Principal Software Engineer SC&L at Marks & Spencer

As part of the M&S Software Engineering team, you’ll join a historic brand, working on solutions that serve millions of customers and thousands of colleagues. You’ll focus on modernising mission‑critical systems across supply‑chain and logistics, driving technical excellence and innovation.

• Lead technical excellence from design to operations and launch of core product features or strategic programmes.
• Drive technical direction and influence overall strategy informing decisions on technology and product investments and team set‑up.
• Champion Communities of Practice to establish engineering excellence at M&S.
• Lead by example via contributions to the engineering ecosystem, pioneer clean code and clean architecture.
• Advocate for engineering productivity, delivery quality and operational excellence through continuous improvement.
• Drive DevOps practices, automate the product development life cycle and ownership demeanour.
• Partner with Engineering, Technology and Product leadership to align strategies.
• Develop best practices and mentor senior engineers across the organisation.
• Promote effective innovation and industrialisation within engineering.
• Inspire teams towards autonomy and maturity.
• Amplify engineering teams, unblock them with direction, lead upward and establish alignment.
• Raise M&S Tech profile via public content, open‑source contributions.
• Support recruitment, onboarding, brand outreach.

Java, Micronaut, PL/SQL, ReactJS, Next.js, Azure Cloud, Dynatrace (observability), Mule, Kafka, MQ, Blue Yonder Dispatcher.

• Significant track record of strategic and innovative thinking, execution and implementation.
• Specialist in clean code and implementation of design patterns for common problems.
• Depth of knowledge in information security, including design, quality review and assurance with embedded security controls.
• Confidence driving system design conversations for high‑risk, high‑impact, complex business or technical solutions.
• Ability to analyse processes, identify optimisation opportunities and lead specialist teams to deliver service improvements.
• Experience using various prototyping methods; mentor others and share methodologies.
• Strong ability to influence industry‑based models for developing new technology applications.
• Develop effective deployment and procurement strategies aligned with business needs.
• Ensure alignment to relevant technical strategies, policies, standards and practices.
• Strong understanding of quality assurance, testing quadrants and pyramid.
• Ability to lead senior engineers and technical customers toward outcomes without prescribing.
• Authoritative skills in cloud computing (network, security, serverless, Kubernetes, etc.) and automation.
• Experience implementing observability & reliability (e.g., Dynatrace).
• Advocate and experience of continuous integration and continuous delivery.
• Advanced experience of DevOps; build and run it.
• Experience with performance engineering (load testing, tuning, page speed, etc.).
• Reliability testing expertise.
• Enterprise‑level communication skills, written and spoken, across audiences.
• Senior leadership mentality with ownership, able to influence people at senior levels.

• Retail domain and/or supply‑chain & logistics, especially warehouse management systems and warehouse control systems.
• Prior software engineering community leadership experience.
• Professional presentation delivery at internal and external events.
• Demonstrable entrepreneurship experience.

Senior Head of Software Engineering, M&S.

• Competitive salary.
• 20% colleague discount after probation.
• Competitive holiday entitlement with optional extra days.
• Discretionary bonus schemes.
• Life assurance: cover up to twice salary (double with Pension Plan).
• Workplace savings through Pension Plan, Share Buy and Sharesave schemes.
• Cycle to work scheme.
• Smart tech: technology purchase financing.
• Family‑friendly policy: inclusive maternity, paternity, adoption and neonatal policies.

Marks & Spencer is committed to an active Inclusion, Diversity and Equal Opportunities Policy. Flexible working is offered, and reasonable accommodation for applicants with disabilities is provided.

Applications are submitted through a short online form. Depending on the role, an assessment or interview may be requested, either remote or in person. Following a decision, the candidate will be notified with next steps.