At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead the Connected Trip Experience and innovate customer-centric tech solutions.
- Company: Join a leading travel tech company transforming how people experience travel.
- Benefits: Competitive salary, flexible working options, and opportunities for professional growth.
- Other info: Dynamic work environment with a focus on collaboration and career development.
- Why this job: Make a real impact on travel experiences while working with cutting-edge technology.
- Qualifications: Extensive tech leadership experience and a passion for innovation in AI and data.
The predicted salary is between 63000 - 77000 £ per year.
About Marketplace
Booking.com's Marketplace unit turns travel goals into travel realities. Our purpose? To create frictionless experiences at each and every stage of the trip. From browsing to booking and beyond, our focus is on building the connected experiences which make journeys smoother, faster and more enjoyable. Think of us as travel matchmakers, ensuring seamless integration across our product verticals to effortlessly and intuitively connect traveller preferences and actions.
The Marketplace mission is to truly understand traveller needs and behaviour across multiple verticals, design and implement common traveller-facing product experiences, steward travellers to the right vertical offering, and grow Connected Trips, where travellers not only book hotels or homes, but also flights, car rentals, rides, and local attractions with us. The long-term mission of Marketplace is to grow traveller loyalty through delivering phenomenal product experience, by evolving our customer loyalty program, and by ensuring Booking.com supports our travellers in the right way throughout their trip.
Marketplace Business Unit runs the common parts of our website and app, as well as is responsible for key Booking.com-wide capabilities, such as the User Experience, Experimentation Platform, Measurement, and operational Predictive ML models.
As a Senior Director Software Development, you are responsible for leading the Connected Trip Experience, Foundational capabilities and Data within the Marketplace Business Function, a department of self-steering teams who develop products and constantly innovate to delight our customers.
We hire the best and the brightest professionals, and we empower them to innovate, you need to have:
- First hand experience of building customer centric experiences at scale on AI, Mobile, and web platforms in partnership with Product
- Experience of leading technology organisations at scale
- Demonstrable experience of partnership with senior stakeholders in and out of technology across matrix organisations
- Deep engineering and technology leadership background who can influence and shape our technology narrative including engineering best practice, AI adoption and modernisation
- Demonstrable experience at building and growing a collaborative, high trust and focused organisation
- Demonstrable experience of leading organisations involved in data & AI products & services
Your focus will be:
- Leading the Technology organisations for Connected Trip Product Experience, Foundations and Data.
- Deeply partnering with Product & Data, planning and delivering to meet our objectives
- Embedding Gen AI into our Customer Experience, Ways of Working and Data platforms
- Continually raising the maturity and capability of the organisation so that we are fast, sharp and focused
- Ensuring your organisation is engaged, focused and resilient.
Desired Outcomes:
- Deliver on Connected Trip product and Data & AI ambition
- Evolve and execute our technology strategy improving tech maturity, scalability, agility, and efficiency, and ensuring future-proofing
- Embed Data & AI deeply into the organisation from a Customer, Builder and Platform perspective
- Deeply embed customer centricity into the habits of your organisation
- Highly engaged, motivated and focused organisation empowered to deliver at speed.
- Technology thought leadership and partnership in and out of Marketplace to drive our strategy forward.
- Ensure the technology strategy is clearly communicated and understood across the organization, and drive adoption and execution.
- Drive alignment and buy-in from both tech and non-tech stakeholders by effectively influencing and collaborating at all levels.
People & Function Leadership
- Lead, inspire and motivate your Engineering function through leading by example and setting expectations around what success looks like, giving ownership and providing clarity when necessary
- Line manage Directors and Senior Managers as well as top technical talent, such as Principals.
- Communicate strategy in a compelling manner to multiple teams and relevant stakeholders
- Foster inclusion by holding self and others accountable
- Drive people centric initiatives that enable workforce diversity
- Organisational design, strategy and budget to ensure we are set up to deliver on our strategic agenda
- Partner in and outside of our Business unit to lead and shape the people agenda across Booking.com
- Create a learning environment by coaching, two-way feedback, helping people extract and share personal learnings, and support teams to constantly adapt
- Foster a positive engineering culture who innovate, work as a team and celebrate success
- Build a world class team through nurturing, attracting, and retaining tech talent from around the world
- Empower your teams to do their best work at Booking.com
- Be curious, learn, iterate and shape our culture
Deputise for the VP Technology, Craft & Delivery Leadership
- Create long-term plans that align with the overall focus of the business
- Lead, influence and own delivery within your function including department goals
- Partner with other functions and business units to deliver on our strategic agenda
- Maintain focus on the end goal, minimise risk and remove roadblocks for our strategic agenda
- Ensure clear and effective communication at all levels: proactively keep all stakeholders informed of what’s happening, upcoming changes, projects, issues and risks
- Foster mastery in engineering craftsmanship across Booking.com including shaping ways of working
- Own Technology-wide topics and help lead and grow the department
- Embed Agile ways of working and values within the organisation
- Identify problems and significantly improve, change or adapt existing methods and techniques drawing from personal experiences and feedback
- Drive a DevOps culture
Technology, Architecture & Product Strategy
- Shape, define and build new products, processes and operational plans in alignment with the commercial and financial needs of the business
- Lead, take ownership and shape the technology strategic objectives and roadmaps
- Be a strategic thought partner and influence senior stakeholders across the Accommodations and the broader business to set and align the strategic direction of your function
- Make decisions in complex and ambiguous situations, and guide others in their decision making by recognizing and challenging assumptions, introducing relevant data and multiple perspectives
- Ensure that the Booking architecture principles and engineering practices are adhered to, and that there is direction and alignment for each product. Anticipate the need for changes based on context, and set renewed courses of action to engage teams and achieve goals, while striving to make the impact clear and understandable
- Drive innovation in your function
- Own the architecture across your function
Skilled
- Extensive years of Tech Leadership experience
- Experience with large scale platforms and high traffic (100,000+ visitors per day), preferably E-commerce sites or marketplace companies
- Demonstrable experience of building, shaping and leading a cross functional Engineering function or business unit at scale (150/200+ people)
- Must understand technology and have a proven track record of designing and building high quality web and mobile applications especially high volume consumer facing applications
- Demonstrable experience of working in Agile environments and more importantly an Agile culture and ethos
- Demonstrable experience of setting, leading and influencing both the Engineering and Business strategy to the medium and long-term
- Experience with managing and coaching teams of senior tech leaders including building and growing teams
- Independent, pragmatic and proactive work attitude
- Well versed in Engineering Craftsmanship
- Cloud based technologies
- Building a DevOps culture
- Be humble and human
- Excellent communication skills
- Strong commercial acumen
- Be able to deputise for the VP of Engineering
Pre-Employment Screening
If your application is successful, your personal data may be used for a pre-employment screening check by a third party as permitted by applicable law. Depending on the vacancy and applicable law, a pre-employment screening may include employment history, education and other information (such as media information) that may be necessary for determining your qualifications and suitability for the position.
Senior Director Engineering - Connected Trip Experience & Data in Manchester employer: Booking.com
At Booking.com, we pride ourselves on being an inclusive employer that values diversity and innovation. As a Junior Legal Counsel in our dynamic Legal & Public Affairs team, you'll have the opportunity to work collaboratively with multidisciplinary teams while enjoying a competitive benefits package, including flexible working arrangements and industry-leading product discounts. Our culture fosters personal growth and encourages you to explore new areas of law, making it an exciting place to build your career in the heart of the travel tech industry.
StudySmarter Expert Advice🤫
We think this is how you could land Senior Director Engineering - Connected Trip Experience & Data in Manchester
✨Join Local Tech Meetups
Get out there and mingle with fellow developers by joining local tech meetups. It’s a fantastic way to meet people who might be working at Booking.com or know someone who does. Plus, you can pick up some trendy tech skills and trends while you're at it!
✨Contribute to Open Source Projects
Show off your coding chops by jumping into open-source projects. Not only does this give you practical experience, but it also gets you noticed in the dev community. You'll create a killer portfolio that speaks volumes about your skills to Booking.com.
✨Tap into Online Developer Communities
Don’t underestimate the power of online developer communities like GitHub, Stack Overflow, and even Reddit. Participate in discussions, share your projects, and build your visibility. We can often find opportunities through these channels that can lead to a full-time gig at companies like Booking.com.
✨Explore Job Boards Specifically for Tech Roles
Keep your eyes peeled on job boards that focus on tech roles. Sites like TechCareers or Stack Overflow Jobs can often have listings for companies like Booking.com that might not show up on broader job sites. Make it a habit to check these regularly, and don’t hesitate to apply directly through our website!
We think you need these skills to ace Senior Director Engineering - Connected Trip Experience & Data in Manchester
Some tips for your application 🫡
Show off your coding skills:When applying for a software engineering role, it's super important to showcase your coding skills. Make sure your CV includes your tech stack, any relevant programming languages you’re comfortable with, and examples of projects you've worked on. If you have a GitHub profile, link it up! We love to see code in action.
Tailor your portfolio:For a full-time role, we’d expect to see some solid examples of your work in your portfolio. Make sure to include at least two or three projects that highlight your problem-solving skills and your ability to work with different technologies. Focus on the projects that are most relevant to the position at Booking.com.
Craft a killer cover letter:Your cover letter is your chance to stand out—make it personal! Explain why you want to work at Booking.com and how your skills align with the role. Show us your passion for software development. We dig enthusiastic candidates who understand the value of collaboration and continuous learning!
Be clear and concise:When it comes to writing your CV and cover letter, clarity is key. Avoid jargon that could confuse us and stick to simple, direct language. Highlight your achievements with quantifiable results where possible, and keep everything easy to read. A well-organised application goes a long way!
How to prepare for a job interview at Booking.com
✨Brush Up on Your Coding Skills
For a full-time software engineering role, it's crucial that we stay sharp with our coding abilities. Expect technical questions that might involve solving problems on the spot or discussing algorithms. Practise on platforms like LeetCode or HackerRank to get comfortable with the types of questions that often come up.
✨Know Your Tools and Frameworks
Make sure we’re well-acquainted with the tools and technologies listed in the job description. Familiarise ourselves with any specific frameworks or programming languages mentioned. If Booking.com uses React or Node.js, for instance, be ready to discuss how we’ve used them in previous projects or coursework.
✨Showcase Your Projects
Bring along a portfolio that highlights our best work. This could be code samples, GitHub repositories, or any side projects we’ve built. Make sure we can talk through our thought process for each project, especially the challenges we faced and how we solved them—this shows our problem-solving skills in action.
✨Prepare for Behavioural Questions
While technical skills are key, full-time positions also require cultural fit. Be ready to discuss our previous experiences and how we handle teamwork, conflict, and deadlines. Brush up on the STAR method—Situation, Task, Action, Result—to clearly articulate our past experiences when discussing how we've contributed to a team.
