Strategic Engineering Lead, Corporate Technology

Financial Times; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Generous annual leave

Medical cover

Inclusive parental leave packages

Subsidised gym memberships

Community involvement opportunities

Job summary

Financial Times is seeking a Principal Engineer – Corporate Technology in London to lead senior engineering across People, Finance and Procurement systems. You will define strategy, set ownership, and mentor leaders while driving secure, scalable platforms and modernisation efforts.

The role collaborates with Architecture, Security, and Data teams to shape technology roadmaps and governance. You will partner with Product and Technology forums to simplify estates, improve interoperability, and

Qualifications

• Extensive background in senior engineering leadership within a complex technology organisation.
• Solid knowledge of enterprise SaaS ecosystems and the engineering methods necessary to integrate, operate, and develop business-critical platforms.
• Experience with leading enterprise platforms like Oracle Fusion, Workday, or similar People, Finance, or ERP systems.
• Solid grasp of contemporary integration methods, APIs, data flows, and cloud technologies.
• Experience leading technology through significant transformation, implementation or modernisation programmes.
• Experience establishing clear technical ownership and sustainable operating models for business-critical platforms.
• Solid grasp of reliability, security, operational risk, and technology lifecycle management.
• Experience working with third‑party technology vendors, implementation partners and managed service providers while maintaining strong internal ownership.
• Experience leading and developing Engineering Leads, senior engineers or other experienced technical professionals, including coaching leaders and creating clear decision rights and accountability.

Responsibilities

• Define the engineering vision for Corporate Technology covering People, Finance, and Procurement platforms and services, converting FT and Internal Products technology strategy into specific priorities and roadmaps.
• Deliver senior technical direction across enterprise platforms, integrations, data flows, and internally developed capabilities.
• Work with Architecture and Engineering Leads to establish appropriate technical standards, patterns and guardrails, ensuring significant decisions consider security, resilience, scalability, operability, maintainability and cost.
• Recognize systemic technical risks, lifecycle challenges, technical debt, and possibilities to simplify the technology estate, cut down on duplication, and boost interoperability.
• Ensure Engineering Leads have clear accountability for the engineering, operation and continuous improvement of their platforms, with consistent expectations for engineering quality and technical ownership.
• Support complex technical decisions and issues spanning multiple platforms, while creating appropriate autonomy for Engineering Leads.
• Direct and cultivate Engineering Leads and senior engineers, improving technical judgement, platform ownership, succession, and specialist capability across the domain.
• Offer senior engineering direction for key People, Finance, and Procurement technology efforts, ensuring new capabilities are transferred into lasting internal stewardship.
• Support platform selection, implementation and major technology investment decisions, challenging approaches that introduce unnecessary complexity, operational risk or long-term dependency.
• Maintain oversight of operational performance and technology risk, including reliability, observability, incident and change management, disaster recovery and business continuity.
• Ensure platforms meet relevant FT security, data governance, compliance and technology standards.
• Strengthen internal capability and knowledge to reduce unnecessary reliance on individual specialists, vendors and implementation partners.
• Build strong relationships across People, Finance, Procurement, Product and Technology, helping collaborators understand technical trade-offs, risks and investment requirements.
• Collaborate with Architecture, Security, Data, and other engineering leaders on decisions that span organisational or technology boundaries, representing Corporate Technology in relevant FT engineering and technology forums.

Skills

Senior leadership

SaaS ecosystems

APIs

Oracle Fusion

Workday

ERP systems

Data flows

Cloud technologies

Tools

Oracle Fusion

Workday

Job description

Financial Times is seeking a Principal Engineer – Corporate Technology in London to lead senior engineering across People, Finance and Procurement systems. You will define strategy, set ownership, and mentor leaders while driving secure, scalable platforms and modernisation efforts.

The role collaborates with Architecture, Security, and Data teams to shape technology roadmaps and governance. You will partner with Product and Technology forums to simplify estates, improve interoperability, and