IT STARTS HERE

Santander (www.santander.com) is evolving from a global, high-impact brand into a technology-driven organization, and our people are at the heart of this journey. Together, we are driving a customer-centric transformation that values bold thinking, innovation, and the courage to challenge what’s possible.

This is more than a strategic shift. It’s a chance for driven professionals to grow, learn, and make a real difference.

Our mission is to contribute to help more people and businesses prosper. We embrace a strong risk culture and all our professionals at all levels are expected to take a proactive and responsible approach toward risk management.

Our Chief Data & Artificial Intelligence Officer (CDAIO) division is building a world-class AI & Data team to make a difference in the lives of over 170 million people worldwide, through one of the largest banks in the world.

We are undergoing one of the biggest transformations in our history and technology is at the heart of our strategy. Join our team to play a part in one of the most important technological projects for the financial sector in the world.

THE DIFFERENCE YOU MAKE

Chief Data & Artificial Intelligence Officer (CDAIO) is looking for a Migration Leader based out of Boadilla del Monte (Madrid).

In this role, you will lead the planning, coordination, governance, and execution of a large-scale strategic Data & AI migration and transformation program, ensuring a controlled transition from the current platform landscape towards a future cloud-native architecture while minimizing business disruption and operational risk.

We’re shaping the way we work through innovation, cutting-edge technology, collaboration and the freedom to explore new ideas. To succeed in this role, you will be responsible for:

• Define and maintain the migration roadmap, including migration waves, sequencing strategy, execution plans, governance, milestones, and success criteria.
• Coordinate migration planning and execution across multiple technology domains and workstreams, ensuring alignment with target architecture principles and transformation objectives.
• Identify, assess, and manage migration dependencies, risks, issues, and blockers, driving mitigation and corrective actions and escalating critical matters through the appropriate governance channels.
• Ensure readiness of environments, tooling, documentation, and operational support processes, and support the planning and execution of cutover and transition activities.
• Act as the primary coordination point for migration activities, aligning business, architecture, engineering, operations, external delivery partners, and system integrators.
• Provide regular status reporting to senior stakeholders and support governance boards, steering committees, and executive reviews.
• Support the modernization of data, analytics, and technology platforms and drive adoption of cloud-native practices and operational models.
• Ensure migration activities comply with security, regulatory, risk, and governance requirements, and contribute to business case development and value realization tracking.

WHAT YOU’LL BRING

Our people are our greatest strength. Every individual contributes unique perspectives that make us stronger as a team and as an organization. We’re enabling teams to go beyond by valuing who they are and empowering what they bring.

The following requirements represent the knowledge, skills, and abilities essential for success in this role. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Professional Experience

• 10+ years of experience delivering large-scale technology transformation programs. (Mandatory)
• Proven track record leading complex migration initiatives. (Mandatory)
• Strong experience in enterprise data and analytics environments. (Mandatory)
• Experience managing multiple stakeholders across business and technology functions. (Mandatory)
• Experience coordinating external delivery partners and system integrators. (Mandatory)
• Experience with cloud migration programs. (Preferred)
• Experience with modern data platforms, analytics platforms, and distributed architectures. (Preferred)
• Experience in highly regulated industries. (Preferred)
• Experience leading migration assessments and migration factories. (Preferred)

Education

• No specific education requirement was specified in the source Job Description. (Preferred)

Languages

• No specific language requirement was specified in the source Job Description. (Preferred)

Hard Skills

• Strong knowledge of migration methodologies. (Mandatory)
• Strong knowledge of cloud-native architectures and data platform modernization. (Mandatory)
• Strong capability in dependency mapping and migration sequencing. (Mandatory)
• Experience with release and cutover management. (Mandatory)
• Strong knowledge of program governance and risk management frameworks. (Mandatory)
• Knowledge of security and compliance controls. (Mandatory)
• Experience with Agile delivery models. (Mandatory)

Soft Skills

• Strategic thinking. (Mandatory)
• Excellent executive communication and presentation skills. (Mandatory)
• Structured problem solving. (Mandatory)
• Strong stakeholder influence. (Mandatory)
• Decision making under uncertainty. (Mandatory)
• Strong risk management capability. (Mandatory)
• Team leadership. (Mandatory)
• Cross-functional collaboration. (Mandatory)

WE VALUE YOUR IMPACT

Your contribution matters, and it’s recognized. You can expect a fair, competitive reward package that reflects the impact you create and the value you deliver. But we know rewards go beyond numbers.

• We’re enabling our teams to go beyond through global opportunities and broad career paths.
• Flexibility that works. Enjoy a hybrid working model—some days remote, some days onsite with your team—along with flexible hours.
• Learning for life. Access hundreds of courses on our platforms, including exclusive access to our global learning space: Santander Open Academy (www.santanderopenacademy.com)
• Frontier exposure. Work directly with Anthropic, Sakana AI, AWS, CMU, ICMAT and INRIA. You will be at the cutting edge of agentic AI in European banking before the rest of the market knows it exists.
• Research impact. If your work deserves a paper, we publish it. The lab has active publications on arXiv. This is not a research lab — but research is not off the table.
• Competitive rewards. Receive a highly competitive salary with performance-based bonuses, motivating you to keep growing with us.
• Financial advantages. Benefit from preferential banking terms, special interest rates on loans, life insurance, and more.
• Your health is our priority. Through BeHealthy, our global wellness programme, we promote holistic wellbeing.
• We know family is everything. That’s why we offer childcare support and family-friendly programmes tailored to each life stage.
• Always by your side. Get access to Santander Contigo, our program for employees and their families offering legal, emotional, and administrative advisory services.
• Extra benefits. Gym/WellHub membership, medical centers in some of our facilities, meal subsidy, parking, shuttle service from various points in Madrid, as well as exclusive discounts and offers for Santander employees.

And that’s only the beginning—we’ll tell you more when you join!

We’re here to keep you motivated, help you reach your goals, and celebrate your progress, every step of the way.

LOCAL COMPLIANCE

Santander is proud of being an organization where there are equal opportunities regardless of age, gender, disability, civil status, race, religion or sexual orientation. We are committed to providing an inclusive and accessible application process for all candidates.

WHAT TO DO NEXT

If this sounds like a role you are interested in, then please apply.

READY TO TAKE THE NEXT STEP IN YOUR JOURNEY?