Open to opportunities

Theo Chirica

@theochirica

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Senior Engineering Manager who scales teams, delivers product impact, and drives AI adoption.

United Kingdom

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What I'm looking for

I seek leadership roles where I can scale engineering teams, adopt AI responsibly, improve delivery practices, and mentor future leaders in a collaborative, impact-focused culture.

I am a Senior Engineering Manager with 12+ years in tech and 5+ years leading teams and technical leaders, focused on scaling high-performing squads and delivering measurable business impact.

I have domain expertise in payments and insurance, and a strong track record of driving company-wide initiatives such as career frameworks, AI tooling rollouts, and OKR programs that improve delivery and engineering culture.

As an action-driven leader, I move quickly to build relationships, take ownership, and execute complex transitions and implementations — including an accelerated transition plan and an AI tooling trial expected to deliver strong ROI.

I coach and grow future leaders, mentor across organisations, and combine hands-on technical understanding (Java, Spring Boot, Ruby on Rails, cloud and container platforms) with stakeholder management to deliver scalable, resilient systems and long-lasting organisational improvements.

Experience

Work history, roles, and key accomplishments

Current

Senior Software Engineering Manager

Current

BR-DGE

Oct 2024 - Present (1 year 8 months)

Joined and accelerated a three-month transition in under one month, led two agile teams (19 people), launched the company's first AI tooling trial with an expected 233% annual ROI, and defined company-wide OKRs to improve delivery and engineering culture.

Engineering Management Agile Delivery Stakeholder Management Payments Java AWS Kubernetes

Engineering Manager L5

Simply Business

Mar 2020 - Oct 2024 (4 years 7 months)

Led two product engineering teams (22 people) delivering insurance tech features, co-led engineering career framework revamp, championed AI initiatives (Gemini, GitHub Copilot), and mentored apprentices and leaders driving improved leadership development.

Engineering Management Agile Delivery Mentoring Stakeholder Management Insurance Domain Ruby on Rails React AWS AI Tools

Senior Software Engineer

Simply Business

Jun 2018 - Mar 2020 (1 year 9 months)

Contributed as a senior engineer on insurance products and delivery practices, supporting feature development for quote & buy journeys and policy systems within a remote engineering organisation.

Ruby Ruby on Rails React AWS Docker Testing Systems Design

Software Engineer

YoYo Games

Aug 2015 - Jun 2018 (2 years 10 months)

Modernised the tech stack, led migration to Git, refactored high-churn areas and raised test coverage from 0% to ~25%, and scaled infrastructure to maintain 100% uptime during high-traffic events.

Ruby Ruby on Rails React Git CI CD AWS Testing Refactoring

Junior Software Engineer

Freelancer.com

Dec 2013 - Aug 2015 (1 year 8 months)

Worked as a junior engineer on remote projects, gaining experience in web development, PHP (Laravel), MySQL and front-end technologies while delivering client-facing solutions.

PHP Laravel MySQL JavaScript HTML CSS WordPress Remote Collaboration