Software Engineering Manager

Role Purpose

The Engineering Manager leads a cross-functional team to deliver robust, scalable software aligned with CarTrawler's business strategy. They foster a culture of performance, accountability, and growth while ensuring delivery quality and team effectiveness. They work closely with the Product Manager and Lead Designer to lead the squad as a cohesive trio, ensuring alignment across product, design, and engineering. Additionally, they collaborate with Senior Engineering Managers and fellow Engineering Managers to maintain technical consistency, share best practices, and support cross-squad coordination.

Responsibilities

• Champions agile delivery by driving planning, stand-ups, reviews, retrospectives, and backlog refinement, ensuring clear prioritisation and steady progress
• Drives estimation, effort sizing, and decomposition of epics into actionable stories, while maintaining visibility through roadmaps, tracking, and reporting
• Removes delivery blockers & capacity issues, manages dependencies across squads, and escalates risks proactively to safeguard delivery
• Owns delivery of high-quality, scalable, and well-documented software, ensuring milestones are met and launches are smooth from QA/UAT to post-go-live hypercare
• Responds rapidly to production issues, minimising business impact and maintaining customer trust
• Builds and develops high-performing teams through regular 1:1s, clear goals, coaching, feedback, and career growth, while leading hiring and team design
• Aligns engineering goals with cross-functional priorities, representing the team in programme-level forums and contributing to wider organisational strategy
• Contributes to the evolution of Agile practices, CI/CD, and architectural strategy to drive continuous improvement and long-term scalability

Critical Interfaces

• Engineering Management for effective team leadership and collaboration across all Product & Technology departments
• Product Management and Product Design to align with CarTrawler's product vision and goals
• Portfolio and Programme Management makes clear delivery plans for important projects and initiatives
• The trading team, Partner Relationship Management, Supply & Insurance, and Customer Support all work together. They aim to deliver quality technical solutions
• External partners to assist in integrating CarTrawler software solutions

Knowledge and Experience

• 5 years of hands-on people management experience in agile, fast-paced software environments
• Familiarity with the Scrum Framework is key, and having a scrum master qualification is a significant plus
• Proven track record guiding teams through estimation, planning, execution, and release cycles
• Technical credibility with the ability to write and review code when required
• Deep understanding of software development practices, CI/CD, and system design
• Experience building and scaling high-performing engineering teams
• Ability to mentor and develop engineers, supporting career growth and continuous improvement
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills with both technical and non-technical stakeholders
• Strong time-management and delivery focus, ensuring timely and high-quality outcomes

Key Competencies

• Technical Leadership & Credibility - Hands-on experience with coding, design, CI/CD, and modern engineering practices, ensuring the leader can make sound technical decisions and earn engineers' respect
• Team Building & People Development - Proven ability to hire, grow, mentor, and scale high-performing teams while supporting career development and fostering continuous improvement
• Delivery & Execution Excellence - Strong skills in planning, estimation, and driving agile execution to deliver timely, high-quality outcomes