[Hiring] Head of Engineering - Protect @RWS

Role Description

RWS Protect helps the world’s leading businesses protect their most valuable ideas, supporting the full intellectual property lifecycle from patent filing through to renewals, search, and brand protection. We are modernising the Protect technology estate: building new products on a modern AWS stack, with AI embedded into both our products and the way we build software, while running and rationalising the systems that serve our customers today.

We are hiring a Head of Engineering to share leadership of this estate. A significant part of your remit will be new development:

• Forming and growing the teams that build the next generation of Protect products.
• Owning your share of the existing estate, driving the deliberate decline and decommissioning of legacy systems as new capabilities take over their workloads.

This is a leadership role, not a hands-on coding role. But you will be technically credible, opinionated about modern software product development, and confident in spinning up the systems and making an assessment yourself when required.

The role reports to the VP of Engineering. You will inherit a small organisation and grow it: the expectation is several new teams formed over your first couple of years, alongside the existing estate you take on.

The position is expected to start in October 2026.

Qualifications

• A track record of leading software product engineering organisations through significant change: building teams from scratch, scaling them, and retiring what they replace.
• Deep, genuine experience of agile product development done well.
• A strong, demonstrable interest in applied AI development tooling.
• Experience with modern cloud-native architecture, ideally on AWS, and with strangler-style migrations away from legacy estates.
• Strong hiring instincts.
• Comfort with ambiguity and pace.

Requirements

• Build and grow new engineering teams.
• Deliver new products and services.
• Drive legacy decline and decommissioning.
• Champion AI-native engineering practice.
• Connect engineering to product and commercial outcomes.

Benefits

• Work with smart people who are passionate about growing the value of ideas, data, and content.
• Inclusive and diverse work environment.
• Opportunities for individual growth and career advancement.

Company Description

Product & Technology plays a pivotal role in aligning the organization with its strategic objectives and enhancing shareholder value. Product & Technology is responsible for establishing unified standards and governance practices throughout the company. Additionally, we oversee the development and maintenance of core applications essential for the seamless operation of various functions across the organization.

• Support services to over 7500 end users worldwide.
• Manage the information security operation and safeguard all assets.
• Core functions encompass Enterprise & Technical Architecture, Network & Voice, Infrastructure, Service Delivery, Service Operations, Data & Analytics, Security & Quality Compliance, Transformation, Application Development, and Enterprise Platforms.
• A dedicated team of over 500 staff ensures a strong presence across all regions.