Director of Search Engineering
Canva’s Commitment and Mission
At Canva, we celebrate diversity. We deeply believe that bringing together diversity of thoughts, perspectives and expression is key to building the best product, team and company. We look for many different skills and abilities, as well as how you can enhance Canva and our culture. So, even if you don’t think you quite meet all of the skills listed or tick all the boxes, we’d still love to hear from you!
Our mission at Canva is to empower the world to design and since launching in 2013, we have grown exponentially, amassing over 75 million monthly active users across 190 different countries and a team of over 2,800 people… and the best bit is that we’ve only achieved 1% of what we know we’re capable of.
Join us and design your future.
The Search and Recommendations Group is a core component of the Canva user experience. They are responsible for providing the core platform that allows all of Canva's amazing templates, images, stickers, video, audio, etc, to be discovered inside and outside Canva. With that, they also own key in-product surfaces to allow users to discover content before and during design.
With over 100 million assets in our library (and rapidly growing), this group is key in ensuring that every user in every locale can find the content they need to create amazing designs. With so much content, surfacing the right ingredients to the right user, at the right time will be critical for the future success of Canva.
We're seeking a Head of Engineering Search and Recommendations with deep experience and knowledge in the search and recommendations space to lead a team (40+ Eng and growing) of software, machine learning engineers, data analysts, QA, etc, towards achieving our ambitious growth goals.
Role Responsibilities
- Drive the technical strategy across Search and Recommendations in a fast-paced, innovation-focused environment.
- Set the group up for success on the march towards 1B Monthly Active Users, which will require a deep thinking across a broad range of technologies, talent, team shape etc.
- Collaborate with talented engineers, product, UX / Design to set and execute group-level goals which impact the core Canva experience
- People leader across engineering in Search and Recommendations group, coaching and supporting the team leads
- Scale engineering within the group to meet the growing needs of an ever more personalized content discovery journey.
- Further up-level the technical capabilities of the group by bringing on board world-class talent and deep experts via partnering with Canva's Talent Acquisition team where needed and identifying and developing emerging leaders within the group
- Nurture the progression of current members within the team, creating a team for the present and future needs of Canva
- Foster a culture of communication, bridging the communication gap between teams, group, and company leadership
- Coordinating and communicating across various specialties and parts of the business to understand the impact and feasibility of strategic goals within the group
- Ensure the Search and Recommendations group is constantly working towards delivering on the high impact efforts by continuously assessing current and future business needs
Required Experience and Background
- Five or more (5+) years of experience leading teams across disciplines in a Search or Recommendations product environment or similar.
- Demonstrated ability to lead large transformative efforts that involves a large number of people and makes a broad impact on the organization.
- Previous experience as a Software Engineer - and still in tune with software engineering fundamentals and first principles. You should have strong technical and people leadership skills to be successful in this role
- Invested in working with engineers on growth and development opportunities to help further their skill set and grow into new roles, with an ability to deliver relevant and timely feedback (positive & constructive) to help them continuously improve and learn
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills; with the ability to work with a diverse range of individuals from different backgrounds, with different expertise, and with different professional and personal needs
- Strong customer focus to understand the use cases and requirements of internal stakeholders, and identify opportunities to empower them to do their best work
- Be capable of leading by example - promoting Canva’s values, psychological safety, no-blame mentality and engineering values
Helpful Experience (not required)
- An understanding of search services built on Elasticsearch or SOLR would be beneficial
- Previous technical background in Search, Recommendations, Machine Learning, or AI domain
Benefits
- Competitive salary, plus stock options via our ESOP plan
- Flexible daily working hours, we value work-life balance
- Breakfast and lunch prepared by our wonderful Vibe team
- Onsite-Gym and Yoga Membership
- End-of-Trip Facilities: Bicycle parking and showers
- Vibe and Thrive Allowance to support health and wellness
- Travel allowance for interstate employees
- Generous parental (including secondary) leave policy
- Pet-friendly offices
- Internal Coaching and Employee Support Programs
- Sponsored social clubs, team events, and celebrations
Remote applicants will require occasional travel to Sydney up to three times per quarter, once it is safe to do so.
The Canva workspace is set up for you to do your best work and have a great time doing so, with breakout areas, little nooks, and quiet places to retreat.
If you're seeking professional growth and enjoy working on large, distributed, cloud-based applications that delight our millions of individual and business users alike - then apply now to be considered for the position!
We will not accept or review any CVs from external recruitment agencies.
Working at Canva
Our culture is unlike anywhere else and we design your #CanvaLife experience to empower you to do the best work of your life.
Whether you’re in the office, working from home or choosing your own adventure, our benefits for full-time Canvanauts include:
• Competitive health benefits plans to support you and your wellbeing
• Equity packages truly be a part of the Canva journey 401(k) retirement plan with company contribution to support you, with your future Hybrid work model (in-office & from home) coming together for 8 days a year
• Flexible leave so you can recharge, give back, support others or focus on your own professional development.
• Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents and carers throughout their parenting and caring journey.
• An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance. This is for you to spend on whatever will support your wellbeing and development.. because you know what you need to Vibe and Thrive, better than anyone.
• Virtual and in-office wellness benefits including Canva University, Employee Assistant Programs and Fitness & Meditation Classes.
• Canva For Good program matching your not-for-profit donations, Force for Good leave (3 paid volunteering days) and a range of sustainability and ethical initiatives to get involved in.
We make hiring decisions based on your experience, skills and passion. Please note that interviews are conducted virtually. When you apply, please tell us the pronouns you use and any reasonable adjustments you may need during the interview process.