Conrad Lotz
Technology executive and engineering leader. Building technology, organizations and leaders that scale.
How I think about leadership- in technology leadership
- 15+ years
- engineers led across geographies
- 100+
- platforms built and modernized
- Cloud, SaaS, Data & AI
Philosophy
Technology should create leverage.
Sophistication alone doesn’t make technology valuable. It earns its place when it helps a company move faster, make better decisions, serve customers better, reduce operational friction, or build capabilities it didn’t have before.
Delivering software is only part of a technology leader’s job. The rest is making sure we solve the right problems, with the right level of engineering, at the right time.
- 01
Start with the problem, not the technology
Architecture follows the problem. Sometimes the answer is a platform investment, sometimes a small change, and sometimes not building anything at all.
- 02
Build for the next stage, not the imagined final one
Simple today, scalable tomorrow, replaceable when necessary. Complexity has a cost — make sure it buys something.
- 03
Strong organizations run on ownership
Engineers who understand the customer, the business and the problem don’t wait to be told what to do. I provide clarity on direction, priorities, constraints and accountability, then room to operate.
- 04
Stay close enough to the technology to ask good questions
Where does this fail? What happens at 10× scale? What will we regret in two years? The point is better decisions, not winning the architecture debate.
- 05
Reliability is a product feature
If customers depend on it, observability, resilience and security are part of the product, not platform work for later.
- 06
Grow leaders, not followers
The real measure of a leader is the organization that remains after them. I want my teams to need me less over time.
How I lead
- Clarity over complexity.
- Context over control.
- Ownership over micromanagement.
- Pragmatism over architectural fashion.
- Outcomes over activity.
- Learning over ego.
High standards without unnecessary process.
Great engineering cultures combine high expectations with high trust. Teams should know what great looks like, and process should exist because it solves a problem — not because “that’s how engineering organizations work.”
The technology leader’s job
A technology leader connects business strategy, technology, people and execution.
01
Business
Where are we going?
02
Product
What should we build?
03
Technology
How should we build it?
04
Organization
Who needs to build it?
05
Operations
How do we run it reliably?
06
Leadership
How do we make the organization better every year?
The job isn’t to own all of these decisions. It’s to build an organization capable of making them well.
What I’ve led
The experience behind the philosophy
Engineering organizations
Led and scaled global engineering organizations of 100+ engineers, including engineering managers and senior technical leaders.
Cloud & platform transformation
Led major AWS migration and modernization programs involving 200+ servers, platform consolidation and modernization of legacy systems.
AI & search
Built enterprise natural-language search using LLMs, RAG, embeddings and vector search, bringing modern AI capabilities into existing enterprise workflows.
Data platforms
Led modernization involving Kafka, EMR, dbt and cloud data architecture, improving how information moved across products and organizations.
SaaS modernization
Modernized legacy SaaS platforms toward microservices, serverless and event-driven architectures while balancing migration risk with continued product delivery.
Operational excellence
Led initiatives across incident management, observability, BCP/DR, security, compliance and production reliability.
How I think about AI
AI is a capability, not a strategy.
Every company is asking where AI fits. The more useful question is where AI can materially change the economics or experience of the business.
I’ve worked hands-on with LLMs, RAG, embeddings and vector search, but I care less about proving we can use AI than about finding where it creates durable value. That means weighing both sides:
The goal is to become a better company using AI where it makes sense — not to become an “AI company.”
The opportunity
Automation, discovery, productivity, personalization and new products.
The reality
Cost, evaluation, reliability, security, data quality and operational complexity.
About
Conrad Lotz
I’m a technology executive and engineering leader with 15+ years of experience building software platforms, modernizing technology organizations and leading global engineering teams. My career has crossed SaaS, fintech, capital markets, cloud infrastructure, data platforms and AI.
I’ve led organizations of more than 100 engineers, managed multimillion-dollar technology portfolios, driven major cloud and platform transformations, and stayed close enough to the technology to understand the architectural decisions behind them.
Outside my corporate roles, I coach software engineers and engineering leaders. Teaching has reinforced something I’ve believed throughout my career: strong technology organizations are ultimately built by developing strong people.
2020 – present
Director of Software Engineering
S&P Global
Leads a global organization of 100+ engineers, accountable for the full software development lifecycle across multiple SaaS platforms.
Earlier
Senior engineering roles
Coronation Fund Managers · Shoprite Group · MBV eQuSyS
Built and led delivery of financial and retail systems, from feature development and UI work to project leadership.
Education
National Diploma, Information Technology
Nelson Mandela University
Followed by further study in financial markets and computational investing.
- Full profile on LinkedIn
Latest writing
Thinking out loud
STAR Method: Make yourself more interesting when you speak
“People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.” – Simon Sinek (adapted to interviews: great candidates don’t just list skills. They tell stories...
Applicant Tracking Systems: What Job Seekers Actually Need to Know in 2026
Separating fact from fear — how ATS really works, who uses it, what it costs, and how to make it work for you.
Should I Be Concerned About AI as a Software Engineer?
To be of a purist mindset and avoiding AI because you feel it does not make you a real developer/engineer is a mistake you will regret in the short...
Let’s talk technology leadership
Always glad to compare notes on engineering organizations, platform strategy and growing the people who do the work.