Head of Technology Integration

Marex is a diversified global financial services platform, providing essential liquidity, market access, and infrastructure services to clients in the energy, commodities, and financial markets.

The Group provides comprehensive breadth and depth of coverage across four core services: Market Making, Clearing, Hedging and Investment Solutions, and Agency and Execution. It has a leading franchise in many major metals, energy, and agricultural products, executing around 50 million trades and clearing 205 million contracts in 2022. The Group provides access to the world’s major commodity markets, covering a broad range of clients that include some of the largest commodity producers, consumers and traders, banks, hedge funds, and asset managers.

Marex was established in 2005 but through its subsidiaries can trace its roots in the commodity markets back almost 100 years. Headquartered in London with 36 offices worldwide, the Group has over 1,800 employees across Europe, Asia, and America.

Marex has unique access across markets with significant share globally both on and off exchange. The depth of knowledge amongst its teams and divisions provides its customers with clear advantage, and its technology-led service provides access to all major exchanges, order-flow management via screen, voice, and DMA, plus award-winning data, insights, and analytics.

The Technology Department delivers differentiation, scalability, and security for the business. Reporting to the COO, Technology provides digital tools, software services, and infrastructure globally to all business groups. Software development and support teams work in agile ‘streams’ aligned to specific business areas. Our other teams work enterprise-wide to provide critical services including our global service desk, network and system infrastructure, IT operations, security, enterprise architecture, and design.

The Business Technology function ensures delivery of Technology services to each Marex business area. We partner with the business to optimise their technology stack, prioritise their strategic technology roadmap, and drive their software delivery lifecycle. We define and agree change initiatives with the organisation’s business areas and then coordinate delivery against specific acceptance criteria. Each Business Technology team is aligned to one of Marex’s business divisions and works with a corresponding Development team and Application Support team. A global team of implementation resources coordinate and support the technology business streams with delivery.

The Head of Technology Integration is accountable for ensuring that the technology of all acquired companies is integrated, by taking technology from its ‘Day 1’ state to the organisation’s ‘Integrated Target State’.

Working flexibly across a complex book of work covering multiple legacy and new acquisitions, the Head of Technology Integration will both coordinate and progress actions to deliver integration for the organisation. This role is responsible for working with technology and business stakeholders to define (and control) the specific Integrated Target State for each acquisition. This role then translates the changes required into a prioritised programme of deliverables and drives progress until each target state is reached.

To do this, the Head of Technology Integration manages and sets direction for dedicated, matrix managed integration resources, ensuring work is correctly prioritised and that the team is capable to support and execute the work required of them. As part of delivery, this role monitors progress; batches, iterates, and adjusts deliverables using agile principles; and manages issues and dependencies as required.

This role also coordinates closure of each acquisition’s integration phase, with formal handover to a relevant business-aligned technology stream to take forward maintenance and/or future rationalisation. Closure includes raising any operational risks related to the achieved integration target state into our Risk Control Framework.

The role will service the internal requirements of the Technology department and the deliverables that are generated by acquisition across the Marex business. Acquisitions generate books of work that need specification, ownership, and co-ordination to reduce operational complexity, increase supportability, and deliver synergies across commercial, productivity, and regulatory areas.

Key to delivery will be the relationships established with Heads of each Technology Business stream, wider technology management, and other business stakeholders who own and drive change.

The role will be expected to manage not just infrastructure changes but also understand and consider business challenges around system integration and rationalisation.

As the Head of Technology Integration, this role should also maintain focus on improving our maturity and efficiency in integrating acquisitions over time, by applying lean methodology, agile delivery, and portfolio management best practice appropriate to our culture and ways of working. This role is supported as required by the Technology PMO and works within the Technology Portfolio Framework.

Responsibilities:

1. Scope, plan and coordinate the delivery of post Day 1 acquisition integration across the infrastructure and application environments to meet the agreed integration target state for each project.
2. Retain alignment to the core Technology Strategy and ensure the Marex Technology footprint is understood during change. Prioritise existing vendors and systems where appropriate.
3. Lead a dedicated Technology Integration team as well as coordinate further stakeholder involvement across infrastructure, platform engineering, networks, service desk, information security, developers, and the wider business functions.
4. Set the technology integration strategy for the firm in collaboration with key stakeholders.
5. Report on integration status, risks and provide MI as required up to the leadership team.
6. Create initiatives and epics that capture business deliverables with an agreed set of Acceptance Criteria (the contract). Report on the priority/progress/effort/cost of these epics/projects.
7. Oversee epic delivery to ensure work is managed efficiently and delivered on time and on budget in line with the Technology Portfolio Framework.
8. Prioritise and drive the business requirements. Give regular status updates to maintain alignment and focus, and flag and resolve issues.
9. Ensure delivered infrastructure and systems are of production quality and adequately documented for handover to the business and/or support functions.
10. Maintain familiarity with the regulatory, audit and compliance requirements that apply to the business. Ensure that technology deployed adheres to these.
11. Ensure delivered systems are secure, reliable and scale to meet the demands of a rapidly growing business.
12. Determine common standards and procedures for the Technology Integration workstream.
13. Determine and report effectiveness of project delivery with regular status updates to key stakeholders.
14. Encourage an inclusive culture – with an appreciation of complete life cycle and consult all areas that are impacted by change.

Competencies:

1. A collaborative team player, approachable, self-efficient and influences a positive work environment.
2. Demonstrates curiosity.
3. Resilient in a challenging, fast-paced environment.
4. Ability to take a high level of responsibility in a fast pace and high-volume environment.
5. Excels at building relationships, networking and influencing others.
6. Strategic collaborator with insight and agility, able to anticipate future challenges, ensuring operational effectiveness.

Skills and Experience:

Essential:

1. Good knowledge across multiple asset classes.
2. Project planning and co-ordination. Demonstratable experience of leading delivery success within a project delivery environment, including status and KPI reporting and managing competing requirements across a portfolio of deliverables.
3. Stakeholder management.
4. Delivery focussed, displaying entrepreneurial and leadership skills.
5. Experience of large-scale technology migrations and integrations.
6. Excellent written and verbal communications.
7. Architecting secure, reliable, and scalable infrastructure and software.

Desirable:

1. Knowledge of Broker business – and several asset classes.
2. Trade Lifecycle knowledge. Pre-trade, Trade, settlement/clearing, Risk. Full front to back.
3. Agile and scrum development methodologies.
4. Broad infrastructure experience, Microsoft Technologies, Cloud Services, Networks and Infrastructure.
5. Cyber Security and Controls – e.g. ISO27001 / NIST / SOX.
6. Product development experience.
7. Experience working in a regulated environment and knowledge of the risk and compliance requirements associated with this.

If you’re forging a career in this area and are looking for your next step, get in touch!

Marex is fully committed to being an inclusive employer and providing an inclusive and accessible recruitment process for all. We will provide reasonable adjustments to remove any disadvantage to you being considered for this role. We value the differences that a diverse workforce brings to the company. We welcome applications from candidates returning to the workforce.

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