The Job in short As an Engineering Director at Backbase, you will lead a multi-project engineering organization delivering complex digital banking solutions for leading financial institutions in the Middle East region. You are accountable for building a high-performing engineering organization that consistently delivers predictable, high-quality software while developing future engineering leaders. This is not only a delivery leadership role. You are expected to continuously improve how engineering operates by introducing modern engineering practices, scaling engineering excellence across teams and driving AI-assisted software development. You will lead Engineering Managers and Technical Leaders across multiple customer engagements, balancing customer success, engineering quality and organizational growth. Meet the Job • Lead and grow an engineering organization of 100+ engineers across multiple customer programs. • Coach, develop and raise the bar for Engineering Managers through regular mentoring, feedback and performance management. • Drive engineering excellence by improving delivery predictability, quality, developer experience, operational readiness and engineering metrics. • Establish consistent engineering governance, release readiness, architecture and quality practices across multiple teams. • Partner with customers, Delivery Managers, Technical Leaders, Architects and Product leadership to build trusted engineering relationships and resolve complex delivery challenges. • Build a culture of ownership, accountability, continuous improvement and technical excellence. • Lead engineering transformation through adoption of AI-native development practices, Agentic SDLC, automation and modern platform capabilities. • Develop engineering capability for the region through hiring, succession planning, technical communities and career development. What success looks like You build an organization where: • Engineering Managers grow into exceptional leaders. • Teams deliver predictably with a balance of quality. • Engineering decisions are driven by data. • Customers trust engineering commitments. • AI measurably improves engineering productivity and quality. • Engineering standards scale consistently across projects and teams. • Difficult organizational changes are implemented when required to improve long-term outcomes. How about you • Proven experience leading multiple engineering teams (50+ engineers) through Engineering Managers. • Experience operating large-scale software delivery organizations across multiple concurrent projects. • Strong understanding of modern software engineering practices including architecture governance, CI/CD, testing strategies, observability, operational excellence and engineering metrics. • Demonstrated success building and coaching engineering leaders • Experience leading organizational transformation and driving measurable engineering improvements. • Strong customer-facing leadership with the ability to build trust while navigating difficult delivery situations. • Hands-on understanding of AI-assisted software engineering, developer tooling and Agentic SDLC with the ability to pragmatically introduce these practices across engineering organizations. • Excellent communication skills with both executive stakeholders and engineering teams. • Bias for ownership, continuous improvement and data-driven decision making. Leadership principles Engineering Directors at Backbase: • Build leaders. • Measure outcomes, not activity. • Solve systemic problems rather than local optimizations. • Raise engineering quality without slowing delivery. • Challenge the status quo and continuously improve how engineering works. • Embrace AI as an engineering multiplier while maintaining strong engineering fundamentals.