Vice President of Technology - Retail

Korn Ferry; Boston (MA); On-site; USD 250,000 - 420,000; Full time

Job summary

Korn Ferry partners with our client to recruit a Vice President of Technology who will lead Web, AI, Data, Enterprise Applications and IT functions. Reporting to the CFO, the role sets and scales the technology strategy during rapid growth and innovation, defining a scalable foundation to support higher transaction volumes, channel complexity, and retail expansion.

The candidate will define the technology roadmap, ensure alignment with business OKRs, and drive modern cloud architectures, data

Qualifications

• 15+ years of progressive technology leadership experience in high-growth environments.
• Experience leading engineering, data, enterprise applications, infrastructure, and IT teams.
• Strong background in modern ecommerce tech stacks and cloud architectures.

Responsibilities

• Define long-term technology vision, roadmap, architecture, and investment priorities.
• Align technology initiatives with business OKRs and Digital Product roadmap.
• Own scalable architecture to support growth across DTC, Wholesale, and Owned Retail.
• Drive build-versus-buy decisions with emphasis on speed, scalability, reliability and cost.
• Serve as executive-level technology voice with the Board and across the organization.
• Lead AI engineering strategy and deployment of AI-powered solutions and governance.

Job description

Korn Ferry has partnered with our client on their search for a role, Vice President of Technology.

The Opportunity

We’re looking for a forward-thinking, execution-obsessed VP of Technology to lead our client’s Web Engineering, AI Engineering, Data Engineering, Enterprise Applications, and Information Technology functions. Reporting to the Chief Financial Officer, this role will set and scale our client’s end-to-end technology strategy during a period of aggressive growth and innovation.

This leader will be responsible for building a scalable technology foundation that enables our client to move faster, make better decisions, and support increasing transaction volume, channel complexity, retail expansion, and organizational growth.

• Define our client’s long-term technology vision, roadmap, architecture, and investment priorities.
• Align technology initiatives with business OKRs and the Digital Product roadmap.
• Establish a scalable technology architecture capable of supporting our client’s continued growth across DTC, Wholesale, and Owned Retail.
• Drive build-versus-buy decisions with an eye toward speed, scalability, reliability, and cost efficiency.
• Serve as the executive-level voice for technology across the organization and with our client’s Board.
• Stay ahead of emerging technologies and identify opportunities to create meaningful competitive advantage through technology.

AI Engineering & Strategy

• Define and execute our client’s enterprise AI strategy and roadmap, identifying the highest-impact opportunities to apply AI across the business.
• Lead the development and deployment of AI-powered solutions, agents, and automation that improve employee productivity, customer experiences, decision-making, and operational efficiency.
• Establish the technical architecture and infrastructure required to securely integrate AI capabilities with our client’s data, systems, and workflows.
• Partner with business leaders to identify and prioritize AI use cases based on business value, feasibility, scalability, and speed to impact.
• Build the capabilities, governance, and operating model required to move AI initiatives rapidly from experimentation to production.
• Evaluate emerging AI platforms, models, and development tools, balancing speed of adoption with security, cost, reliability, and long-term scalability.
• Drive adoption of AI-enabled development and productivity tools across the organization while establishing appropriate standards for security, data privacy, and responsible use.
• Build and develop internal AI engineering capabilities while selectively leveraging external partners and platforms where they accelerate execution.

Enterprise Applications & Business Systems

• Own the strategy, architecture, scalability, and operational performance of our client’s core enterprise application ecosystem, including ERP, planning, PLM, integration/middleware, EDI, and warehouse management systems.
• Establish scalable application support, integration, release management, and change-management practices that improve system reliability and business continuity.
• Partner closely with Finance, Operations, Supply Chain, Merchandising, Retail, and Commercial teams to translate business requirements into scalable technology solutions.
• Drive decisions around system architecture, integrations, and build-versus-buy opportunities with an emphasis on scalability, reliability, speed, and cost efficiency.
• Oversee strategic technology vendors and implementation partners, establishing clear accountability for delivery, service levels, cost, and performance.
• Ensure our client’s core systems and integrations can scale with increasing transaction volume, channel complexity, retail expansion, and organizational growth.
• Lead the Web Engineering function responsible for the technical development and delivery of our client’s eCommerce and B2B platforms, partnering closely with Digital Product on roadmap, prioritization, and customer experience.
• Champion agile development practices, rapid iteration, and a culture of clean, scalable, and well-documented code.
• Ensure strong site performance, uptime, monitoring, quality assurance, and disaster recovery protocols.
• Own the technical architecture, development operations, cloud infrastructure, and platform reliability supporting our client’s digital experiences.
• Own technical integrations with Shopify and other components of our client’s digital ecosystem.
• Partner closely with Digital Product, Marketing, Customer Experience, and Operations to translate product priorities into high-quality technical solutions.
• Build and mature our client’s modern data infrastructure, owning data architecture, pipelines, warehousing, governance, quality, and accessibility.
• Ensure stakeholders across the organization have access to organized, accurate, timely, and trusted data that supports key business decisions.
• Develop a scalable data foundation that enables advanced analytics, AI/ML applications, automation, and increasingly data-driven decision-making across the organization.
• Establish strong data governance, security, documentation, and quality standards as our client’s data environment grows in scale and complexity.
• Partner with business and analytics teams to ensure data infrastructure is designed around our client’s highest-value business use cases.

IT, Security & Compliance

• Oversee our client’s IT infrastructure strategy, ensuring secure, reliable systems that support corporate offices, remote employees, and our client’s growing retail footprint.
• Establish and maintain strong cybersecurity, identity and access management, endpoint security, network security, and business continuity practices.
• Maintain appropriate technology controls and compliance standards as our client continues to scale.
• Establish internal service levels and scalable processes for employee IT support, access management, onboarding/offboarding, device management, and technology asset management.
• Develop the technology infrastructure, controls, documentation, and operating disciplines required of a scaled enterprise.
• Build, lead, and retain a high-performing team of technologists who thrive in a fast-paced, impact-driven environment.
• Develop strong leaders across Engineering, AI, Data, Enterprise Applications, and IT.
• Establish clear ownership, accountability, operating rhythms, and performance expectations across the technology organization.
• Build an organization capable of balancing long-term technology investments with the speed and pragmatism required of a high-growth business.
• Model our client’s core values and foster a customer-focused, high-impact, collaborative culture.
• Creating an environment that promotes clear communications and information sharing.

The Candidate

• 15+ years of progressive technology leadership experience, ideally including senior technology leadership at a high-growth B2C, DTC, retail, or omnichannel business.
• Demonstrated experience leading multiple technology disciplines, including engineering, data, enterprise applications, infrastructure, and information security.
• Strong experience with modern eCommerce technology ecosystems and demonstrated understanding of Shopify Plus and the architecture required to support a scaled digital commerce business.
• Experience overseeing complex ERP and enterprise application environments; experience with NetSuite or similar cloud ERP platforms strongly preferred.
• Proven experience building and scaling modern cloud data architectures using platforms such as BigQuery or Snowflake, with familiarity across SQL, Python, dbt, and modern data integration tooling.
• Demonstrated experience deploying AI capabilities beyond experimentation, including AI-enabled applications, automation, agents, governance, and integration with enterprise data and systems.
• Strong understanding of modern cloud infrastructure, APIs, integrations, cybersecurity, and enterprise technology architecture.
• Exceptional people leadership skills with a track record of building high-performing, accountable technology teams.
• Strong business judgment and the ability to translate business priorities into technology strategy, investment decisions, and execution.
• Comfort operating at both strategic and tactical levels, you know when to delegate and when to roll up your sleeves.