At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead a team to shape Wise's cloud platform and ensure secure, scalable cloud usage.
- Company: Join Wise, a global tech company revolutionising money management.
- Benefits: Competitive salary, RSUs, and a diverse, inclusive work environment.
- Other info: Dynamic role with excellent career growth opportunities in a collaborative culture.
- Why this job: Make a real impact on cloud technology while leading a talented team.
- Qualifications: Experience in cloud engineering and strong leadership skills required.
The predicted salary is between 135000 - 175000 € per year.
Wise is a global technology company, building the best way to move and manage the world’s money. Min fees. Max ease. Full speed. Whether people and businesses are sending money to another country, spending abroad, or making and receiving international payments, Wise is on a mission to make their lives easier and save them money.
About the role
We are looking for a highly technical Engineering Lead to own our Cloud Foundations domain — the platform that enables safe, scalable, and frictionless cloud usage across Wise. Cloud Foundations provides the “paved path with guardrails” for engineering teams: making it easy to deploy infrastructure while ensuring strong security, governance, and compliance by default.
You will define and evolve how cloud environments are provisioned, accessed, and governed across Wise — primarily in AWS today, with increasing adoption of GCP and other cloud and SaaS providers over time. As Wise continues to evolve its infrastructure strategy, Cloud Foundations is driving toward a more cloud-agnostic platform model for core compute, storage, and networking capabilities. Our goal is to reduce tight coupling to any single provider API and enable portability, resilience, and strategic flexibility across diverse cloud environments.
You’ll lead a senior-heavy team of 5 engineers, owning critical platform services such as managed cloud accounts, infrastructure deployment tooling, workload access patterns, and shared infrastructure primitives. This is a high-impact role where your work will shape how hundreds of engineers build in the cloud.
How we work
At Wise, we optimise for autonomy with accountability. Cloud Foundations sits at the intersection of platform engineering, security, governance, and developer experience. Our goal is to enable teams to move quickly while staying within strong, automated guardrails. We believe the best solutions come from diverse perspectives and inclusive teams. As an Engineering Lead, you’ll create an environment where engineers feel safe to contribute ideas, challenge decisions, and grow.
What will you be working on?
- Cloud Foundations Platform Leadership: Define the technical vision and lead the evolution of Wise’s Cloud Foundations platform, balancing developer experience, governance, scalability, and operational resilience across multiple cloud providers.
- Multi-Cloud Strategy & Platform Evolution: Help drive Wise’s long-term cloud strategy toward greater cloud portability and reduced provider lock-in for core infrastructure capabilities. Shape platform abstractions and operating models that support diverse cloud providers and SaaS ecosystems.
- Cloud Governance & Automated Guardrails: Design and implement governance that is built-in, not bolted on. Establish secure-by-default patterns, policy enforcement, and automated controls that enable teams to move safely at scale.
- Developer Experience & Enablement: Enable teams to deploy infrastructure safely and independently through self-service tooling, paved paths, reusable infrastructure primitives, and excellent platform ergonomics.
- Access, Identity & Zero Trust: Own workload and infrastructure access patterns, helping evolve Wise’s identity, authentication, and authorization models toward modern zero-trust principles.
- Shared Infrastructure Services: Oversee shared infrastructure primitives including networking, compute foundations, storage patterns, deployment tooling, and cloud account lifecycle management.
- Strategic Execution & Operating Model Evolution: Translate strategic initiatives into actionable engineering plans and measurable OKRs. Drive platform adoption, maturity improvements, and organizational alignment across engineering and security stakeholders.
- Team Leadership: Lead and grow a small, senior-heavy team, creating an environment of trust, ownership, technical excellence, and continuous learning.
What do you need?
We recognise that people come from a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. You don’t need to meet every requirement below to apply.
- Leadership & Communication: Experience leading, mentoring, or growing engineers and technical teams. Strong communication and stakeholder management skills. Ability to influence technical direction across teams and present progress clearly to both engineering and business stakeholders.
- Cloud & Platform Engineering Experience: Strong hands-on experience with at least one major cloud provider (AWS preferred). Experience working across multiple cloud providers, including at least one non-hyperscaler environment. Experience working on cloud platform or infrastructure platform teams. Understanding of the tradeoffs and strategic importance of cloud-agnostic architectures. Experience supporting or delivering cloud migration or cloud transformation initiatives.
- Infrastructure & Automation: Strong experience with Infrastructure as Code and platform automation. Hands-on knowledge of Terraform and related tooling ecosystems. Familiarity with policy-as-code approaches and governance automation.
- Security, Governance & Risk: Strong understanding of cloud security, governance, and compliance principles. Familiarity with zero-trust architectures, IAM, and workload identity patterns. Ability to balance usability, flexibility, security, and operational control. Experience operating in regulated or high-compliance environments is a plus.
- Strategic & Systems Thinking: Systems-thinking mindset with the ability to navigate ambiguity and organizational complexity. Experience defining OKRs, platform metrics, KPIs, or cloud maturity indicators. Ability to turn high-level strategy into pragmatic execution plans.
Skills that will help you succeed in this role:
- Cloud Strategy Execution
- Governance & Standardization
- Operating Model Evolution
- Systems Thinking
- Platform Engineering
- Metrics & KPIs
- Cloud Security
- Risk Management
- Ambiguity Management
- Stakeholder Influence
Nice to have:
- Experience in regulated environments
- Familiarity with policy-as-code tools
- Experience with access tooling such as Teleport
- Experience building internal developer platforms
- Experience designing multi-cloud or cloud-portable infrastructure architectures
What do we offer:
Starting salary: £135,000 - £175,000 + RSUs
Wise Benefits
For everyone, everywhere. We're people building money without borders — without judgement or prejudice, too. We believe teams are strongest when they are diverse, equitable and inclusive. We're proud to have a truly international team, and we celebrate our differences. Inclusive teams help us live our values and make sure every Wiser feels respected, empowered to contribute towards our mission and able to progress in their careers.
If you want to find out more about what it's like to work at Wise visit Wise.Jobs. Keep up to date with life at Wise by following us on LinkedIn and Instagram.
Sr Engineering Team Lead - Cloud Foundations in London employer: Wise
Wise is an exceptional employer that champions a culture of autonomy, accountability, and inclusivity, making it an ideal place for talented engineers to thrive. With a focus on professional growth, employees are empowered to lead innovative projects in a dynamic environment while enjoying competitive salaries and comprehensive benefits. The company's commitment to diversity ensures that every team member feels valued and has the opportunity to contribute meaningfully to Wise's mission of transforming global money management.
StudySmarter Expert Advice🤫
We think this is how you could land Sr Engineering Team Lead - Cloud Foundations in London
✨Tip Number 1
Network like a pro! Reach out to current or former employees at Wise on LinkedIn. A friendly chat can give you insider info and maybe even a referral, which can really boost your chances.
✨Tip Number 2
Prepare for the interview by diving deep into Wise's mission and values. Show us how your experience aligns with our goals in Cloud Foundations. We love candidates who are genuinely passionate about what we do!
✨Tip Number 3
Practice your technical skills! Brush up on cloud platforms, especially AWS, and be ready to discuss your hands-on experience. We want to see how you can lead our engineering team to success.
✨Tip Number 4
Don’t forget to apply through our website! It’s the best way to ensure your application gets seen by the right people. Plus, it shows you’re serious about joining our team at Wise.
We think you need these skills to ace Sr Engineering Team Lead - Cloud Foundations in London
Some tips for your application 🫡
Tailor Your Application:Make sure to customise your CV and cover letter for the Sr Engineering Team Lead role. Highlight your experience with cloud platforms, especially AWS, and showcase how your skills align with our mission at Wise.
Showcase Leadership Skills:Since this role involves leading a senior team, emphasise your leadership experience. Share examples of how you've mentored engineers or influenced technical direction in previous roles to demonstrate your capability.
Be Clear and Concise:When writing your application, keep it clear and to the point. Use straightforward language to explain your experience and achievements, making it easy for us to see why you’d be a great fit for the team.
Apply Through Our Website:We encourage you to apply directly through our website. It’s the best way for us to receive your application and ensures you’re considered for the role. Plus, it shows you’re keen on joining our team!
How to prepare for a job interview at Wise
✨Know Your Cloud Stuff
Make sure you brush up on your knowledge of cloud platforms, especially AWS, as this role is heavily focused on it. Be ready to discuss your hands-on experience and any projects you've worked on that involved cloud infrastructure.
✨Showcase Leadership Skills
As a Sr Engineering Team Lead, you'll need to demonstrate your leadership abilities. Prepare examples of how you've mentored engineers or led teams in the past. Highlight your communication skills and how you've influenced technical direction across teams.
✨Understand Governance and Security
Familiarise yourself with cloud security principles and governance practices. Be prepared to discuss how you've implemented security measures in previous roles and your understanding of zero-trust architectures.
✨Think Strategically
This role requires a systems-thinking mindset. Be ready to talk about how you've turned high-level strategies into actionable plans. Discuss any experience you have with defining OKRs or metrics that measure platform success.
