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Wattpad, a leading global webnovel platform with approximately 155 million monthly active users, is seeking a Head of Engineering to lead and develop the engineering leadership team across architecture, client engineering, platform, and data engineering.
In this role, you will lead a multi-team engineering organization and shape the technical direction of Wattpad alongside senior technical leaders. Key responsibilities include:
- Lead and develop the engineering leadership team, building on existing strengths and momentum
- Strengthen engineering delivery, planning, estimation, and technical roadmapping
- Shape technical direction and ensure architecture and systems support both current experiences and future platform needs
- Strengthen Data Engineering capabilities to support personalization, content intelligence, experimentation, and AI
- Help teams make strong technical decisions and thoughtful tradeoffs between speed, scalability, complexity, and maintainability
- Build an engineering culture of proactive problem solvers with strong ownership
- Develop strong engineering leaders who operate with autonomy and grow high-performing teams
- Evolve engineering operating practices to provide clarity, communication, and rigor for rapid response
- Deepen partnerships between Engineering, Product, Design, Data, Content, and Trust & Safety
- Foster a culture of technical excellence, curiosity, accountability, urgency, collaboration, and continuous learning
Wattpad is part of WEBTOON Entertainment's IP & Creator Ecosystem and operates a hybrid model with employees working from the downtown Toronto office 3 days per week.
REQUIREMENTS:
- 10+ years of progressive software engineering experience, including 5+ years leading engineering teams and senior engineering leaders
- Experience leading a multi-team engineering organization across engineering, infrastructure, and data
- Strong technical depth and architectural judgment with ability to credibly challenge senior engineers and technical leaders
- Experience leading or partnering closely with Data Engineering and strong understanding of modern data platforms, pipelines, architecture, and analytics infrastructure
- Demonstrated experience improving engineering operating practices including planning, estimation, technical roadmapping, delivery, ownership, and incident response
- Strong people leadership and coaching skills with experience developing engineering managers and senior technical leaders
- Proven ability to make sound decisions in ambiguous environments, evaluate tradeoffs, and move teams from problem identification to resolution
- Strong cross-functional leadership skills and experience partnering with Product, Design, Data, and other business functions
- Experience leading through organizational or technical change while maintaining team engagement and delivery
- No specific degree, license, or professional certification required; equivalent practical experience valued
NICE TO HAVES:
- Track record of creating engineering rigor through stronger planning, decision-making, accountability, and operational discipline without unnecessary process
- Proactive problem-solving mindset with experience moving teams from identifying problems to developing options and solutions
- Demonstrated success developing engineering managers and senior technical leaders with increasing autonomy
- Experience building collaborative engineering cultures where Engineering operates as integrated partner with Product, Design, Data, Content, Trust & Safety, and broader business
