Senior Director: Software Engineering

SUMMARY:
Our client in Pretoria is looking to appoint a Senior Director: Software Engineering.

The purpose of this role is to lead multi-disciplinary development teams, including Mobile, Web, and Test Engineering, while collaborating closely with Architecture, Platform, and Data functions. The position oversees product and project strategy, capacity planning, and technical specifications, acting as the Subject Matter Expert for front-end development and quality engineering. The primary focus involves driving profitability through scalable software design, optimized time-to-market, and rigorous technical accuracy. Furthermore, this role spearheads technology advancement initiatives, including AI-driven programming, to ensure the organization remains at the forefront of innovation.

POSITION INFO:
Description:

Team Management 15%

• Direct the development team through coaching, mentorship, and regular performance reviews to ensure professional growth and support.
• Align development efforts with Product Management, Architecture, and Infrastructure strategies.
• Manage team productivity and resource deployment, driving quarter-on-quarter metric improvements.
• Lead proactive recruitment and capacity planning based on strategic objectives.
• Enforce high software quality standards by establishing robust development lifecycle processes and habits.

• Analyze system requirements and identify technical deficiencies to implement optimizations and improvements.
• Oversee the creation of efficient, reusable, and reliable code in accordance with quality accredited standards.
• Manage testing, debugging, and fault correction protocols to ensure applications perform to specification.
• Direct the design of robust integrations and ensure a data-led approach is integrated into all functional specifications.
• Execute sprint management and development methodologies, ensuring alignment with product strategy and company goals.
• Establish metrics and reporting frameworks to monitor SDLC progress and system performance.

• Optimize development and data processes to improve operational efficiency and output accuracy.
• Provide strategic input for Data Warehouse design and dimensional modeling to ensure comprehensive data mining.
• Develop implementation strategies for new products, considering commercial, legal, and operational risks.
• Identify and report on technical risks, implementing appropriate mitigation measures.
• Streamline maintenance and development workflows to enhance product profitability.

• Act as the technical Product Owner for B2C and B2B platforms, ensuring ultimate responsibility for technical excellence.
• Implement best-practice design methodologies to maintain clean, auditable, and manageable systems.
• Facilitate efficient code reviews to reduce time-to-market and deployment errors.
• Approve business, functional, and technical specifications prior to development commencement.
• Ensure product conformity with regulatory, legislative, and quality objectives.
• Resolve bottlenecks and bugs within the tech ecosystem to ensure prolonged scalability.

• Promote cybersecurity awareness and integrate security requirements into system documentation.
• Oversee the implementation of fixes resulting from monthly vulnerability scans and penetration tests.
• Ensure the safety and security of all systems by prioritizing the resolution of identified deficiencies.
• Manage CI/CD procedures in alignment with the Architecture, Platform, and Data teams.

• Standardize and enforce best practices for technical documentation across the team.
• Review the quality and accuracy of as-built system designs and cybersecurity documentation.
• Maintain records required for compliance with ISO, CE, FDA, SOC2, and other relevant regulatory standards.

• 15+ years relevant working experiece
• 5+ years in a Team Management Role

• Essential: BEng (Computer) Degree or BSC Information Technology Degree or similar
• Desirable: Relevant Information Technology degree or diploma Certified Scrum Master

• Cybersecurity (SOC 2 or HiTrust)
• Team management
• • Recruitment
  • Effective management of employees
  • Dev output management
  • Excellence management
• Software engineering roadmap planning, analysis, estimations.
• Software product analytics and data insights
• Data driven customer experience design and development
• IT systems scoping relating to consumer-facing applications. (SaaS and/ or HaaS models would be beneficial).
• Requirement gathering and documentation.
• Scrum Master (Agile).

• Practising knowledge of SDLC.
• Knowledge of consumer-facing web development, deployment and maintenance.
• An in-depth understanding of User Experience design and Consumer products.
• Knowledge of SQL queries, SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) and SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS).
• Non-relational database design and management.
• SQL Database management, BQuery and SQL Server skills including SQL objects development. performance tuning, analysis and integration.
• Working knowledge on translating business needs into technical specifications.
• The application of critical thinking and a data-driven approach to the continuous improvement of a systems and the customer's experience relating to the product.
• In-depth understanding of database management systems, online analytical processing (OLAP) and ETL (Extract, transform, load) framework.
• Strong analytical, troubleshooting skills and root-cause analysis ability.
• Familiarity with BI technologies (e.g. Tableau).