Head of Engineering

Full Time Senior

Job description

Who We Are

Building the AI-first frontier enterprise.

We are a global technology consultancy with a trademarked, AI-first approach-Gen-e2™. It redefines how enterprises build digital products and transform their organizations with AI. We do the right thing, and we do it right. We’re proud to be a World Economic Forum New Champion, and a B Corp-certified company.

We are small enough to care locally, big enough to deliver globally (10 countries, 450+ experts from 50+ nationalities)

We are becoming an agentic organization, adopting the AI-native operating model we bring to our clients

We are robust and resilient (100% independent, 0 debt, founded 2009)

We are AI-native professionals who invest in what we believe and work as a collective intelligence

We are positive, courageous and deliver at the leading edge

Your Role

As Head of Engineering at PALO IT Labs, reporting directly to the CTO, you are the operational engine of our engineering organisation. You translate strategy into daily execution, lead our AI engineering community, and ensure every team-client-facing or product-side-delivers at the highest standard.

Where the CTO sets direction and makes structural architectural decisions, you make those decisions real. You own the day-to-day: team health, engineering standards, roadmap execution, and the development of our AI engineers. You are the technical authority your teams rely on to unblock, challenge and grow-while the CTO focuses on vision, key clients, and long-term positioning.

Engineering Excellence

Deploy the Gen-e²™ technology roadmap defined by the CTO: architecture governance, AI governance, and factory standards (agents, prompts, rules, pipelines) across all squads

Own the token economics of our delivery, balancing model cost, latency and quality across squads, so “AI-first” means production-grade, not prototype-grade

Operate one level above Lead Engineers: arbitrate divergences, challenge local decisions, spot systemic debt and keep the bar rising as execution becomes increasingly agentic

Deploy on our most complex client engagements as the senior technical authority: design AI-first architectures and see them through to production-you ship, not slide decks

Step in as Tech Lead on client projects when needed: if a mission requires it, you can take the technical lead role directly, ensuring continuity and quality without waiting for a resource to be available

Define and enforce engineering standards: CI/CD practices, code reviews, incident management, and security posture across squads

Own technical incidents and escalations with clear ownership and post-mortems

People & Community

Directly manage Forward Deployed Engineers (FDE) and later AI tech leads and - their growth, performance, workload and career paths are yours

Own the engineering community’s rituals end to end: critiques, showcases, community days, learning circles and the shared knowledge base that keeps them visible, inclusive and connected to real delivery challenges

Foster cross-project collaboration by connecting engineers facing similar challenges, surfacing reusable patterns, and turning field learnings into shared standards

Set the community’s norms and health signals: champion psychological safety, experimentation, wellbeing and sustainable pace, and run lightweight pulse checks to catch issues early

Build the mentorship engine: create structures and learning pathways for Senior Engineers and Forward Deployed Engineers, and grow the technical leadership bench

Operate the hiring process for engineering roles: sourcing strategy, interviews, technical assessments and recommendations to the CTO

Partner with delivery and staffing teams to maintain visibility of capacity and utilisation, support staffing decisions, and turn bench time into meaningful learning, R&D or community contribution

Gen-e2 Practice & R&D

Feed everything back into Gen-e²: what you learn on live engagements becomes standards, artefacts, prompts and learning paths for the whole firm, in collaboration with international teams

Produce and own engineering KPIs: velocity, quality, incident rate, technical debt, and team health; report regularly to the CTO

Represent the engineering practice in leadership forums and working groups, communicate regularly on team health and needs, escalate risks promptly, and uphold PALO IT values, confidentiality, information security and professional standards

Contribute to pre-sales through technical scoping, estimation, proposal input and executive-level advisory, ensuring commercial promises remain grounded in production-grade engineering reality

Who You Are

You bring 12+ years of software engineering experience, including significant leadership of an engineering organisation or practice (VP Engineering, Head of Engineering, Head of Tech, or CTO of a scale-up)

You have delivered production-grade AI-first systems, LLM integration, RAG pipelines, agent orchestration-and you think in token economics (cost, latency, quality tradeoffs) as naturally as you think in code. You master AI coding assistants as a force multiplier: you still code, by choice

You have led delivery in complex, client-facing environments (consulting, embedded squads, platform modernisation) with real users, real constraints and real accountability

You are a proven people developer and manager, with a track record of scaling engineering practices-not just individuals-through mentorship, community-building and hands-on AI adoption

You think in systems and write things down: architecture decisions under uncertainty, ADRs, standards that make quality reproducible

You are fluent at every altitude, from engineering stand-ups to leadership forums, and you switch between them in the same afternoon

You lead with care and exigence: high expectations held with accountability in a psychologically safe environment

You know how to read team signals early: engagement, workload imbalance, burnout risk, retention risk and under-utilisation, and you act with care, clarity and accountability

You care about Tech for Good: sustainability, accessibility and responsible AI are embedded in how you build

You are comfortable partnering with HR on hiring strategy, interviews, portfolio reviews, offer decisions and talent-pipeline building through community engagement and events

Bilingual French/English, English is mandatory for client and international collaboration

Nice to have: cloud architecture certifications (AWS SA, GCP/Azure Professional), public speaking or publications on AI-first delivery

More About PALO IT

Our mission is to become the most advanced consulting company when it comes to AI-First product and software engineering. 100% of our projects are focused on deploying our Gen-e2 methodology to clients to help them accelerate delivery and scale those new practices.

A playground matching your expertise: missions chosen for their complexity, engineering excellence, and meaningful business and societal impact.
Dedicated career coaching with regular development check-ins and goal support.
A demanding yet supportive technical community: code reviews, pair programming, mentoring to raise development craft daily.
Gen-e²™ skill ramp-up from week 1, fully integrated onboarding.
Funded Microsoft and GitHub certifications.
From idea to impact: internal R&D labs, default open source culture, tech conferences, and innovation dojos to experiment and share.

…Plus

🌍 Global career opportunities with cross-sector and multi-country missions, connecting 11 offices worldwide.
🏠 Remote-friendly arrangements depending on project needs, alternating client sites and Paris office for team collaboration.
🌱 Impact Academy: training on climate, digital responsibility, and accessibility embedded in everyday practices.
🤝 Solidarity engagements: team volunteering, skills sponsorship, and more.
🥗🩺 Benefits including Swile meal vouchers and Alan health insurance.

For more on our team culture and benefits, check out our careers page.

PALO IT Labs is an equal opportunity employer. Employment decisions will be based on merit, qualifications and abilities. PALO IT Labs does not discriminate in employment opportunities or practices based on race, colour, religion, sex, sexuality, national origin, age, disability, marital status or any other characteristics protected by law.

Protecting your privacy and the security of your data are longstanding top priorities for PALO IT. Your data will be processed to manage PALO IT’s recruitment-related activities. Please consult our Privacy Notice (https://www.palo-it.com/en/privacy-policy) to know more about how we collect, use, and transfer the personal data of our candidates.

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Required skills

consulting execution quality mentoring confidentiality ai sustainability qualifications care strategy manager software engineering onboarding engagement learning digital products r&d code reviews disability wellbeing experimentation events escalations performance key clients incident management pre-sales velocity pipelines community engagement estimation career coaching information security ci/cd practices client-facing team collaboration hiring process technical assessments vision accountability professional standards data security privacy accessibility interviews colour rules clarity security posture tech lead continuity ai governance rag pipelines candidates microsoft certifications technical debt needs senior engineers architecture decisions responsible ai equal opportunity employer learning paths pair programming client projects ai-first agents public speaking systems thinking roadmap execution agent orchestration latency psychological safety delivery teams engineering excellence cto client-facing environments organizational transformation engineering standards merit risks platform modernisation b corp technology consultancy workload technical authority factory standards personal data production-grade vp engineering abilities squads cloud architecture certifications age adrs sexuality token economics artefacts religion architecture governance high expectations complex client engagements learning pathways career paths engineering organization client sites impact academy post-mortems engineering kpis working groups llm integration sex race marital status people developer prompts privacy notice talent pipeline building pulse checks community contribution sourcing strategy global career opportunities bilingual french/english ai engineers ai coding assistants societal impact showcases field learnings leadership forums community norms team health lead engineers national origin careers page tech conferences paris office real users critiques reusable patterns technical incidents technical community cost tradeoffs staffing decisions under-utilisation technical scoping sustainable pace software engineering experience alan health insurance gen-e2 tech for good github certifications world economic forum new champion ai engineering community product-side long-term positioning gen-e²™ technology roadmap model cost prototype-grade divergences systemic debt agentic execution ai-first architectures people & community forward deployed engineers (fde) ai tech leads engineering community rituals community days learning circles shared knowledge base cross-project collaboration mentorship engine technical leadership bench staffing teams capacity visibility utilisation visibility bench time gen-e2 practice & r&d live engagements incident rate palo it values proposal input executive-level advisory commercial promises engineering organisation leadership engineering practice leadership head of tech cto of a scale-up production-grade ai-first systems latency tradeoffs quality tradeoffs embedded squads real constraints real accountability scaling engineering practices hands-on ai adoption reproducible quality engineering stand-ups exigence team signals workload imbalance burnout risk retention risk hr partnership aws sa gcp professional azure professional publications on ai-first delivery ai-first product engineering gen-e2 methodology mission complexity development check-ins goal support development craft skill ramp-up internal r&d labs open source culture innovation dojos cross-sector missions multi-country missions remote-friendly arrangements climate training digital responsibility training accessibility training solidarity engagements team volunteering skills sponsorship swile meal vouchers recruitment-related activities

Head of Engineering

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