Head of Threat Intelligence & Detection Engineering

As the Head of Threat Intelligence and Detection Engineering at Tesco, you will provide strategic leadership for two of the most critical pillars of cyber defence, ensuring proactive protection of a retail ecosystem that serves millions of customers globally. You will define and drive the long-term vision for operationalising threat intelligence into prioritised detection use cases and detection capabilities, aligning security investments with Tesco’s business priorities. Operating at a senior leadership level, you will shape the organisation’s ability to anticipate, detect, and respond to evolving threats, embedding innovation, resilience, and customer-first outcomes across the enterprise. You will lead the Threat Intelligence and Detection Engineering functions, including ownership of intelligence platforms, detection platforms, and associated engineering practices, ensuring measurable improvements in detection coverage, fidelity, and time-to-detect.

• Set the long-term vision and strategy for Threat Intelligence and Detection Engineering, aligning capabilities with Tesco’s global risk landscape and business priorities.
• Grow and maintain detection and intelligence capabilities across global enterprise environments. Build and evolve intelligence-led and detection engineering functions to ensure scalable, resilient, and high-performing cyber defence capabilities.
• Champion the adoption of Applied Artificial Intelligence (AI) and responsible AI governance to enhance threat intelligence, detection accuracy, and operational efficiency.
• Act as a trusted advisor to senior leadership and executive stakeholders, translating complex threat landscapes into clear, actionable business insights.
• Own budgets, vendor relationships, and performance outcomes, ensuring optimal resource allocation and a measurable return on security investment.
• Partner across Cyber Defence, Technology, and Business teams to deliver integrated, customer-first security outcomes, promoting a culture of inclusion and shared accountability.
• Drive organisational change, embedding modern engineering practices, including detection-as-code, version-controlled pipelines, automated testing, and continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) for detection content, product-centric delivery, and continuous improvement across detection and intelligence capabilities.
• Ensure intelligence is operationalised into detections and that detection outputs are actionable within Incident Investigation & Response (IIR), maintaining a closed feedback loop.
• Accountable for measurable improvements in:
  • Detection coverage across priority threat scenarios
  • Detection fidelity (false positive reduction)
  • Mean Time to Detect (MTTD)
  • Intelligence utilisation rates in detection and response

• Demonstrable expertise in strategic thinking and problem solving, with the ability to define and execute long-term cyber defence strategies at enterprise scale.
• Strong understanding of how threat intelligence and detection engineering capabilities operate and integrate to deliver proactive cyber defence outcomes.
• Proven ability to communicate complex cyber risk concepts clearly and influence stakeholders up to executive and board level.
• Demonstrable understanding of how Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be applied within cyber defence, alongside knowledge of governance, compliance, and responsible AI principles.
• Broad understanding of enterprise technology environments and retail systems, with the ability to connect cyber risk to customer and operational impact.
• Experience managing budgets, procurement processes, and third-party relationships, ensuring value-driven decision-making.
• Experience embracing and enabling change, driving adoption of modern practices such as product-led delivery, engineering rigour, and automation.
• Strong commitment to fostering inclusive environments and collaborating effectively across diverse teams, ensuring a culture where innovation and belonging drive performance.
• Demonstrated curiosity and engagement with the wider cybersecurity profession, contributing to industry knowledge and continuous learning

You might know us as a supermarket, technology company or even for our award-winning mobile network. Truth is, we’re all of those things, and much more. Our colleagues work with one goal in mind, helping to make every day a little better for our customers, colleagues and communities all over the world. No two customers are the same, neither are our colleagues. At Tesco, we champion a balance that lets you thrive both in and out of work. Spend 60% of your week collaborating with colleagues at our office locations or local sites and the rest remotely. Whether you're just kicking off your career, juggling passions, or navigating big life events, we're here to support you. We always welcome a conversation about flexible working, so talk to us throughout your application about how we can support. We're proud to be an accredited Disability Confident Leader, where everyone’s welcome. That’s why we commit to providing a fully inclusive and accessible recruitment process. If you need support with your application, click here for more information. And if you're interested in joining our team but don't tick every box, don't let that hold you back from applying.