Director, AI Productivity & Engineering Governance

Daily, millions of Australians connect, work, stream, and keep in contact via the Optus network. When it runs without interruption, it’s easy to take for granted. Behind this seamless service is a team making thousands of decisions every day—decisions that ensure people, businesses, and communities stay connected. Right now, Optus is passionate about getting the fundamentals right - simplifying how we work, lifting standards, and building a more reliable, resilient experience for our customers. It’s not about superficial change. It’s about how we make decisions, how we collaborate, and how we deliver. The Director, AI Productivity & Engineering Governance is a senior technical leadership role focused on AI-enabled engineering and broad engineering governance at Optus's Software Engineering Centre of Excellence. As Optus advances a multi-year software transformation, this role leads automation of engineering tasks using AI and applies this approach to governance at scale. It is a hands-on position supported by executives, serving real customers in delivery, and offers a chance to develop how engineering operates at a crucial time. Beyond direct delivery, the role is accountable for engineering efficiency and governance results across IT engineering, and manages the multi-year capability strategy and investment. Here, you’ll take on meaningful challenges, build positive relationships, and have a direct impact on how we show up for customers. If you’re looking to do work that matters - and help build what comes next - this is your opportunity to be part of it. What You’ll Do | Your day to day will consist of Lead the development and build of AI-infused automations that perform engineering work, including agents, scripts, MCP tools, pipelines, and prompts. Define what great AI-augmented engineering looks like at Optus and make it adoptable across delivery. Guide cross-domain engineering policies and standards that platforms need to follow, including security telemetry, observability, common engineering metrics, audit posture, and exception management. Lead a senior team with hands-on technical leadership and accountability for outcomes across both AI Efficiency and Engineering Governance pillars. What You Bring | What makes you perfect for the role? Senior people or principal engineer background, or engineering management with deep hands-on experience writing or reviewing production code. Day-to-day proficiency with AI development tools (e.g. Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot, Glean, or equivalents), with a track record of creating real work. Strong understanding of agentic workflows, MCP, timely engineering, and the limitations of current models in production environments. Demonstrated skill in crafting engineering policies and procedures that are embraced, not ignored. The good stuff…. | What’s in it for you? Competitive remuneration, plus $80 monthly credit, 25% off Optus products and exclusive shopping discounts with our retail partners — making everyday life a little more affordable. Genuine Flexibility - work three days in the office, two days from wherever works best for you. An office campus that has it all - cafes chill out zones, GP, post office, gym and on-site childcare centre. It’s built for real life. Great leave policies, including additional 'Connected’ days to focus on culture, family, health, community, or whatever matters most to you. Inclusive, carer-neutral paid Parental Leave of up to 16 weeks, because family comes first. Build meaningful connections through colleague-led networks and diversity initiatives including Culture Connect, Elevate Women, Disability Network and Express Yourself (LGBTQIA+). Your wellbeing matters, so we offer with free counselling and support services, available 24/7 in-person, by phone, SMS, or video. A free Optus bus from Macquarie University Metro Station (every 6-8 minutes); morning and afternoon. Or, heaps of onsite parking. Plus, end of trip facilities with lockers, showers, irons and hair dryers. Not every box ticked? Apply anyway. We believe the right approach matters more than a perfect CV. We’ll back you to grow from there! At Optus, we are strengthened by others and that means valuing diversity and saying ‘yes’ to embracing individual differences. We are committed to ensuring that our application process provides an equal employment opportunity to all job seekers, including individuals from diverse gender, cultural and linguistic backgrounds, individuals with a disability, individuals identifying as being part of the LGBTQIA+ community, individuals who may have served in the armed forces or who identify as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander. We also want to do our best to make our recruitment process inclusive. If you require any adjustments or accessibility support to participate fairly and equitably in the recruitment process, please email or call 1800 309 170. For more information on Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging at Optus, please visit