background in software engineering with a philosophy rooted in TDD, CI/CD, and Agile XP (Extreme Programming) principles. Understanding of "good" software and solutions. Crucially, you have practical experience of AI tools and understand the impact this has on productivity and crucially on code quality., • Distributed Systems: Proven experience architecting and managing complex Distributed Systems and Cloud-Native architectures (AWS/Azure/GCP). You understand the complexities of building a multi-sided global marketplace., • Marketplace/Platform Context: Experience building platforms that support B2B or B2C marketplaces, or complex content ecosystems, is highly desirable., • Global Leadership: Experience leading large-scale, globally distributed engineering teams. You have a playbook for managing distributed agile at scale, handling cultural nuances, and synchronizing delivery across time zones., • Strategic Transformation: Demonstrated history of leading engineering teams through transformations from legacy methods to modern, automated, and AI-enhanced workflows., • Product Fluency: You speak "Product." You have experience working in a "Triad" model (Engineering, Product, Delivery) and understand how to balance technical debt reduction with feature delivery., • Holistic business knowledge with an understanding of the operational complexities of large multinational organisations particularly of a matrix organisational structure., • Mature and proactive attitude, with excellent judgment and problem-solving skills, • A flexible and agile mentality able to quickly adapt and respond to changing work pressures and prioritises, • Excellent communication and influencing skills with the ability to present and drive change with stakeholders at all levels of the business., • A curious outlook – known for asking the right questions of the right stakeholders., • Highly collaborative, emotionally intelligent and someone people are excited to work with; also having strong personal influencing skills, • Extremely well organised and comfortable managing a significant and varied workload across global time zones that needs constant prioritisation., • Numerate with an ability to interpret and understand project plans, budgets, and financial targets; Ability to analyse and compile a large amount of data and come up with conclusive results, • Commercially minded with strong financial acumen and a dedicated customer focussed attitude, • Demonstrated commercial acumen and results orientation., • Programme management skills with a proven ability to get things done, not deterred by the changing or evolving nature of a project. We ask that candidates live within a reasonable commuting distance of our office in either Milton Park Oxfordshire (OX14) or London Blackfriars to enable you to collaborate in person at least 3 days per week. Taylor & Francis is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer. If you have a disability, or face another barrier, and would like to request an adjustment to assist your participation in the hiring process and/or in the advertised position, please contact . Your request will be reviewed and considered in the strictest confidence.