The company is looking for a high-energy, rigorous, and strategic leader with diverse technical experience to head the (re)design of their architecture and organisation for scale. The Head of Technology will bring a structured process, solid people management, and cutting-edge technologies to a relatively traditional industry.

With this in mind, the Head of Technology reports to the Chief Innovation Officer where new ideas and organisational strategies get transformed into a real product and process innovations. In addition, the Head of Technology will work closely with operating Country Managers on their supply chain and facility technology.

They will oversee all technology, from manufacturing sensors to consumer applications, to corporate administration. Beyond their direct reports, this leader should expect to engage with strategic partners, functional leaders, and specialist advisors to develop and achieve business goals at a healthy ROI.

In brief, the Head of Technology will build a scalable architecture, automated processes, simple product experiences, and a reliable team for the short and long term.

Finally, we realise everyone has personal commitments outside of work. To enable people to work and live at their best, the company supports flexible work. Sometimes work takes place in the industrial area plant, at other times in a shared workspace for innovation, and sometimes from home. They expect leaders to work with their teams to design a high-performance, values-aligned work environment.

While the day-to-day office is flexible, the position is based in Nairobi, Kenya and may require up to 30% travel in Kenya and internationally. Salaries are competitive and commensurate with qualifications and experience.

Map out the right mix of external and internal components to strengthen and easily manage multiple stakeholder needs and business growth plans. Advise leadership on technical investment decisions.

Gather, define, and prioritise user stories and associated development requirements based on the scaling business strategy and customer needs. This requires taking the initiative to speak with clients, stakeholders, advisors, and peers to develop individual sprint plans up to long-term milestones.

Ensure interoperability between existing and new applications. Build the system to plug and play with new applications and enable easier entry into new countries or offer new services.

Collect and translate data as well as introduce technology to simplify processes and reduce manual tasks across the supply chain including collection, sorting, processing, distribution, and administration.

Develop and integrate self-reporting and sensor data to improve forecasting. Lay the groundwork for future AI investments (e.g., computer vision plastic identification and mix estimations)

Design and develop features that are easy to access, obvious to follow, and fast to complete. This should limit the need for follow-up support service and/or human intervention.

Ensure products work on any device and work by text, app, or web. Front-end information should seamlessly integrate with other processes and players along the supply chain.

Create expectations based on technical practice areas, expectations of MGA stakeholders, and consumer product benchmarks (inc. security and up-time). Enable quality execution through training, examples to follow, and regular reviews.

Structure, organise, and fluidly execute sprints by introducing agile development (and other best practices) as well as establishing open/transparent communication practices with stakeholder teams.

Develop and fill new jobs as needed to execute the technical roadmap. Prioritise training and development of the existing team whenever possible. Manage and ensure the performance of external partners is at or above the internal staff.

Technical Domains

• • Consumer-facing Mobile Applications
  • Partner and Operator Application
  • Data Engineering and Analytics
  • IoT Sensors and Manual Entry Devices
  • Machine Operating Devices
  • ERP and Related Operational Systems
  • All Software Applications across functional areas
  • All Personal Computing Devices
  • Cloud Infrastructure
  • Security Policies and Procedures
  • Operating Budgets and Tech Investment ROI
  • Release Schedules and Quality Assurance Testing

Experience and Skills

• • +5 years in CTO / technology leadership role in a fast-growing or supply chain company
  • +10 years of diverse technical work experience
  • Hired, led, and scaled world-class engineer/developer teams delivering high-quality outputs for customer-facing and internal requirements
  • Full-stack experience using multiple languages and frameworks is an advantage
  • Some familiarity with AI, data science and machine learning techniques
  • Have managed secure environments that contain sensitive information (e.g. customer profiles, financial information, regulatory filings etc) with the relevant security processes in place
  • Understanding of budgets, business planning, and investment business cases
  • Experience with selecting, measuring, and managing suppliers and vendors
  • Outstanding track record of delivering complex technology developments and programmes Familiarity with cloud-computing platforms
  • Skilled in planning and forming strategic roadmaps to ensure high-quality output
  • Very strong communication skills and comfort speaking to high-stakes audiences
  • Experience overseeing engineering teams in an agile environment
  • Good knowledge of DevOps toolchains and processesDegree in Information Technology, Computer Science, or another equivalent
  • Qualifications in Agile or Project Management an advantage

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