Head of Engineering (Convo AI)

Lloyds Banking Group; Manchester; On-site; GBP 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Pension up to 15%

Annual bonus

Share schemes

Discounted shopping

30 days holiday

Wellbeing initiatives

Parental leave

Job summary

Lloyds Banking Group is seeking a senior engineering leader to build and scale Conversational AI experiences that transform how customers interact with the Group. You will lead delivery, people leadership, and platform strategy across GenAI, agentic AI, orchestration, search and fulfilment.

You will collaborate with Product, Design, Data and Architecture to deliver secure, resilient, production-ready AI solutions, while embedding monitoring, governance and cost discipline across customer

Qualifications

• Experience building and leading high-performing multidisciplinary engineering teams.
• Delivery of customer-facing Conversational AI, GenAI or intelligent assistants.
• Strong knowledge of modern software engineering, cloud-native architectures, APIs and DevOps.
• Experience in regulated environments with governance, risk controls and explainability.
• Strong stakeholder management and leadership of talent.

Responsibilities

• Lead and scale multidisciplinary engineering teams across Conversational AI initiatives.
• Deliver AI-powered customer experiences, intelligent assistants and agentic journeys.
• Ensure security, resilience, compliance and customer trust in delivered solutions.
• Collaborate with Product, Design, Data, Architecture and Platform enabling teams.
• Drive adoption of reusable patterns and platform capabilities across journeys.

Skills

Team leadership

Conversational AI

GenAI capabilities

Cloud-native architecture

Agile delivery

Stakeholder management

Platform engineering

Job description

You will lead a multidisciplinary engineering team responsible for building and scaling Conversational AI experiences that transform how customers interact with Lloyds Banking Group. You will be accountable for engineering delivery, people leadership, operational excellence and strategic technology execution across a portfolio of Conversational AI initiatives including customer servicing, intelligent search, AI-powered guidance, agentic experiences and future customer-facing AI capabilities. Working closely with Product, Design, Data, Architecture and Platform enabling teams, you will deliver scalable solutions that combine GenAI, Agentic AI, orchestration, search and fulfilment capabilities while meeting the highest standards of security, resilience, compliance and customer trust. This role offers the opportunity to lead, grow and develop a high-performing engineering team, fostering a culture of ownership, innovation, continuous improvement and customer-centred delivery. You will create an environment where engineers can thrive, championing modern ways of working and establishing clear quality standards and performance expectations across teams. As a senior engineering leader, you will drive engineering excellence across software engineering, AI engineering, testing, observability, reliability and operational excellence. You will lead the delivery of Conversational AI products, AI-powered servicing journeys, intelligent assistants and agentic customer experiences, ensuring solutions are designed to meet both customer and business needs. You will play a key role in accelerating delivery by driving the adoption of common engineering assets, reusable patterns and platform capabilities across customer journeys and business domains. Working closely with Product Owners, Architects and Business Leaders, you will help shape delivery and investment decisions, balancing customer outcomes, technology strategy, risk management, technical debt and long-term platform sustainability. A core focus of the role will be ensuring AI solutions are secure, resilient, scalable, reusable and production-ready. You will embed monitoring, evaluation, experimentation and operational controls into services, helping to deliver reliable and trusted customer experiences. You will also be responsible for workforce planning, organisational design, succession planning, recruitment and capability development, ensuring the team has the skills and capacity to deliver both current and future priorities. In doing so, you will contribute to the ambition of building the Group's leading AI-enabled customer platform. Why join us? Join us and, give us your best and we'll give you ours. Here, you'll make a difference to customers, you'll enjoy a fulfilling career where you're free to be yourself. Great colleagues, amazing workspaces, hybrid working and huge career opportunities-you'll find them all here., Our ambition is to be the leading UK business for diversity, equity and inclusion supporting our customers, colleagues and communities, and we're committed to creating an environment in which everyone can thrive, learn and develop.

• Proven experience building, organising and leading high-performing multidisciplinary engineering teams in large-scale digital, technology or platform environments.
• Experience delivering customer-facing Conversational AI, GenAI, Agentic AI or intelligent assistant capabilities, with strong knowledge of modern software engineering, cloud-native architecture, APIs, DevOps, Agile delivery and platform engineering.
• Ability to manage delivery roadmaps, workforce plans, budgets, technology risks, operational performance, resilience and technology strategy.
• Experience working in regulated environments, with strong governance and risk controls across reliability, security, safety and explainability.
• Strong stakeholder management and influencing skills, including experience working with senior business, product and technology leaders.
• Track record of coaching technical colleagues at all levels, developing engineering talent and balancing delivery with learning, experimentation and adoption of emerging technologies.

We know that great talent comes from many backgrounds. Whilst this job advert may reference specific years of experience, we recognise that skills are developed in many ways, so if you have relevant, transferable experience, we encourage you to apply.

At Lloyds Banking Group, we're driven by a clear purpose; to help Britain prosper. Across the Group, our colleagues are focused on making a difference to customers, businesses and communities. With us you'll have a key role to play in shaping the financial services of the future, whilst the scale and reach of our Group means you'll have many opportunities to learn, grow and develop. We keep your data safe. So, we'll only ever ask you to provide confidential or sensitive information once you have formally been invited along to an interview or accepted a verbal offer to join us which is when we run our background checks. We'll always explain what we need and why, with any request coming from a trusted Lloyds Banking Group person. We're focused on creating a values-led culture and are committed to building a workforce which reflects the diversity of the customers and communities we serve. Together we're building a truly inclusive workplace where all of our colleagues have the opportunity to make a real difference.

We were one of the first major organisations to set goals on diversity in senior roles, create a menopause health package, and a dedicated Working with Cancer Initiative. We offer reasonable workplace adjustments for colleagues with disabilities, including flexibility in office attendance, location and working patterns. And, as a Disability Confident Leader, we guarantee interviews for a fair and proportionate number of applicants who meet the minimum criteria for the role with a disability, long-term health or neurodivergent condition through the Disability Confident Scheme. We provide reasonable adjustments throughout the recruitment process to reduce or remove barriers. Just let us know what you need.

We also offer a wide-ranging benefits package, which includes:

• A generous pension contribution of up to 15%
• An annual performance-related bonus
• Share schemes including free shares
• Benefits you can adapt to your lifestyle, such as discounted shopping
• 30 days' holiday, with bank holidays on top
• A range of wellbeing initiatives and generous parental leave policies