About The Role

We are looking for a Senior Engineering Leader to lead in the Manufacturing Product organization at IFS. This role operates at a strategic and organizational level, overseeing a multi-layered engineering organization comprising Engineering Directors, Architects, and Principal Engineers. 

You will be responsible for defining and executing engineering strategy across multiple teams and domains, ensuring alignment with product vision, architecture direction, and business priorities. 

While this is a senior leadership role, technical depth and sound engineering judgment remain critical. You are expected to guide architectural direction, influence key technical decisions, and ensure strong engineering discipline across the organization. 

AI is a core enabler and strategic priority in this role. You will drive enterprise-wide adoption of AI-assisted engineering and AI-powered product capabilities, ensuring measurable impact on both engineering productivity and customer value.  

What You’ll Do 

Organizational Leadership 

Lead a multi-layered engineering organization, including Engineering Directors, Architects, and Principal Engineers 
Define and execute the engineering strategy for Manufacturing, aligned with product and company-wide technology direction 
Drive organizational design, capability building, and succession planning 
Build a culture of ownership, accountability, and continuous improvement 
Scale leadership capability by coaching and developing leaders of leaders

Delivery and Execution 

Own delivery outcomes across multiple teams, ensuring predictability, quality, and timely execution at scale 
Establish and evolve consistent engineering operating models and execution practices 
Balance business priorities, technical investments, and operational excellence 
Ensure teams operate with a “you build it, you run it” mindset

Technical & Architectural Leadership 

Provide strategic technical direction across teams, in close collaboration with Architecture 
Influence and governing architecture decisions, platform evolution, and system design standards 
Ensure high standards across:  
Cloud-native architecture 
CI/CD and DevOps practices  
Automated testing, observability, and security 
Maintain strong technical credibility and intervene hands-on where it adds the most value

AI Leadership 

Drive organization-wide adoption of AI-assisted engineering practices 
Enable teams to improve delivery speed, quality, and confidence using AI  
Guide development of AI-enabled Manufacturing capabilities  
Ensure AI usage is practical, responsible, and outcome-driven

Cross-functional Collaboration 

Partner closely with Product Management, Architecture, and Manufacturing domain leaders  
Aligning engineering execution with business priorities and customer outcomes 
Represent Engineering in senior leadership and strategic forums

Manufacturing Domain Leadership 

Provide strong leadership across key Manufacturing domains, including:  
End-to-end Manufacturing lifecycle (Plan, Build, Quality, Maintain 
Regulatory and industry-specific requirements  
Large-scale, configurable, multi-tenant Manufacturing Solutions  
Aligning Manufacturing strategy with platform, data, and integration capabilities

Required Background 

Strong foundation in software engineering and enterprise application development  
Extensive experience leading leaders (Directors/Managers) and senior technical experts 
Proven track record delivering large-scale, complex software systems across multiple teams 
Deep understanding of modern architectures (cloud-native, APIs, distributed systems, agentic workflows) 
Ability to operate effectively at both strategic and technical levels 
Strong communication, decision-making, and stakeholder management skills  
Customer obsession, ability to work hands on with customers on site, including travel to key manufacturing customer locations.

Preferred Experience 

Manufacturing, ERP, or industrial enterprise software  
Platform or multi-product engineering leadership 
Experience scaling engineering organizations and driving transformation 
AI-enabled enterprise product development  
Executive-level stakeholder engagement

 
What We’re Looking For

You balance strategic leadership with strong technical depth  
You lead leaders and build high-performing organizations 
You create clarity and alignment while empowering teams to succeed 
You care deeply about quality, sustainability, and customer value  
You see AI as a practical enabler of transformation  
You scale impact by enabling others, not controlling them

Interviews and selections are being made continuously. If you are interested, apply as soon as possible.
As a step in our recruitment process, all final candidates will undergo a background check, to get us an understanding of our future employees.
We respectfully decline all offers of recruitment and/or advertising assistance.

IFS Fact

IFS develops and delivers enterprise software for customers around the world who manufacture and distribute goods, build and maintain assets, and manage service-focused operations. The industry expertise of our people and solutions, together with a commitment to delivering value to every one of our customers, has made IFS a recognized leader and the most recommended supplier in our sector. Our team of 7,000+ employees and growing ecosystem of partners support more than 10,000 customers around the world challenge the status quo and realize their competitive advantage. Learn more about how our enterprise software solutions can help your business today at ifs.com .

We believe that coming together as a community, in person, is important for innovation, connection and fostering a sense of belonging. Our roles have the right balance of remote and in-office working to enable flexibility for managing your life along with ensuring a real connection with your colleagues and the broader IFS community.