Senior Lead, UK Public Affairs

Shopify is seeking a senior leader to direct our Government Affairs work in the United Kingdom. Your role is to help shape a policy environment where entrepreneurs can start, run, and grow their businesses with confidence, and where Shopify can continue building the tools and infrastructure that support them. You will be Shopify's lead public policy and government engagement advocate in the UK: building influential relationships across government and the wider policymaking ecosystem, ensuring Shopify's voice is heard, respected, and differentiated in the UK's most important policy debates. You will own the full advocacy lifecycle, from intelligence gathering and policy development through stakeholder engagement, coalition building, and legislative strategy, while translating policy developments into strategic opportunities, mitigating regulatory risk, and helping shape a business environment that enables entrepreneurship and commerce to thrive.
RESPONSIBILITIES
- Develop, lead, and execute Shopify's government affairs and public policy strategy for the United Kingdom, ensuring our priorities are reflected in political, legislative, and public policy initiatives.
- Be Shopify's lead voice with UK government, Parliament, and the broader policy community: ministers, senior civil servants, MPs, regulators, trade associations, and industry peers.
- Oversee Shopify's UK trade association memberships and external advisors, keeping advocacy efforts aligned and focused.
- Lead engagement on priority policy areas affecting Shopify and our merchants, including platform regulation, artificial intelligence, payments and fintech, privacy and data protection, consumer protection, digital trade, and emerging digital policy issues.
- Coordinate engagement across the UK’s political and regulatory ecosystem, translating Shopify’s policy priorities into relevant government outreach, coalition building, and consultation responses where appropriate.
- Build strategic engagement with the UK entrepreneurship and SMB ecosystem, enabling founders, retail entrepreneurs, and trade bodies to bring real-world business perspectives into policy discussions affecting commerce and innovation.
- Develop high-impact, data-driven narratives that translate merchant experience, market realities, and Shopify's strategic priorities into messaging that lands with policymakers.
- Anticipate regulatory trends, political risks, and policy opportunities; translate them into strategic recommendations that shape Shopify's product, business, and reputation decisions.
- Brief and advise Shopify's executive team on UK political and regulatory developments and advocacy opportunities.
- Lead both proactive engagement (agenda-setting, coalition-building, thought leadership) and reactive engagement (risk mitigation, issue management) across the UK policy landscape.
- Partner cross-functionally with executives, communications, legal, product, and international public affairs colleagues to align UK positions with global strategy.
REQUIREMENTS
- 12+ years of experience in government affairs, public policy, or regulatory advocacy in technology, digital services, payments, ecommerce, or an adjacent sector.
- Deep understanding of UK government and decision-making process, with an established network across Westminster, Whitehall, and key regulators.
- Ability to engage directly and credibly with UK government and regulatory stakeholders in line with applicable lobbying and transparency requirements.
- Demonstrated track record of end-to-end ownership and delivery on high-impact UK policy and advocacy outcomes.
- Strong data literacy and ability to use research, analytics, and merchant stories to strengthen advocacy.
- Exceptional written and verbal communication skills.
- Track record of building strong relationships across government, industry, and civil society to move policy outcomes. Experience managing trade associations and external advisors.
- Reflexive AI use: you're comfortable leveraging AI tools for drafting, research, and analysis but also know when human judgment, nuance, and stakeholder expertise are essential.