Head of Engineering

About Zigzag

Do you want to help pups and their pawrents develop a lifelong bond? Come and join us at Zigzag, the #1 app for puppy training & life skills. Sadly, many pups don’t get the right training, which often leads to future behavioural problems, or worse, abandonment – we want to prevent that. We're on a mission to make puppy training accessible and enjoyable for everyone. Come and join us!

You’ll be joining us at an exciting time, having recently concluded a major scientific research study proving the impact of our product and now expanding into multiple markets. Zigzag operates with the mindset and agility of a true startup — fast-moving, innovative, and impact-driven — but with the backing of the big dog: Purina, one of the world’s leading petcare companies. That means you get the best of both worlds: the freedom and energy of a startup, paired with the support and stability of a global organisation.

Zigzag is also proud to be a certified B-Corp, which means we meet the highest standards of social and environmental impact. We believe business should be a force for good — and that purpose and profit can thrive side by side. If you’re ambitious, love a sense of adventure, and want your work to make a real difference from day one, we’re probably the right place for you.

About our Head of Engineering role

We currently have a lean team of full stack developers maintaining and evolving the Zigzag Puppy Training mobile app (iOS & Android), used by customers around the world. Built with Angular Ionic, we can develop for both platforms quickly and efficiently. The backend is written in NestJS, and we use Nx for scalable monorepo management.

As our Head of Engineering, you’ll report directly to the CEO and join the senior leadership team, helping shape the company's strategic direction. You'll lead our technical strategy, aligning it with business goals and integrating emerging technologies like AI across the organisation. This is a hands-on role where you’ll drive app development and key projects while mentoring a team of four mid-level developers. We follow modern engineering practices such as trunk-based development, TDD (red-green-refactor), and CI/CD.

You’ll shape and optimise our software development cycle, balancing speed with quality, and ensuring best practices are in place to support scale. Collaboration is key — you’ll work closely with the Head of Product to build and deliver on our roadmap, OKRs, and KPIs.

You'll also oversee IT security, ensuring company-wide compliance (hardware, software, data), and manage audits from our parent company, Purina — building a strong and collaborative relationship with them along the way.

What you’ll be doing as a Head Of Engineering

• Build and execute a Technical Strategy that supports business goals. This includes scaling technical resources as required.
• Drive forward-thinking discussions and decisions around emerging technologies (e.g. AI, ML) and how they might benefit our platform, tooling, and user experience.
• Champion how technology can create competitive advantage and measurable customer impact (e.g., personalisation, automation, scalability).
• Plan for scale across global markets (including multi-language support, compliance, localisation, and performance optimisation).
• You will play a crucial role in building a high performing team with a healthy, fun culture.
• Coaching, to support the growth & development of engineering team members.
• Although your main responsibility will be to manage the team and deliver a technical strategy, you will be expected to code almost every day at the beginning.
• Make sure the architecture, infrastructure and technology stack meet the current and future demands of the product.
• Lead annual tech budgeting, and manage vendor relationships where needed (e.g. infrastructure, third-party APIs, outsourced support).
• Ensure the code you produce is secure and the privacy of our users is properly guarded.
• Aid in streamlining operations as our user base is growing and expanding all over the globe.
• We work two days a week in our London Victoria based office.

What experience you’ll offer

• Prior experience working as Head of / Engineering Lead on a customer facing web application (mobile is a bonus).
• Experience producing and executing against a technical strategy that works in tandem with the overall business strategy.
• Experience working cross-functionally with a product-oriented mindset.
• Experience managing and motivating highly-skilled development teams.
• Hands-on experience with Typescript, Angular and frameworks within (rxjs, ngrx). Backend experience with an OOP language and ORM framework is a major plus! Especially if it’s NestJS.
• SQL Server (or similar) experience.
• Nx experience is also highly desirable, albeit not required. Experience with Ionic Framework, Capacitor or native Android and iOS knowledge is a bonus
• Experience of DevOps and setting up and managing CI/CD pipelines. in setting up and operating an infrastructure in the cloud. We use Azure, but we’re open to those with backgrounds in other providers.
• Prior AI experience is desirable, too!
• Excellent people & communication skills.
• A feel & empathy for user experience & design.
• A passion for pets!

What you'll get

• Join a purpose led B-Corp company where we strive to use our business as a force for good
• Attractive incentive scheme
• Retirement Planning: Zigzag’s contribution 5% and employee 3%
• Private health scheme
• Birthday day off - you deserve to celebrate
• Work from abroad 2 weeks per year
• Volunteering: 1 day a year
• Modern dog-friendly office
• Hybrid and flexible working with 1-2 days a week at our Victoria office (WeWork)
• Budget for at-home work set-up support
• Dedicated annual budget for training and development for all employees
• 25 days holiday, increasing 1 day per year with the company (up to a maximum of 27)

Values, inclusion, and equality

Here at Zigzag, equal opportunity runs through every aspect of the business. We’re creating an environment where a diverse mix of talented people want to work, do their best, and share in our journey for the long term. We strive to be a workplace where everyone feels empowered and can be their authentic selves, while encompassing the following values and principles:

• User-led, data-informed: our success is our users’ success.
• Progress over perfection: go 80%, test-and-learn, be bold to move things forward.
• Own it, drive it: Everyone in our team is a leader.
• Raise the bar: we constantly strive to be a better version of ourselves, step by step