Software Engineering Manager

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As an Engineering Manager, you will lead Digi2al's software engineering capability and play a crucial role in delivering modern, secure, cloud-native services across the Royal Navy DNA programme. You will guide multidisciplinary engineering teams, ensure high-quality delivery, set modern engineering standards, and drive technical excellence across multiple defence digital workstreams. This is a hands-on leadership role blending team management, technical direction, coaching, and delivery oversight to ensure Digi2al engineers can deliver impactful, mission-focused digital capabilities.

Key Responsibilities

Leadership of the Digi2al Engineering Practice
• Establish and lead a high-performing software engineering discipline, defining development standards, modern engineering practices, and quality frameworks.
• Shape the long-term engineering strategy for defence-sector delivery, aligning with company vision and client needs.
• Mentor and develop engineers, engineering leads, and multidisciplinary teams raising capability and embedding engineering excellence across the organisation.
• Establish reusable code patterns, engineering templates, CI/CD blueprints, and best-practice development documentation.

Royal Navy DNA Account Responsibilities.
• Serve as the senior engineering lead for Digi2al's work on the Royal Navy's Digital Navy Architecture (DNA) programme.
• Work closely with Navy stakeholders to understand operational constraints, user needs, and system behaviours within a defence context.
• Oversee the design and delivery of modern software systems spanning cloud services, microservices, integration, identity, data, and secure APIs.
• Provide technical assurance across engineering workstreams, ensuring alignment with architectural direction, MOD standards, and security requirements.
• Support capability planning, delivery roadmaps, and engineering resource allocation across the programme.

Strategic & Technical Governance.
• Lead engineering governance to ensure secure, robust, maintainable, and MOD-compliant software delivery.
• Influence technology selection, toolchain adoption, and engineering approaches across teams.
• Ensure engineering artefacts (code, pipelines, documentation, tests) meet the needs of multidisciplinary teams and stakeholders.

Stakeholder Engagement
• Act as a trusted advisor to senior Royal Navy and MOD stakeholders.
• Translate complex technical concepts into clear, actionable insights for both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Balance security, delivery, user needs, and operational constraints in a fast-moving agile environment.

Top 3 requirements for this role:
• Significant experience leading software engineering teams in complex, multi-system environments.
• Strong background in cloud-native development (Azure/AWS), microservices, API-led integration, and modern software delivery.
• Experience delivering software in UK Defence, government, or other highly regulated environments.

Experience and Skills:

Must haves:
• Deep knowledge of modern engineering practices (DevOps, CI/CD, TDD/BDD, automation, secure coding).
• Excellent leadership, coaching, and stakeholder-management skills.

Nice to haves:
• Familiarity with MOD accreditation, security standards, and defence digital ecosystems.
• Experience with event-driven architecture, Domain-Driven Design (DDD), and cloud platform engineering.
• Background in hands-on software engineering or technical delivery.