Director of Engineering
Zopa · London, United Kingdom · 15d ago
As a Director of Engineering, you’ll lead an established engineering organisation responsible for one of our key business areas, with the autonomy and accountability to make a significant impact on how engineering performs at Zopa. You’ll set direction, build high-performing teams and drive meaningful improvements across people, technology and ways of working. This isn’t a role focused on incremental change: we’re looking for someone who can identify where the biggest opportunities exist, create a clear strategy and turn it into measurable progress. You’ll have the scope to influence significant technical and architectural decisions, improve engineering effectiveness and shape how we build and operate technology.
Your impact will extend beyond the teams you directly lead. Our Directors are expected to raise the level of engineering across Zopa, working closely with Product, Commercial and Technology leaders to turn engineering improvements into better business outcomes. You’ll bring strong people leadership, technical credibility and a genuinely data-led approach to understanding what’s working and where we can improve, while helping us push further in areas such as AI-enabled engineering.
This is an opportunity for an experienced engineering leader to take real ownership, drive substantial change and clearly see the results of the decisions they make.
As a highly collaborative role, you’ll attend our Canary Wharf office 3 days per week
What you'll do:
- Lead Engineering Strategy & Drive Meaningful Change:
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- Set and lead the engineering strategy for your area, identifying the biggest opportunities to improve technology, people and ways of working.
- Take ownership of moving the organisation from its current state towards a clear future state, building stakeholder buy-in and delivering measurable progress.
- Operate with a high degree of autonomy, making decisions and driving execution without requiring significant direction.
- Build a High-Performing Engineering Organisation:
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- Lead a sizeable engineering organisation through Engineering Managers, setting a high bar for people leadership and engineering performance.
- Build and develop high-performing teams through effective hiring, performance management and people practices.
- Identify organisational challenges and opportunities, including how teams are structured and how engineering capacity is used most effectively.
- Reduce key-person dependencies and build an organisation that can perform sustainably as it evolves.
- Improve Engineering Effectiveness Through Data & AI:
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- Identify and deliver improvements that make engineers and engineering teams more effective across people, technology and process.
- Use meaningful engineering metrics to identify opportunities, guide decisions and demonstrate whether changes are delivering the intended impact.
- Drive practical adoption and experimentation with AI, focusing on how it changes engineering effectiveness rather than simply introducing new tools.
- Share meaningful evidence of engineering performance with teams and stakeholders to inform decisions and drive continuous improvement.
- Shape Technology & Architecture:
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- Bring the technical credibility to challenge significant design and architectural decisions and make informed judgements on complex technology choices.
- Develop clear strategies for improving, modernising, consolidating or replacing technology where opportunities exist.
- Make pragmatic build, buy or partner decisions based on the needs of the organisation.
- Work effectively with engineering, architecture, platform and other technology teams to manage dependencies and deliver change.
- Partner Across the Business & Raise the Engineering Bar:
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- Build strong partnerships with Product and Commercial leaders, creating shared ownership of outcomes rather than operating in functional silos.
- Influence senior stakeholders, navigate demanding conversations and build support for significant engineering change.
- Build effective relationships across Technology and supporting functions, understanding how to leverage those teams rather than simply transact with them.
- Contribute beyond your immediate organisation, helping raise the level of engineering across Zopa.
How you'll do it:
- Lead with Autonomy & Ownership:
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- Bring the experience to quickly understand the problem space, form a clear point of view and turn it into action.
- Take ownership of outcomes, moving at pace while knowing when to seek input, support or validation.
- Draw on lessons from challenges you’ve faced before, adapting your approach rather than relying on a fixed playbook.
- Be Curious, Adaptable & Improvement-Focused:
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- Ask the right questions, challenge existing approaches and continually look for opportunities to make engineering better.
- Stay adaptable as business priorities and technology needs evolve, responding effectively when plans need to change.
- Bring genuine curiosity to emerging technologies, particularly AI, and be willing to experiment, learn and apply what works.
- Use Data to Make Better Decisions:
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- Take a genuinely data-led approach, using meaningful metrics to understand engineering performance and identify where improvement is needed.
- Go beyond reporting metrics by using them to shape priorities, change behaviours and measure the impact of your decisions.
- Communicate engineering effectiveness in a way that gives teams and senior stakeholders a clear view of progress and outcomes.
- Influence with High EQ & Low Ego:
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- Build trusted relationships across Engineering, Product, Commercial and the wider organisation.
- Be comfortable having difficult conversations, constructively challenging others and standing behind decisions you believe are right.
- Adapt your style to different stakeholders, combining conviction with collaboration to build buy-in and move change forward.
- Think Big & Deliver at Pace:
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- Look beyond incremental improvements and identify opportunities to make a step change in the organisations you lead.
- Translate ambitious ideas into practical plans, bringing people with you and creating momentum towards meaningful outcomes.
- Balance long-term thinking with visible progress, demonstrating impact while building towards larger-scale change.
About you:
- You’re an experienced engineering leader who has led sizeable teams and knows how to build a high-performing organisation through strong Engineering Managers, effective hiring, performance management and people leadership.
- You can demonstrate meaningful improvements to engineering effectiveness across people, technology and ways of working. You use data and metrics to identify opportunities, make decisions and understand whether your changes are having the intended impact.
- You’ve led significant organisational change, taking teams from their current state to a materially better one. You can set a clear direction, build stakeholder buy-in and translate strategy into tangible progress.
- You bring the technical credibility to engage in significant design and architectural decisions. You can process complex information, challenge thinking and make sound judgements, including practical build, buy or partner decisions.
- You know how to build strong partnerships with Product and influence senior stakeholders. You’re comfortable navigating competing priorities and difficult conversations, combining conviction with high EQ and a low-ego approach.
- You’re actively exploring how AI can improve engineering effectiveness and can talk practically about what you’ve tried, what worked, what didn’t and what you learned.
- You’re comfortable operating with significant autonomy, bringing experience and judgement to complex challenges without needing the path laid out for you. You’re naturally curious, adaptable and resilient, and comfortable adjusting course as priorities change.
- Experience within FinTech, lending or another regulated environment would be valuable, as would experience in a technology-first organisation.
At Zopa we value flexible ways of working.
We value face-to-face collaboration and a good work-life balance. This hybrid role requires you to come to our London office 2-3 days a week.
You'll also have the option of working from abroad for up to 120 days a year!* But no matter where you are, we’ll make sure you’ve got everything you need to thrive, both in your work and home life, from day one.
*Subject to having the right to work in the country of choice
Diversity Statement
Zopa is proud to offer a workplace free from discrimination. Diversity of experience, perspectives, and backgrounds leads to better products for our customers and a unique company culture for our people. We are made up of nearly 50 nationalities, have a DE&I forum made up of Zopians wanting to make a difference and we are proud of our culture where everyone can bring their full self to work. Our approach to DE&I is reflected in our hiring process so please let us know if you require any reasonable adjustments.
Our approach to AI in interviews
At Zopa, AI isn't something we're testing out — it's part of how we work every day. As a proud partner of Jobs 2030, we're committed to building AI fluency across our workforce, and we expect Zopians to use AI as part of how they do their jobs.
Because of that, we want to be transparent about how we think about AI use during our hiring process.
Behavioural and competency-based interviews: please don't use AI. These conversations are designed to understand you — your experiences, your judgment, and how you've approached real situations. An AI-generated answer can't tell us that. What it can do is get in the way of us finding out whether we're the right fit for each other.
Technical interviews: it depends on the role. Some technical stages actively welcome AI use, others don't. Your Talent Partner will let you know what's expected at each stage. Where AI is part of the assessment, we'll be interested not just in the outcome, but in how you used it – the tools you chose, your reasoning, and the decisions you made along the way.