Engineering Manager - Shop

We’re On the Beach! Since 2003, we've been rewriting the rules of how people discover, book, and experience their perfect getaway. What started as connecting people to short-haul beach holidays has evolved into something much bigger - premium beach destinations, long-haul adventures, and vibrant city breaks – and that’s just the beginning of our story.

We send around two million holidaymakers on their dream breaks every year. And we're still growing.

Powered by our deep-rooted entrepreneurial spirit, proprietary tech, curiosity and our incredible people, we’re accelerating - delivering best in class technology, the ultimate holiday app, and experiences that keep our customers coming back for more.

Ready to build the future of travel with us?

About the Role

We're on the lookout for an Engineering Manager to join our Channels and Content team - the brilliant people responsible for customer acquisition and retention through marketing technology, SEO, and the content management systems that power experiences across all our platforms.

What you’ll be doing day to day

You'll be leading a collaborative, high-performing engineering team in our journey from legacy Ruby-on-Rails to our modern Next.js platform. As an Engineering Manager, you'll focus on developing your team members while ensuring we deliver exceptional customer experiences that help nearly two million people find their perfect holiday.

Our Channels and Content team works with technologies including Next.js, TypeScript, GraphQL, AWS-powered Kubernetes clusters, and the Contentful headless CMS. However, we're more interested in your ability to enable others and build great teams than your specific technical stack knowledge.

You'll partner closely with Product Managers to translate customer needs into technical reality, working collaboratively to balance business priorities with technical excellence. You'll understand how our work impacts the traveller journey and help your team make decisions that enhance customer experience whilst maintaining system reliability - especially during those crucial peak booking periods.

You’ll be a great addition to our team if you have the following skills, knowledge and experience

Leadership & People Development:

• Passion for developing people and creating inclusive environments where everyone can thrive at On The Beach.
• Experience coaching team members through career development conversations and performance challenges.
• Natural ability to facilitate constructive dialogue and build consensus across diverse perspectives.
• Track record of building sustainable, high-performing teams through mentoring and support.
• Experience with hiring, performance management, and creating psychologically safe team environments.

Technical Leadership & Delivery:

• Background as a hands-on engineer with sufficient technical depth to guide architectural decisions.
• Experience translating product requirements into clear technical delivery plans and realistic timelines.
• Ability to balance technical debt management with feature delivery in fast-paced environments.
• Understanding of operational excellence including monitoring, alerting, and system reliability practices.
• Experience coordinating across teams and managing technical dependencies

Collaboration & Communication:

• Excellent communication skills with both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Experience working closely with Product Managers to ensure alignment between vision and delivery capabilities.
• Ability to navigate competing priorities and make well-reasoned decisions with incomplete information.
• Experience providing clear, actionable feedback and creating development plans aligned with both individual growth and business needs.

Business Context & Adaptability:

• Understanding of customer impact and how technical decisions affect user experience.
• Ability to adapt team priorities based on changing market demands and seasonal patterns.
• Experience with data-driven decision making and measuring team effectiveness.
• Track record of identifying and addressing risks before they impact delivery.

What we expect from you:

• Previous experience successfully leading and developing engineering teams
• Demonstrable experience in technical delivery using Agile methodologies
• Strong problem-solving skills and experience with modern software development practices
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines and collaborative development workflows
• Comfortable with web technologies and cloud platforms (we use AWS)

We'd also love if you have:

• Travel industry experience or understanding of seasonal business patterns
• Experience with GraphQL, React ecosystem, or headless CMS systems
• Background with automation technologies, particularly around testing and quality assurance
• Passion for operational ownership and developer experience, not just feature delivery

Innovation and Future Technology

We're embracing AI and automation to transform both our development processes and customer experiences. If you're excited about exploring how emerging technologies can revolutionise team productivity and customer journeys, you'll find plenty of opportunities to experiment and innovate with us

What to expect from our interview process

We’ll start our process with a conversation with our Talent Acquisition team, followed by a 3 stage interview process, all on Microsoft Teams.

We want to make sure everybody has the opportunity to perform at their best. If you require any reasonable adjustments during the interview process please let the Talent Acquisition team know and they will be happy to assist.

Ways of working
Our full time hours are 37.5 per week, but we don't have rigid working hours so you can find the working pattern that's right for you. We have core working hours between 10am - 4pm, so we can collaborate and enjoy the social side of work.

We also have hybrid working so we all work from home and from our Aeroworks office in Manchester City Centre. You’ll be in the office one day every two weeks, and you’re more than welcome to come in more if you’d like.

Our benefits
We might be biased but we think our colleagues are pretty great. They're the people that have made On the Beach what it is today and continue to make it vibrant and successful tomorrow. That's why we offer a competitive benefits package, known as our Beach Perks, to all On the Beach colleagues.

These include:

• 25 days holiday and your birthday off
• Generous discount on holidays, plus you will receive 2 extra days annual leave on top of your holiday allowance to use whilst you're away on your On the Beach package holiday
• Access to Learnerbly learning platform, plus workshops, courses and professional qualifications
• Enhanced maternity, paternity, shared parental leave and adoption pay, plus other family friendly support
• Employee Assistance Programme and free access to counselling
• Simplyhealth Optimise Health Plan
• Company Sick Pay scheme
• Regular wellbeing events
• Gym discount
• Share Incentive Plan (SIP)
• Death in Service cover
• Onsite subsidised coffee shop
• The Sandbox (our very own bar)
• Food and drink discounts across a number of venues in Manchester City Centre
• Regular social events
• Cycle to Work scheme