Lokku - Engineering Manager position

Maybe. This job was first posted in March 2010 to jobs.perl.org and jobs@london.pm.org (among other places). We have spoken to a number of excellent candidates since then, but have not filled the position. As of 19 May 2010, we are reposting this role and expanding the scope of our search.

Who should apply?

Please apply if:

you have experience managing teams of engineers
you have experience managing complex engineering projects
you can communicate fluently in English. Ideally you are fluent in at least one other major language.
The more the better. We want to amaze users everywhere.
you are excited by diverse challenges
The dual goals of growing our existing, profitable markets while also launching new ones is not easy. We believe our key skill is being able to work well across functions and projects.

What are we looking for?

you are comfortable working with remote colleagues
Our model is increasingly distributed. Many of your colleagues, collaborators and direct reports will not be in the same office as you.
you are comfortable with occasional travel
Once per quarter for less than a week.
you hate meetings
Good coordination is critical. We aim to spend our time doing things, not talking about doing things.
you are able to commit for at least the next two years
you think internationally
Our users and customers are from all over the world. Each market has its own challenges, and we tackle them with a very diverse team. We need someone who understands that differences are what make us great.
you look forward to speaking at conferences and representing Lokku.
We attend and sponsor many industry events. They are a chance to learn from others and show off some of the interesting things we do. We expect you to be stage diving into the middle of the innovation mosh pit. Likewise, we regularly organise tech exchanges with other London based companies, small and large.

In addition we highly value the following personality traits:

you are focused
You know that the path to success is not to do more, more quickly, but rather to do the right things well. We have many, many ideas of things we could do. We have the resources to do only a few of them. You enjoy the challenge of deciding which projects are worth investing our most valuable resource - our time.
you are analytical
Search is a scientific business. We measure everything. Numbers drive our decisions. If you want access to lots of data, we have it. More importantly we expect you to be capable of turning data into information, information into decisions, decisions into action. Read some thoughts on web analytics from Ed in a guest post on TechCrunch.
you are pragmatic
Great ideas are critical. Equally critical is getting things done.
you seek responsibility
We need generals not soldiers.
you are humble
We make a lot of mistakes. Lots of other people are better than us at many things.
you are aggressive
We need to dream big and make it happen.

and, critically:

you are fun to sit next to in an office

Technical requirements.

You need to be great with:

the LAMP stack
We have done almost everything to date in Perl. You do not have to be a Perl guru to join our team, but you should know your way around the language or be willing to learn quickly.
scaling web applications
building for the long term
You understand that maintaining is harder than building. Everything we do needs to be automated and easily maintainable. We want to spend time being innovative, not holding the roof up.
automated testing
There is no QA team.
legacy code
We have accumulated some code over four years. Most, but not all, of it is awesome.

bonus points if you have experience with

geodata and geo information systems (especially OpenStreetMap)

What will the Engineering Manager do?

A typical month might include:

management of London-based engineers. Some of these engineers will be full time employees that have been with Lokku for years. Others will be interns, consultants, or contractors that will be with Lokku for only months.
We need someone that can recruit talented coders and create an environment that lets them work and learn efficiently. There is more to management than filling out TPS reports.
management of a remote outsourcing team.
Lokku has recently started working with a group of professional outsourcing engineers. They spend 100% of their time working for us, but they are not based in London. We are looking for someone that welcomes the challenge of managing this relationship.
researching and selecting vendors, software packages, or hardware.
We are experts at vertical search. We are not experts at building issue tracking systems or maintaining selenium testing infrastructure. We need a manager that can confidently select companies and technologies and negotiate a great deal.
solving a particularly nasty or mysterious bug or system issue.
We need someone who has been around the block enough times to tackle that bug that "just is not possible".
designing software or system architecture and writing specifications.
Making a plan is easy. Making a plan for others to carry out is harder.
working with other staff to decide now to build and change our products and how to build and change our company.
This role is not just about engineering. We want somebody that can contribute to Lokku at all levels.

Who do we think would be a good match for this role?

You are currently managing a team of engineers at a big internet brand. You work with great people on a product used by millions, but the focus of your team is narrow. You want to take on new challenges by working on all parts of a complete product.
You are start-up junkie. Your most recent adventure did not work or (better yet) you sold it and are ready to move on. You want to get back into a small, established team and get over the finish line again.
You are a veteran engineering manager and you now manage a team of managers. You want a new challenge that gets you closer to the ones and zeroes.

Who should NOT apply?

Please do not apply if:

you are looking for a boring 9 to 5 job.
This will not be boring. It will sometimes be more than 9 to 5.
you can not work full time.
you are not based in London or you are not willing to relocate to London.

About compensation.

Our policy is to pay above market rates for above market people. We offer ownership in the company through a tax-efficient stock option scheme.

One final point.

We are 4 years old, but this is not a Big Company. There is no IT guy. There is no office manager. You should see this as a good thing, otherwise you are probably not right for us. We have BIG goals, but we will do our best to stay "small".

Okay, I am interested. What is the process from here?

Please follow the instructions on our main jobs page. We look forward to hearing from you.

Last Updated: Wed 19 May 2010 15:26:32 BST