Head of Engineering
Betfred is looking for a Head of Engineering to lead the engineering function for one of its workstreams, which covers a specific area of its technology landscape. This role will help rapidly grow the business and build market share in the UK and emerging new territories.
The Head of Engineering will be responsible for all Software Engineering, Architecture, and Quality Assurance colleagues and processes within that workstream. The role involves leading the execution of engineering best practices, ensuring teams have the right capabilities and skills to support and maintain healthy environments, and enabling frequent release cadences through automation.
- Lead the execution of engineering best practices within one of Betfred’s workstreams.
- Ensure the team has the right capabilities and skills to support and maintain healthy environments through automation.
- Maintain strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders.
- Ensure teams are correctly sized, resourced, and that processes are established, measured, and continuously improved.
- Maintain a career and skills framework alongside HR to provide clear career paths and required skills to grow people.
- Provide process guidance to product teams, ensure maximised throughput, reduced defects between development stages, and reduced defects leaking into production.
- Support the DevOps culture and ensure teams have the necessary skills and capabilities to build, release, and support the workstream’s software.
- Line manage the Engineering Managers within the workstream.
- Work closely with support and other technology functions to ensure effective 3rd line support for production systems, proactively keeping them healthy and resolving potential problem areas.
- Support Betfred objectives and help define goals and strategies for engineering teams.
- Work closely with fellow Heads of Engineering and other functions within Betfred to define measures and improvements for engineering capabilities.
- Report to senior management on engineering personnel, process improvements, and impediments.
- Participate in and encourage learning activities, promoting a learning culture and identifying knowledge gaps to be plugged through internal or external training.
- Champion technical requirements within the workstream necessary to implement Betfred’s Technology Strategy.
- Share learnings and achievements of the workstream with other streams to level up the organisation.
- Proven ability to scale engineering teams in a high-growth business (required).
- Up to date understanding of modern Software Engineering (required).
- Strong focus on Quality Assurance best practices across teams (required).
- Experience with Continuous Integration and Deployments (required).
- Experience working on complex systems in a fast-paced environment (required).
- Excellent line management skills, including managing managers, with the ability to inspire and drive direct reports (required).
- Agile mindset and willingness to optimise workstreams for flow of change (required).
- Great communication skills in both public speaking and technical writing (required).
- Metrics-driven approach for effective value delivery (required).
- Experience running database systems such as MySQL, MariaDB, Oracle, or Microsoft SQL Server (required).
- Experience with NoSQL database solutions such as Redis or MongoDB (required).
- Proficiency using operational tools such as Zabbix, Nagios, Splunk, ELK, or Prometheus (required).
- Experience working in an environment that adheres to strict change control processes, as well as supporting incident and problem management processes (required).
- Familiarity with PCI-DSS and ISO-27001 standards (required).
- Competitive rate of pay and pension contribution (£90,000-£120,000)
- Generous discretionary bonus schemes, incentives, and competitions
- Annual leave entitlement that increases with length of service
- Access to an online GP 24/7, 365 days a year for you and your immediate family
- Employee wellbeing support through an Employee Assistance Programme
- Enhanced Maternity & Paternity Pay
- Long Service Recognition
- Access to a pay day savings scheme, financial coach and up to 40% of your earned wage ahead of payday, through Wagestream
Betfred is a betting and gaming company that has operated for over 50 years, founded by Fred and Peter Done. It runs more than 1,300 betting shops and employs around 9,500 people, combining a large retail estate with online sports betting and gaming. In 2019 it entered the US sports betting market as Betfred Sportsbook, now operating in several states, and has established a presence in South Africa, where it holds a majority stake in the online betting company LottoStar. Headquartered in Warrington, England, Betfred emphasises customer service and responsible gambling across its operations.