Head of Engineering and Platform Services at Alfred & Victoria Associates

Job Description

• The Head of Engineering and Platform Services will lead the engineering function and drive the next phase of platform growth.
• This role is responsible for building a high-performing engineering team, delivering the product roadmap, maintaining platform reliability, and ensuring that engineering practices support the organisation's commercial objectives.
• This role requires a leader who can strengthen engineering capability, improve delivery discipline, modernise development practices through AI-assisted engineering, and establish the systems, standards, and culture required to scale a multi-country technology business.
• Working closely with the executive team, the role combines technical leadership with operational accountability, ensuring engineering delivers secure, reliable products while working seamlessly with Product, Customer Experience, Finance, Revenue Assurance, and the Hardware Team.

Responsibilities
Engineering Leadership:

• Build, lead, and develop a high-performing engineering organisation comprising software engineers, product management, UX design, infrastructure, and quality assurance.
• Recruit outstanding talent, establish effective onboarding, and create clear expectations for performance and career growth.
• Foster a culture of ownership, collaboration, technical excellence, continuous learning, and constructive feedback.
• Coach team members while addressing performance issues promptly and fairly.

Product Delivery:

• Lead execution of the engineering roadmap, ensuring timely delivery of product priorities.
• Work closely with the CTO to translate strategic objectives into quarterly plans, sprint commitments, and measurable engineering outcomes.
• Balance delivery speed with technical quality, platform stability, and sustainable management of technical debt.
• Remove delivery bottlenecks and make informed trade-offs where priorities compete.

Engineering Excellence:

• Define and maintain engineering standards covering architecture, code quality, testing, documentation, deployment, and operational readiness.
• Strengthen CI/CD practices and increase automation across testing and release processes.
• Ensure critical customer journeys are supported by comprehensive automated testing and robust monitoring.
• Drive continuous improvements in system performance, scalability, and reliability.

AI-Enabled Software Development:

• Lead the adoption of AI-assisted software development across the engineering function.
• Equip engineers to use modern AI tools effectively throughout design, coding, testing, documentation, and troubleshooting.
• Establish practical governance that improves productivity without compromising security, maintainability, or engineering quality.
• Evaluate emerging AI capabilities and introduce improvements where they deliver measurable value.

Platform Security and Payments:

• Maintain a strong security posture across all platform services, with particular focus on payments, access control, and customer data.
• Ensure payment validation controls are embedded within the platform and supported by appropriate governance and audit processes.
• Work closely with Finance and Revenue Assurance to strengthen reconciliation, payment integrity, and operational controls.
• Ensure engineering supports internal and external compliance requirements.

Platform Operations:

• Establish effective incident management, monitoring, and on-call processes.
• Lead response to critical production incidents and oversee post-incident reviews that result in lasting improvements.
• Define service standards, operational runbooks, and engineering support procedures that improve platform reliability.

Cross-Functional Collaboration:

• Partner with the Hardware Team on device integration, firmware releases, testing, and deployment readiness.
• Work closely with Customer Experience to improve issue resolution, release planning, and service quality.
• Collaborate with Product, Operations, Finance, and Executive Leadership to ensure engineering priorities remain aligned with business goals.

Vendor and Contractor Management:

• Manage external engineering partners and specialist contractors supporting delivery.
• Ensure contractors integrate effectively into engineering processes while maintaining consistent quality standards and architectural governance.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Engineering Capability:

• Core engineering structure established and fully operational within four months.
• Annual team retention rate of at least 90%.

Delivery Performance:

• Quarterly roadmap commitments delivered within agreed timelines.
• Stable sprint delivery with predictable velocity by Month 3.

Engineering Quality:

• Automated testing coverage exceeding 95% across critical customer journeys.
• Mean time to resolve Priority 1 incidents below two hours.
• Continuous improvement in deployment frequency and release stability.

Platform Security:

• Payment validation controls fully implemented.
• Successful completion of internal and external security reviews.
• Zero critical payment failures resulting from platform defects.

AI Adoption:

• AI-assisted engineering practices embedded across the engineering function.
• Engineers proficient in approved AI development tools within the first three months.

Operational Excellence:

• Documented incident management processes and engineering runbooks in place.
• Effective coordination with Hardware, Customer Experience, and Operations on platform releases and production support.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Software Engineering, Information Technology, or a related discipline.
• At least eight years of progressive software engineering experience, including leadership responsibility for engineering teams.
• Experience leading engineering through significant growth, platform transformation, or organisational rebuild.
• Demonstrated success in hiring, developing, and retaining high-performing technical teams.
• Strong experience delivering payment platforms, financial systems, or other security-sensitive applications.
• Practical experience implementing AI-assisted software development within engineering teams.
• Experience working in fast-growing technology businesses or digital product organisations.
• Relevant professional certifications or equivalent industry experience will be an added advantage.
• Experience within African markets, particularly Nigeria or Kenya, will be an added advantage.

Skills & Competencies
Technical Leadership:

• Provides strong architectural direction while remaining sufficiently hands-on to guide engineering decisions, review technical designs, and challenge assumptions where necessary.

AI Fluency:

• Demonstrates practical experience using AI tools to improve software delivery, engineering productivity, and code quality while understanding the governance required for security-critical systems.

Delivery Focus:

• Balances speed, quality, and commercial priorities, ensuring engineering consistently delivers reliable business outcomes.

People Leadership:

• Builds capable teams, develops talent, and creates an environment where engineers are accountable, engaged, and able to perform at their best.

Communication:

• Communicates complex technical concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical stakeholders, enabling informed decision-making across the business.

Ownership:

• Takes responsibility for engineering outcomes, proactively resolves issues, and drives continuous improvement across people, processes, and technology.

Desirable:

• Background in PropTech, property management, IoT, or smart metering software.
• Experience in FinTech or payments infrastructure, including disbursement platforms, reconciliation, and fraud detection.
• Experience coordinating hardware and software integration, including field deployment QA and go-live sign-off processes.
• Prior experience working in a founder-led or CEO-led product environment with close executive involvement in engineering direction.