JD JIHAD DIBPhD | CEng | MIET
Engineering leadership

Jihad Dib.

PhD | CEng | MIET
Engineering Manager | Software Architect | Agentic AI

I'm an engineering manager and Chartered Engineer with over 10 years of experience building software and leading teams, and a PhD in Artificial Intelligence and Deep Learning. I currently lead an engineering team of nine at APCOA Parking, where our C# and .NET platform handles more than 7 million transactions a day across the UK and the EU.

My background is hands-on: C#, .NET and C/C++, with a record of making applications faster, releases safer and teams more effective. I build teams that deliver predictably through clear standards, regular coaching and close work with product, design and QA, and I have taken agentic AI from experiments into everyday use by an engineering team.

Experience Full CV LinkedIn
01 / Profile

Leadership with
engineering depth.

I lead teams with clear goals, honest feedback and real room to grow. I also stay close enough to the code to review architecture, dig into performance problems and judge new tools on what they actually do for the team.

Team leadership

One-to-ones, performance reviews and development plans, coaching engineers into senior responsibilities, and delivery that stays predictable.

Engineering and performance

C#, .NET and C/C++, architecture and code reviews, and performance work on systems that handle millions of transactions a day.

Agentic AI in delivery

Claude Code across the development lifecycle, a self-hosted AI software engineer, and LLM code review and checks in the CI pipeline.

7M+Transactions a dayHandled by the .NET SaaS platform my team runs at APCOA, across the UK and the EU.
60%Less deployment effortAfter replacing manual releases with automated, containerised CI/CD.
40%Fewer post-release errorsFrom the same change, backed by mandatory pull requests and end-to-end tests.
20People ledIT and software team at Pearl Healthcare Group. A team of nine at APCOA today.
02 / Career

Experience.

From telecoms and systems administration to engineering management, with hands-on software, cloud and AI work throughout.

2025 to PresentAPCOA Parking
Uxbridge, London

Engineering Manager

Team leadership | C# and .NET | Azure | Agentic AI | DevOps

I lead an engineering team of nine (seven direct reports and two dotted-line) covering developers, software architects, automation testers and technical authors. We own the SaaS platform used by APCOA's operational teams worldwide.

  • Run one-to-ones, performance reviews and personal development plans, and coach engineers into more senior responsibilities.
  • Raised engineering standards with architecture design reviews, hands-on code reviews, shared coding guidelines and mandatory pull requests.
  • Scope and prioritise the roadmap with product, design, QA and senior stakeholders, delivering in small increments and tracking velocity to flag risks early.
  • Own the C#, ASP.NET, Blazor and .NET MAUI platform, which handles more than 7 million transactions a day.
  • Led performance work on the core .NET services, from profiling and query tuning to caching, keeping response times stable as volumes grew.
  • Manage the Azure estate, and built a local replica of it so development matches production without touching live data.
  • Set up a self-hosted autonomous AI software engineer that works on scoped tickets in an isolated environment and opens pull requests for human review.
  • Introduced Claude Code across the development lifecycle, with shared project context, custom commands and team conventions.
  • Moved the team beyond basic prompting to structured agentic coding, with clear task specifications, context engineering and guardrails.
  • Added LLM code review to every pull request and AI quality checks to the CI pipeline, so human review time goes on design and architecture.
  • Replaced manual deployments with automated, containerised CI/CD, cutting deployment effort by 60% and post-release errors by 40%.
  • Brought onboarding for new developers and contractors down to under 24 hours, and introduced Playwright end-to-end tests before QA.
2024 to 2026HumanKind Ventures
Bristol

Lead Full-Stack Developer

Team leadership | AI | SaaS | AWS

Led a team of junior developers building SaaS products and bespoke AI models for healthcare features.

  • Set team KPIs, ran performance and development reviews, and supported each engineer's career progression.
  • Mentored junior developers and introduced templated documentation that improved knowledge sharing.
  • Designed, built and trained bespoke AI models for healthcare features, and integrated them into the core platform.
  • Rolled out LLM tools across the development lifecycle and trained the team to use them well.
  • Built SaaS products and RESTful APIs with .NET, PHP, TypeScript, Python, Node.js, React and Vue.js, tuning API and database performance as usage grew.
  • Managed AWS infrastructure (EC2, CloudFront, Lambda) with zero downtime during critical operational periods.
2024 to 2025Drink Warehouse UK
Ramsgate, Kent

Lead Full-Stack Developer

Team leadership | Cloud migration | CI/CD | AI

Led a team of seven full-stack developers and software engineers delivering projects across on-premises, AWS and Azure environments.

  • Set up and tracked team KPIs, and planned resourcing to deliver milestones within scope, time and budget.
  • Introduced Agile, DevOps and CI/CD practices, with Docker so every environment ran the same runtime.
  • Migrated legacy systems to Azure and AWS, improving resilience, performance and scalability.
  • Built multi-platform solutions on Linux, AWS and Azure using .NET, PHP, Python, Java and TypeScript.
  • Built RESTful APIs and integrations with Dynamics 365 and PostgreSQL.
  • Led the integration of Microsoft AI and machine learning services into data engineering work.
2015 to 2024Pearl Healthcare Group
Canterbury

IT Manager / Software Development Team Lead

Team leadership | Software delivery | Infrastructure | Security

Nine years at Pearl Healthcare Group, progressing from Systems Administrator to IT Manager and Software Development Team Lead, leading a team of 20 across IT infrastructure, security and in-house software.

  • Managed budgets of around £200,000, including IT asset management, procurement and supplier negotiation.
  • Introduced Agile Scrum to the development team, with short iterations and regular retrospectives.
  • Wrote software in C/C++, .NET, Python, PHP, MSSQL, Node.js and React, using C/C++ for hardware-facing and performance-sensitive components.
  • Built back-office systems for petty cash, staff attendance and RFID access control.
  • Built CI/CD pipelines to automate build, test and deployment.
  • Managed cyber security, data protection and incident response.
  • Led the rollout of remote working equipment during COVID-19 with minimal disruption to the business.
  • Wrote IT policies and SOPs tied to performance metrics and SLAs.
2013 to 2023J-Telecom
Tripoli, Lebanon

Founder

Entrepreneurship | Telecoms | VoIP | Hosted PBX

Founded a VoIP, hosted PBX and bulk SMS provider and grew it into Lebanon's leading international communications provider and mobile dealer.

  • Set the commercial and technical direction of the business.
  • Set up Asterisk, FreeSWITCH and VoIP Switch gateways and a proprietary SMS gateway.
  • Deployed virtual PBX systems for customers with smart call routing and error handling.
  • Managed networks, databases, IT infrastructure, VoIP phones and cloud AI-based IVR systems.
2012 to 2023Earlier career

Telecoms, Engineering and Academic Roles

University of Kent | Books2africa UK | Ammar Electronics | ALFA | Touch

Early roles in telecoms network planning, plus teaching and mentoring at the University of Kent alongside my studies.

  • Demonstrator, University of Kent (2019 to 2023)
  • Academic Peer Mentor, University of Kent (2016 to 2018)
  • Logistics Assistant, Books2africa UK (2015)
  • Administrator, Ammar Electronics (2014)
  • Radio and Network Planning Unit Assistant, ALFA Telecommunications (2013)
  • Network Planning Unit Assistant, Touch Telecommunications (2012)
03 / Capabilities

What I bring
to a team.

The skills I use day to day, and what each one looks like in practice.

01

Engineering Team Leadership

Teams of up to 20, currently a team of nine at APCOA, with clear goals and real ownership.

02

Coaching & Career Development

One-to-ones, development plans and coaching engineers into senior responsibilities.

03

Team Health & Performance

KPIs, performance reviews and velocity tracking, used to spot overload and blockers early.

04

Delivery Planning & Risk

Scoping, prioritisation and incremental delivery, with risks raised before they hit deadlines.

05

Stakeholder Management

Explaining technical trade-offs clearly to senior stakeholders and non-technical teams.

06

C#, .NET & C/C++

Hands-on with C#, ASP.NET, Blazor and .NET MAUI, and C/C++ for hardware-facing work.

07

.NET Performance Optimisation

Profiling, query tuning and caching on services that handle millions of transactions a day.

08

Architecture & Code Review

Design and code reviews that keep standards high without slowing the team down.

09

Agentic AI Engineering

Structured agentic coding with clear task specifications, context engineering and guardrails.

10

Claude Code Across the SDLC

Claude Code from planning through to documentation, with shared context and team conventions.

11

Self-Hosted AI Software Engineer

An autonomous coding agent on company infrastructure that raises pull requests for human review.

12

LLM Code Review & CI Checks

AI review on every pull request and AI quality checks in the build pipeline.

13

CI/CD & DevOps Automation

Automated, containerised releases that cut deployment effort by 60%.

14

Azure & AWS Architecture

Cloud environments designed for scale, security and fault tolerance.

15

Cross-Functional Leadership

Working closely with product, design and QA from first idea to release.

04 / Technology

Hands-on,
across the stack.

Languages & frameworks

C#, C/C++, .NET Core, ASP.NET, Blazor, .NET MAUI, Python, TypeScript, JavaScript, PHP, Java, SQL, React, Vue.js, Node.js, Laravel, Django, Assembly, VHDL, RESTful APIs, SOLID principles, unit testing

AI engineering

Claude Code, agentic coding workflows, self-hosted AI coding agents, LLM code review, prompt and context engineering, LLM fine-tuning, machine learning, deep learning, object recognition

Cloud, DevOps & delivery

Azure, AWS, Azure DevOps, Docker, CI/CD, Git, Nginx, shell scripting, Playwright, PHPUnit, LambdaTest, Agile Scrum

Platforms & enterprise

Windows Server, Linux, Ubuntu, Debian, Raspbian, macOS, Microsoft 365, SharePoint, Power BI, Dynamics 365

Hardware & embedded

Intel Quartus Prime, FPGA design, PADS PCB design, EAGLE EDA, embedded systems, microprocessors, RFID systems, Raspberry Pi

Security & engineering tools

Cryptography, network security, SPICE, Simulink, MATLAB, TINA-TI, Wolfram Mathematica, AutoCAD

05 / Credentials

Credentials.

Professional registration, qualifications and memberships.

Professional registration

Chartered Engineer (CEng)

Engineering Council

Doctorate

PhD, Electronic Engineering

AI and Deep Learning | University of Kent | Fully funded studentship

Degree

Computer Systems Engineering

First Class Honours | University of Kent

Professional membership

Institution of Engineering and Technology

Member (MIET)

Professional membership

IEEE

Member | Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

Professional membership

Internet Society (ISOC)

Member

Research

Publications

View on ResearchGate

Languages

English | French | Arabic

Fluent in all three

06 / Education & research

Academic foundation.

2018 to 2024

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Electronic Engineering

University of Kent

AI and Deep Learning, on a fully funded studentship. Projects included AI-Based Socially-Assistive Robotics (ABSAR), an EPSRC-funded smart wheelchair that avoids positive and negative obstacles, and a Real Smart Home system using machine learning.

2015 to 2018

Bachelor in Computer
Systems Engineering

University of Kent

First Class Honours. Projects included an advanced line-following robot (The Beast) and the Smart Collision Avoidant Wheelchair (SCAW).

07 / Contact

Let's talk.

The full CV covers my career history, technical skills and projects in more detail. For anything else, email is the best way to reach me.

Email me Download CV