Head of Technical Program Management - Food (Warehousing)

Marks and Spencer; City Of London; Hybrid; GBP 75,000 - 95,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading UK retailer is seeking a Head of Technical Program Management to lead technology and data capabilities for their Food business. This role requires extensive experience in delivering large-scale initiatives, excellent technical leadership, and a strong understanding of Agile practices. The position focuses on strategic planning and driving transformation across the Food service and warehousing platforms. Join a dynamic company committed to inclusivity and excellence in customer service.

Benefits

20% colleague discount

Competitive holiday entitlement

Discretionary bonus schemes

Defined Contribution Pension Scheme

Comprehensive training programmes

Parental and neonatal policies

24/7 Virtual GP access

Charity volunteer day

Qualifications

• Extensive experience delivering large-scale initiatives across multiple product functions.
• Ability to communicate effectively with both technical and non-technical individuals.
• Strong working knowledge of Agile/Scaled Agile practices including Scrum, Kanban and DevOps.

Responsibilities

• Plan, own and deliver highly complex and multi-disciplinary initiatives.
• Drive data-driven decisions through metrics and regular reporting.
• Develop trusted relationships with partners across business areas.

Skills

Technical leadership

Agile methodologies

Interpersonal skills

Critical thinking

Program management

Job description

Summary

At M&S Foods, we're protecting the magic of our Food business and modernising the rest. Our strategy is to safeguard what our customers love most about M&S – exceptional quality, high sourcing standards, and market-leading innovation – while transforming our supply chains, enhancing our stores, and delivering better value.

As the Head of Technical Program Management, you will lead the delivery function that designs, builds, and runs the technology and data capabilities underpinning the M&S Food business driving transformation across our Food Warehousing Platforms, together with the technology underpinning Food export, customs & excise and inventory related data.

This role focuses on strategic planning and ensuring alignment with broader business goals. We have bold plans and large programmes underway to open new Distribution centres that will facilitate the growth of M&S Food.

All the details

What’s in it for you

Being a part of M&S is exactly that – playing your part to bring the magic of M&S to our customers every day. We’re an inclusive, dynamic, exciting, and ever evolving business built on doing the right thing and bringing outstanding quality, value, service to every customer, whenever, wherever and however they want to shop with us.

Here are some of the benefits we offer that make working for M&S just that little bit more special:

• After completing your probationary period, you'll receive 20% colleague discount across all M&S products and many of our third-party brands for you and a member of your household.
• Competitive holiday entitlement with the potential to buy extra holiday days!
• Discretionary bonus schemes awarded based on how you achieve your personal objectives and our performance as a business.
• A generous Defined Contribution Pension Scheme and Life Assurance.
• A dedicated welcome to our teams with a tailored induction and a wide range of training programmes to develop your skills.
• Amazing perks and discounts via our M&S Choices portal to maximise your financial and personal wellbeing.
• Industry-leading parental, adoption and neonatal policies, providing support and flexibility for your family.
• Access to a fantastic range of wellbeing support for all colleagues including access to our 24/7 Virtual GP and PAM Assist to support you and your family.
• A charity volunteer day to support a charity or cause you're passionate about through a dedicated day away from work.

What you'll do

The Head of Technical Program Management is the glue of engineering, product and business strategies – owning Programmes of work of significant visibility and complexity with broad cross‑organisational and/or deep architectural impact. You are accountable for end‑to‑end technical delivery and performance across domains within the organisation and external suppliers, utilising your expertise in handling constraints, improving quality or removing blockers.

The mission is to harness agile ways of working and embed our strategic ambitions to successfully deliver sophisticated change at scale. The key to the success of this role is simplifying the complex processes into simple, straightforward solutions and building positive, trusting relationships through consistent delivery of solutions and effective communication in‑line with the M&S Way.

More specifically, the Head of Technical Program role is the embodiment of own it, and get it done' with key responsibilities as follows:

• Plan, own and deliver highly complex and multi‑disciplinary initiatives, collaborating with senior leaders to align strategic goals and drive a customer‑first mind‑set in Technology.
• Creates roadmaps and objectives and key results alongside the Head of Product & Head of Engineering to ensure alignment to strategic ambitions for M&S including the Technology Strategy.
• Facilitate continuous refinement and prioritisation of initiatives working alongside Product, Engineering and Business leaders.
• Drive data‑driven decisions through metrics and regular reporting to provide visibility creating a culture of transparency.
• Develop trusted relationships with partners across business areas using deep and relevant technology experience to simplify complex technology issues.

Who you are

• Extensive experience delivering large-scale initiatives across multiple product functions and domains.
• Excellent interpersonal skills, proactive can do demeanour and ability to communicate effectively with both technical and non‑technical individuals including director level.
• Track record of providing Technical leadership across domains, product groups and Program management during all phases of software development from ideation to realising value, demonstrating critical thinking and thought leadership.
• Strong working knowledge/experience of Agile/Scaled Agile practices including Scrum, Kanban and DevOps.
• Highly diligent professional with excellent leadership and coaching skills in lean agile practices.

Everyone’s welcome

We are ambitious about the future of retail. We’re redefining, innovating and leading the industry into a more conscientious, inspiring digital era. We’re redefining how we work together and offering our most exciting opportunities yet. Marks & Spencer strives to be an inclusive organisation, trusted and admired by our colleagues, customers and suppliers. Join us and make change happen.

We are committed to building diverse and representative teams, where everyone can bring their whole selves to work and be at their best. We support each other and work together to win together.

If you feel you’d benefit from any support or reasonable adjustments during any stage of the recruitment process, please don’t hesitate to let us know when completing your application. This information will be picked up by our team, so we can try and put steps in place to help you be at your best through this process.

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