Head of Technology & Engineering

Head of Technology & Engineering

Final date to receive applications: 6 September 2026

Department: Data and Technology

Employment Type: Permanent - Full Time

Location: London

Compensation: £115,000 / year

Salary: c £115,000

Bonus: Discretionary

Location: Kings Cross, London (Tuesdays-Thursdays - 3 days in our office, Monday + Friday - anywhere)

Employment Type: Permanent, full time

Closing date:
Sunday 6 September 23.59

About ARIA

ARIA is a new R&D funding agency built to unlock technological breakthroughs that benefit everyone. We fund scientists and engineers to pursue research at the edge of the possible.

From climate change to AI, society faces enormous challenges and opportunities that can be uniquely addressed by science and technology. ARIA was created to activate the UK’s world-class R&D in new ways, so we can meet these head on.

Our success is shaped by one question: how will ARIA transform the lives of the UK’s future generations? Whether that’s a life‑changing new technology or a burgeoning new industry, it should be obvious that ARIA played a catalytic role.

If you want to help make breakthroughs like these possible, come and build ARIA with us.

Learn more here.

ARIA’s success depends on our ability to intelligently leverage technology, data and AI to accelerate how the organisation operates, learns and innovates. As the Head of Technology & Engineering, you will lead ARIA’s Data & Tech function within the COO portfolio, building the organisational capability, technical foundations and ways of working needed to support ARIA’s ambitions. You will lead a multidisciplinary team, enabling teams across ARIA to experiment, automate and build safely at scale.

Your function will both enable distributed innovation across ARIA and directly build, ope rationalise and scale high‑value organisational products, workflows, automations and technical capabilities. You will balance rapid innovation with strong architectural governance, security and long‑term sustainability, ensuring technology solutions remain strategically aligned and resilient.

This role is one of two complementary technology leadership roles king in partnership with the Head of IT Operations, you will ensure that ARIA’s Data & Tech capabilities are designed, built and operated securely and sustainably. The Head of IT Operations is responsible for ARIA’s IT services and estate and cybersecurity within the CFO portfolio, including SaaS platforms, end‑user technology and network infrastructure.

This role leads data, engineering, internal technology products and AI enablement within the COO portfolio, building products and capabilities that integrate with and build on that estate. The two roles will jointly contribute to cross‑organisational technology governance, standards and investment decisions.

• Continue to shape ARIA’s Data & Tech function as an internal product, engineering and enablement capability: helping teams across ARIA identify opportunities, design effective solutions and deliver lasting organisational value.
• Lead and grow a multidisciplinary team spanning product management, engineering, data, platforms and AI enablement, developing the capability mix, talent and leadership needed as ARIA evolves.
• Evolve the function’s operating model, including clear interfaces, shared ways of working and effective joint governance with IT Operations.
• Define how Data & Tech work is discovered, prioritised and resourced, drawing on internal capability, external partners and specialist support.
• Embed and continuously improve the product, delivery and engineering ways of working that enable the function to move from experimentation to reliable, scalable organisational…