Principal Engineer (ECommerce & Digital)
New Today
About the role The Partnership is the UK’s most successful omni-channel retailer which includes two of the UKs most loved department store and grocery brands with annual sales revenues in excess of £12B.
John Lewis E-Commerce & Digital is critical to its success, delivering market-leading digital experiences and supporting omnichannel services - over 50% of John Lewis's revenue from digital channels.
Our technology stack includes a domain-driven microservice architecture, cloud-native technologies, composable SaaS, and some legacy applications, all built for high availability and performance.
Changes to systems in E-commerce are currently delivered through product teams using CI/CD techniques. There are 30 build it, run it teams in this part of the business, releasing to production over 30,000 times a year. There is a strong focus on engineering culture and engineering excellence in this part of our business
We're looking for an engineering leader to enhance our practices, digital sales experience, omnichannel strategy, and modernise our tech stack, including optimising AI.
As the Principal Engineer for JL E-Commerce & Digital, you will report to the Head of Architecture & Engineering for John Lewis. Find out more about being a Software Engineer in the Partnership, and the technology we use.
At a glance
Contract type
-
This position is a permanent contract.
Flexible Working:
This is a hybrid working role, therefore your time will primarily be split between working from home (in the UK) and London Head Office. However, there will also be an expectation to visit other locations as the need arises.
While most engineers visit the office once or twice a month, occasionally business needs may require more frequent attendance. Our offices are open five days a week for those who prefer to work from the office more regularly.
Key Responsibilities:
You will be a key leader in shaping the engineering strategy and roadmap for John Lewis E-Commerce & Digital, ensuring alignment with business goals. Your influence will drive how engineering operates and evolves across this complex area, including how work is managed (agile or hybrid) and how teams are structured and measured for optimal performance - all while aligning with the broader Partnership engineering strategy."
To do this, you will collaborate closely with key stakeholders such as Product Leads, Delivery and Operations Managers, Infrastructure Leads and Enterprise Architects as well as Senior Staff Engineers and specialist engineering teams. You will also work closely with other Principal Engineers who may be responsible for other business areas or for deep engineering specialisms such as cloud or data.
Successful candidates will have a passion for using technology to deliver outstanding and innovative software solutions, and will have a track record of working with high-performing engineering teams delivering complex, performant, high-quality software.
Essential skills/experience you’ll need:
Strong engineering background with real world experience of modern software engineering techniques such as Continuous Delivery and experience of using strategic patterns of Domain Driven Design.
Experience of the technical implementation of composable SaaS into complex environments
Experience in senior leadership role, working with senior stakeholders and influencing multi-million pound investments in engineering
Knowledge/experience of working with different architectural styles (e.g. microservices, service based) and integration patterns when working with different platforms (RESTful, streams, event based, broker models).
Knowledge/experience of techniques used to improve the resilience, performance, security and evolvability of complex systems.
Proven experience of strong engineering culture and leading high performing engineering teams who optimise for flow
Experience of applying techniques from Lean and Systems Thinking.
ECommerce experience
Desirable skills/experience you may have
Working with legacy and on prem
ecommerce systems
Will have been a hands-on software engineer for part of their career.
Worked in organisation with highly mature product teams
Engineering management role, working across multiple teams or architecture role working across a large part of an enterprise.
Next Steps
The application form consists of a CV upload followed by application questions. Please ensure you refresh the page each time you complete a task to ensure you complete everything that you need to do before the closing date.
If you are successful following your initial application, the next stages are: a screening interview followed by a formal interview and up to 2 informal interviews.
You'll be asked about any adjustments you might need to support the recruitment process. Let us know, and we'll be sure to discuss it with you.
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About The Partnership
We’re the largest employee owned business in the UK and home of our cherished brands, John Lewis and Waitrose. We’re not just employees, we’re Partners, driven by our purpose to build a happier world. As we look to our future, there’s never been a more exciting time to join us.
We’re ruthlessly focused on being brilliant at retail. We continue to innovate, adapt and diversify. Never Knowingly Undersold on price, quality and service in John Lewis and passionately serving food-lovers in Waitrose.
As Partners we all share the responsibility of ownership and in its rewards. We use our voices to contribute to our success, working together through the good and challenging times, holding true to our behaviours and treating everyone with kindness and respect.
We all own making the Partnership somewhere we belong. Embracing our differences and creating an environment where we’re free to be ourselves and can THRIVE. Growing ourselves individually, and as a collective.
As Partners, we make all the difference. And, we all own it.
Important points to note:
It’s important to note that some of our roles are subject to pre-employment vetting (which may include DBS checks for successful candidates). If required, you’ll be informed and provided with information about vetting during the recruitment process and we encourage you to complete any vetting documents quickly to avoid delays. Any DBS checks required will be carried out by a third-party registered body and financial probity checks may also be required for some of our roles.
We occasionally close vacancies early in the event we receive a high volume of applications, and therefore, we recommend you apply early. If you require a reasonable adjustment due to a disability which means you may need longer to complete your application please contact us as soon as possible.
We want all of our Partners to have a good work-life balance and we support flexible working. This might mean flexible or compressed hours, job sharing or shorter hour contracts, where possible. Please discuss this further with the hiring manager during your interview.
- Location:
- London
- Salary:
- £140,000
- Job Type:
- FullTime
- Category:
- IT