Director of Engineering

Handtevy

$130K — $160K *
Information Technology
8 - 10 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • 10+ years in software engineering, including 3+ years in leadership at a SaaS company
  • Experience managing engineering teams transitioning from startup to growth-stage delivery
  • Proven track record managing high-performing engineering and QA teams
  • Strong technical background for evaluating architectural trade-offs in web/mobile SaaS
  • Exceptional communication skills for diverse audiences, from C-suite to engineers
  • Fluency or openness to AI-assisted development practices
  • Experience improving Agile/Scrum without excessive bureaucracy

Responsibilities

  • Lead and develop engineering and QA teams through coaching and growth initiatives
  • Partner with product leadership to translate roadmaps into actionable engineering plans
  • Enhance engineering execution by owning and improving the delivery operating system
  • Establish clear ownership and expectations across product and technical domains
  • Drive quality and reliability through improved engineering practices and KPIs

Benefits

  • Opportunity to shape and influence a high-impact engineering organization
  • Collaborative culture focused on continuous improvement and team growth
  • Exposure to strategic decision-making and architectural discussions
  • Direct impact on technology that aids in life-saving solutions
Full Job Description
THE OPPORTUNITY
Every second in the field counts, and the systems that power our clinicians need to be built, led, and scaled with the same precision they depend on.

We are looking for a Director of Engineering to join our leadership team as we scale. This is a people-first, communication-forward leadership position for someone who knows how to build great teams and run a disciplined delivery operation across our web, mobile, and backend systems. Someone who raises the bar on engineering practices and translates strategy into execution without losing either side in the process.

You should be technical enough to understand the architecture, evaluate trade-offs, and pressure-test estimates. You don't need to write production code in this role, but you need to have written it.

You'll report directly to our CTO and work closely with our Senior Engineering Leads and our Director of Product, who owns the roadmap. Your job is to make the whole system work: keeping the team focused, the commitments honest, and the business informed.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

Lead & Develop the Engineering and QA Teams
• Manage, coach, and grow our engineering and QA teams, owning hiring, performance management, and career development
• Foster a culture of ownership, accountability, and continuous improvement where good engineers stay and grow
• Partner with our Senior Engineering Leads to ensure engineers have the support and clarity to do their best work

Partner with Product & Represent Engineering to the Business
• Be the engineering counterpart to our Director of Product: Product owns the what and why, you own the how, when, and who. Together you own the planning seam between roadmap and execution
• Translate the product roadmap into clear engineering plans with real estimates and explicit trade-offs, and translate engineering constraints and risk back into business language leadership can act on
• Push back constructively when scope or timelines are unrealistic; offer alternatives, not just problems
• Engage engineering early in product discovery so feasibility and effort shape requirements before they are locked
• Establish and enforce a practical definition of ready for engineering work, ensuring features have clear scope, acceptance criteria, technical considerations, test expectations, and trade-offs before development begins

Drive Delivery & Engineering Execution
• Own and continuously improve the engineering operating system, including the SDLC, planning, sprint execution, release process, quality practices, and delivery rhythm, while developing leads so the system does not depend on one person
• Remove blockers proactively and keep the team moving without becoming a bottleneck yourself
• Establish clear ownership across product and technical domains, ensuring engineers understand their areas of responsibility, decision-making expectations, and when broader cross-functional alignment is needed
• Raise the bar on release confidence: drive quality and reliability across the platform, including test automation strategy, incident response, and production monitoring
• Track and improve engineering KPIs: velocity, reliability, incident response, and tech debt Partner on Strategy & Architecture
• Work with the CTO to align engineering execution with business goals and long-term product vision
• Own the engineering-side contributions to our SOC 2 posture: secure development practices, code-level controls, and audit-ready engineering processes, in partnership with the CTO who owns the overall program
• Co-evaluate architectural trade-offs with the CTO. There is no dedicated architect on the team, so this role carries real technical authority and accountability for how the platform is built and scaled
• Partner with the CTO on vendor relationships, tooling decisions, and team growth planning

YOUR ROLE ON THE TEAM
You're joining a lean, high-impact engineering organization. Our CTO sets the technical vision and has direct ownership of the Cloud and DevOps function. Our Director of Product owns the roadmap, prioritization, and the voice of the customer. Our Senior Engineering Leads drive hands-on execution with the engineering team. You are the leader who makes delivery work: the person who builds the team, keeps commitments achievable, and makes sure the rest of the business always knows where things stand.

Software Engineering and QA report to you. While Cloud and DevOps report through the CTO, you are accountable for application delivery readiness and work closely with DevOps to ensure releases, observability, CI/CD, and incident response support predictable product delivery. Your partnership with the Director of Product is the most important working relationship in this role. When Product and Engineering are aligned, the whole company moves faster.

This is a role for someone who gets energy from clarity. From turning an ambitious roadmap into crisp engineering plans, from having hard conversations early so the team isn't scrambling later, and from building the kind of team culture where good engineers stay and grow.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

*MUST-HAVES
• 10+ years in software engineering, including 3+ years in an engineering leadership role at a SaaS company
• Experience managing and growing a growing engineering team through a transition from startup-style execution to more structured growth-stage delivery
• Proven track record managing high-performing engineering teams, including QA functions and release quality
• Deep enough technical background to evaluate architectural trade-offs in a modern web/mobile SaaS stack
• Exceptional communicator equally comfortable presenting to the C-suite and collaborating with a senior engineer
• Experience working as the engineering-side partner to product leadership: turning roadmaps into execution plans and business priorities into sprint reality
• Ability to hold technical quality and delivery velocity simultaneously without sacrificing either
• Genuine fluency with, or strong openness to, AI-assisted development practices and how they change team productivity
• Experience improving Agile/Scrum practices in a growing engineering organization without adding unnecessary bureaucracy
• Authorized to work in the United States

*NICE TO HAVES
• Background in healthcare, emergency services, or safety-critical SaaS
• Experience scaling engineering teams from startup to growth stage
• Exposure to mobile-first product development
• Familiarity with Cloud and distributed environments
• Experience working in SOC 2 or similarly compliance-driven environments

THE RIGHT FIT
• You can walk into a planning session with the Director of Product and a sprint review with engineers on the same day, and hold your own in both rooms.
• You believe that great engineering leadership is mostly communication and trust, and you have the track record to prove it.
• You say no early, with alternatives attached, instead of agreeing in the meeting and letting the team fail quietly.
• You stay calm when priorities shift, and you help your team do the same.
• You take ownership without micromanaging. You know the difference.
• You care about the mission. Technology that helps save lives deserves engineering leadership that takes it seriously.

HOW TO APPLY
Send us a brief intro and your resume. We're most interested in understanding how you've worked with product leadership: the moments where alignment broke down, and how you rebuilt it. Tell us about a time you had to push back on a roadmap, or a time you had to explain an engineering constraint to a non-technical stakeholder and get their buy-in.

Compensation is competitive and commensurate with experience. Candidates must be authorized to work in the United States. We are not able to provide visa sponsorship at this time.

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