Head of Software Engineering - Mobile Apps

Job purpose

As part of the M&S Software Engineering team, you’ll be joining a well-loved historic brand, working on solutions that serve millions of loyal customers and thousands of colleagues! With ethical values that run right through the company’s core and technology leaders that truly understand software engineers and engineering, it’s an exciting time as we’re redefining ourselves into a digital first and engineering-led organisation, with the quality of our engineering team being a key differentiator.

We are seeking a passionate Head of Software Engineering who will provide technical expertise, ship thoughtfully and operate with excellence. Being creative, curious, and confident, you will be an integral part of our empowered, self-managing, multi-disciplinary engineering teams - designing, building, releasing, and maintaining products. Working as an equal partner with the Product and Delivery teams you will deliver sophisticated and robust solutions to solve daring problems for our customers and colleagues.

You’ll be joining the leadership for the Mobile Apps Sub-domain within Online, who are responsible for our native Android and iOS mobile applications. Mobile is the most popular way for customers to shop online with M&S, so this group have a pivotal role to play in the future growth of the business and the satisfaction of our customers in the here and now.

The seven squads in this area work on the entire shopping journey from landing on the home page through to completing returns. There is a team focused on optimising the developer experience, and one looking at architectural improvements and tooling.

Our Engineering Managers each have responsibility over 1-2 squads working alongside Product Managers, in blended iOS/Android teams. We lean heavily on automation for our testing and release, and are investing in using AI to accelerate our processes.

You will play a key role in driving our ambition to create a best-in-class software engineering team, environment, and culture. We are looking for people to join our community of engineers to drive this transformation, build a modern digital ecosystem using exciting technologies and do the best work of their careers.

M&S peers

Principal Software Engineers, Heads of Product, Heads of Data Science, Senior Technical Programme Managers

Team

• 4 Engineering Managers

• 7 Squads in the strategic Sub-Domain (~40 Engineers growing to ~60)

Key Accountabilities & Responsibilities

The Head of Software Engineering role is the embodiment of ‘solving problems through technology’ with key responsibilities as follows:

• Lead, develop and inspire Engineering Managers and teams, fostering a strong learning culture, high-quality engineering standards, and clear development and talent strategies.

• Partner closely with Product, Delivery and Technology leadership to shape strategy, prioritise roadmaps, solve complex problems, and maximise value to colleagues and customers.

• Drive technical excellence and modern engineering practices, including clean code, automation, architecture design, and the adoption of standard frameworks, AI, policies, and North Star principles.

• Own Sub-domain outcomes and health, setting OKRs, ensuring reliability, quality, and full operational support across products.

• Champion innovation, continuous improvement and agile ways of working, encouraging experimentation, pragmatism, and commercially sound delivery.

• Build and scale high-performing teams and communities, leading recruitment, onboarding, coaching, Communities of Practice, and contributing to wider engineering brand and culture.

Tech stack

Our core mobile technologies include:

• Swift, SwiftUI

• Kotlin, Jetpack Compose, Hilt

• Wiremock, Appium, XCUITest, Espresso

Additionally M&S uses a variety of technologies across the wider business, including:

• React, Next.js, Typescript

• Java, Kotlin, Python, Rust

• GraphQL Federation

• Azure Cloud

• GitHub, GitHub Actions, Co-Pilot

Essential Experience

• Significant hands-on experience as a senior software engineer in the mobile space, with exposure (but not necessarily expertise) across web front-end, back-end, APIs, cloud infrastructure, and modern development frameworks.

• Leading large product areas with 5+ teams

• Knowledge of modern iOS and Android frameworks and development methodologies.

• Proven ability to design and evolve complex systems, with deep knowledge of software architecture, system design, and engineering standard methodologies.

• Strong experience delivering, operating and scaling software at Sub-domain level and above, including building, leading and hiring senior engineering teams.

• Testing and reliability engineering expertise, embracing CI/CD, automation, observability, and a “you build it, you run it” ownership model.

• Technically credible people leader and servant leader, able to line manage and influence senior engineers and engineering managers, drive technical outcomes, and communicate effectively with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Works closely with

You’ll be working closely with Senior Heads of Software Engineering, Heads of Product, Heads of Data Science, Commercial and Finance, CTOs, Software Engineering Managers, Principal Engineers, Software Engineers, other Heads of Software Engineering, UI/UX Engineers, Architects and Product Managers to collaboratively tackle problems! There will be day-to-day interactions with Technical Program Managers, who you’ll work with to constantly evolve your team’s ways of working.

As a member of M&S Software Engineering, you’ll also work with and learn from other engineers and specialists in the organisation through Business Platforms, Product Portfolios, Product Groups, other teams and Communities of Practice.

What’s in it for you

Being a part of M&S is exactly that – playing your part to bring the magic of M&S to our customers every day. We’re an inclusive, dynamic, exciting, and ever evolving business built on doing the right thing and bringing exceptional quality, value, service to every customer, whenever, wherever and however they want to shop with us.

Here are some of the benefits we offer that make working for M&S just that little bit more special…

• After completing your probationary period, you’ll receive 20% colleague discount across all M&S products and many of our third-party brands for you and a member of your household.

• Competitive holiday entitlement with the potential to buy extra holiday days!

• Discretionary bonus schemes awarded based on how you achieve your personal objectives and our performance as a business.

• A generous Defined Contribution Pension Scheme and Life Assurance.

• A dedicated welcome to our teams with a tailored induction and a wide range of training programmes to develop your skills.

• Amazing perks and discounts via our M&S Choices portal to maximise your financial and personal wellbeing.

• Industry-leading parental, adoption and neonatal policies, providing support and flexibility for your family.

• Access to a fantastic range of wellbeing support for all colleagues including access to our 24/7 Virtual GP and PAM Assist to support you and your family.

• A charity volunteer day to support a charity or cause you're passionate about through a dedicated day away from work.

Everyone’s welcome

We’re ambitious about the future of retail. We’re innovating, disrupting, and leading the way into a more inspiring, digital era. It’s an exciting time to be part of M&S.

To support us on our journey, we’re building inclusive, diverse teams where everyone can be themselves, do their best work, and make change happen. We support each other and succeed together.

Don’t worry if you don’t meet every single requirement of the job description. It’s more of a guide to what’s possible within the role. If you’re passionate, ready to work hard, and think the role feels right for you, we’d love to hear from you.

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