Director, Software Development

Reporting to the Vice President, Information Systems and Technology, the Director, Software Development is a pivotal position within the IT organization, with a mandate to build and maintain systems to drive business value and increase revenue.

The Director, Software Development’s mandate spans web, mobile, services and application development as well as quality assurance. Within this mandate, they are accountable for the execution of development initiatives, delivering high quality code that is robust, sustainable and aligned with industry best practices, and ensuring the quality of that code with comprehensive and efficient quality assurance.

The Director, Software Development is also accountable to maintain a cohesive and dynamic application systems architecture. They should have a strategic view to the maintenance and evolution of the application landscape with an aim to minimize technical debt and maintain a strategic view of the future state, identifying areas for investment that can lower costs, increase efficiency, and bring value to the organization. They should champion and drive initiatives to move the organization toward that ideal future state.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Be accountable for the enterprise application landscape, including web, mobile, software applications and services, ensuring that the landscape is well-documented with areas of technical debt highlighted

• Develop a long-term strategic technology roadmaps that will anticipate the operational and commercial needs of the business

• Champion, initiate and lead initiatives to implement technology enhancements and address technical debt, as well as keeping the software technologies current with respect to industry best practices

• Collaborate with the Directors of other technology domains, Data and Infrastructure, to ensure the proper sharing of information, effective cross-domain solutions, and architectural governance

• Make long-term recommendations to senior management on how to leverage technology to maximize revenue and minimize costs

• Prepare and present proposals and recommendations to senior management on technologically complex subjects

• Negotiate with members of senior management to obtain consensus and approval to  engage in new, major, complex technology initiatives, including proposals with goals that may not be mutually beneficial to all departments

• Participate in vendor negotiation by performing technical due diligence, discovery, and making recommendations to senior management

• Make implementation decisions about large, commercially critical, highly complex projects, including initiatives that require extensive research and have incomplete or ill-defined requirements and goals

• Ensure the timely delivery of robust, mission-critical software for the company’s operational and commercial needs, including products that with high uptimes SLAs

• Develop processes to identify and measure the speed, quality, and reliability of critical operational and commercial software and infrastructure

• Develop processes to identify and measure the financial success and efficiency of customer-facing software and websites

• Through continual learning, acquire knowledge and understanding of recent technological advances and industry trends

• Develop and implement processes to attract and retain the most talented technology employees in a fiercely competitive labour environment

• Be accountable for the performance a team of ~60 technology employees with diverse specialties and responsibilities

• Supervise and provide mentorship and guidance to the Manager of Web Development, Manager of Application Development, Manager of Software Quality Assurance

• Be available 24/7 to respond to critical outages and other emergency situations

BEHAVIOURAL COMPETENCIES:

• Concern for Safety: Identifying hazardous or potentially hazardous situations and taking appropriate action to maintain a safe environment for self and others.

• Teamwork: Working collaboratively with others to achieve organizational goals.

• Passenger/Customer Service: Providing service excellence to internal and/or external customers (passengers).

• Initiative: Dealing with situations and issues proactively and persistently, seizing opportunities that arise.

• Results Focus: Focusing efforts on achieving high quality results consistent with the organization’s standards.

• Fostering Communication: Listening and communicating openly, honestly, and respectfully with different audiences, promoting dialogue and building consensus.

• Exemplifying Integrity: Treating others fairly, honestly, and respectfully, furthering the integrity of the organization and its relationships of trust with team members and the broader community.

• Inspiring Others: Energizing and inspiring others to strive for excellence and commit to common goals and purposes, creating a sense of self-efficacy, resilience, and persistence in followers.

• People Leadership: Assuming a leadership role in helping others achieve excellent results.

• Leading Change: Recognizing the need for change, being open to new ideas and methods, and championing transformational change within the organization and beyond.

 QUALIFICATIONS:

• Undergraduate degree in computer science, computer engineering, or a related field

• Master’s degree in computer science, computer engineering, or business administration would be an asset

• A minimum of 10 years’ experience in software development roles, with a minimum of 5 years’ experience in a technology management role

• Knowledge of the  core concepts of enterprise architecture, especially application and integration architecture. Knowledge of TOGAF would be an asset

• Experience in all aspects of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC)

• Strong written and verbal communication skills

• Proven performance as a leader of software development teams with at least 20 people

• Expert level knowledge of all major internet technologies (networking, web server, web service, email, DNS, load-balancing, etc.)

• Experienced in web design, including proven track record of implementing and maintaining high-volume, high-availability eCommerce websites

• Experience with native mobile applications

• In-depth knowledge of cloud computing and associated services, preferably Amazon AWS

• Experienced in object oriented programming languages and frameworks used in modern web-app design, preferably using a Microsoft technology stack

• Strong understanding of software and web application performance, particularly issues related to asynchronous operations that execute remote procedure calls across distributed systems

• Strong understanding of cyber security issues and remedies

• Mandatory COVID-19 Vaccination

LOCATION: Toronto (Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport - YTZ)