Vice President, Digital, Customer and Commercial Platforms

Essential Functions

• Lead Digital Transformation Execution
  • Lead the execution of the company’s digital transformation initiatives across customer-facing platforms and services.
  • Drive modernization of digital capabilities to support a seamless, scalable, and premium customer experience.
  • Translate product strategy and business priorities into technology delivery plans, platform roadmaps, and engineering execution.
  • Ensure customer-facing technology platforms are designed to support growth, agility, and continuous innovation.
• Own Digital, CRM, and Reservation Platform Engineering
  • Oversee the engineering, enhancement, and operational performance of:
    • Digital platforms (web, mobile, guest-facing digital services)
    • CRM platforms and related customer technologies
    • Reservation and booking platforms - led by an integrated domain owner; commercial priorities (inventory, fares, availability) are set by Revenue Management, and the platform integrates with the RM / pricing system owned in Product
  • Ensure these platforms are reliable, scalable, secure, and integrated end to end.
  • Drive simplification and rationalization of fragmented customer technologies where needed.
• Deliver an Integrated Customer Platform Ecosystem
  • Ensure strong integration and orchestration across digital, CRM, and reservation platforms to support a connected customer journey.
  • Partner with Enterprise Platforms & Integration, Data & Analytics, and Product leaders to deliver cohesive capabilities across the ecosystem.
  • Eliminate gaps between front-end experiences and backend transactions, customer, and operational systems.
  • Ensure alignment with enterprise integration patterns, APIs, and event-driven architectures in partnership with Enterprise Platforms & Integration.
• Establish Engineering and Platform Excellence
  • Build and lead high-performing engineering and platform teams across multiple customer technology domains.
  • Establish modern engineering practices, including API-first design, platform scalability, DevOps, CI/CD, and operational readiness.
  • Promote strong technical architecture, design discipline, code quality, release management, and system observability.
  • Ensure solutions are built for reliability, performance, and maintainability over time.
  • Drive adoption of platform engineering principles to enable reusable services, scalability, and faster delivery across customer-facing systems.
• Drive Operational Reliability and Service Performance
  • Own platform performance, availability, and stability across all customer-facing systems.
  • Partner with Infrastructure, Managed Services, Security, and QA teams to ensure high service quality and operational resilience.
  • Define and track KPIs and SLAs related to platform uptime, performance, defects, release stability, and customer impact.
  • Ensure customer platforms are designed to operate effectively across both shoreside and shipboard environments, including constraints related to connectivity, performance, and synchronization. The shipboard technology estate itself is owned by a separate function; this role partners to ensure continuity across the boundary.
• Lead Vendors, Partners, and Delivery Execution
  • Oversee strategic delivery partners, system integrators, and platform vendors supporting digital, CRM, and reservation technologies.
  • Ensure strong governance across delivery, quality, velocity, and cost.
  • Drive vendor accountability and ensure third-party delivery aligns with architectural, operational, and business expectations.
• Build a Strong Leadership Team and Operating Model
  • Lead and develop the senior leaders responsible for Digital Technologies, CRM Technologies, and Reservation Systems.
  • Foster a platform-oriented, engineering-led, customer-centric culture focused on accountability and business impact.
  • Build an operating model that supports efficient collaboration with Product, Data, Enterprise Platforms, Infrastructure, and Shipboard Technology teams.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, or a related field required.
• 12+ years of progressive experience in technology leadership, with significant experience in digital platforms, customer technologies, and large-scale transformation.
• Minimum of 5 years in a senior technology leadership role with responsibility for complex delivery teams and business-critical platforms
• Proven success leading engineering and platform delivery teams across multiple integrated technology domains.
• Demonstrated experience leading digital transformation initiatives and large-scale technology programs
• Experience managing integrated technology environments involving digital, CRM, and transactional or booking-related platforms
• Strong understanding of system integration, platform modernization, and operational excellence.
• Demonstrated experience leading cross-functional teams, managing partners/vendors, and operating at executive level.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree preferred
• Experience in hospitality, travel, cruise, luxury services, or similarly customer-intensive industries.
• Familiarity with high-availability, service-critical environments.
• Experience working across globally distributed or hybrid delivery models.
• Exposure to customer data, personalization, and AI-enabled platform evolution.

Key Competencies

• Strong technology and engineering leadership
• Deep understanding of digital transformation and customer platform ecosystems
• Broad understanding of platform architecture, systems integration, application delivery, and operational support
• Platform thinking with an execution-oriented mindset
• Ability to lead both strategy translation and operational delivery
• Strong stakeholder management and executive communication
• High accountability, technical credibility, and delivery discipline

Success Measures

Success in this role will be measured by:

• Delivery of digital transformation initiatives aligned to business priorities
• Stability, scalability, and performance of digital, CRM, and reservation platforms
• Improved end-to-end customer platform integration and reduced fragmentation
• Faster and more reliable technology delivery
• Strong engineering team performance and leadership maturity
• Measurable improvements in customer experience, platform quality, and operational resilience
• Contribution to measurable business outcomes including customer engagement, conversion, and operational efficiency