About the RoleWe're looking for a hands-on Senior Engineering Manager to lead the Core team behind dbt V2, dbt's next-generation engine. This is a backfill role for an engineering leader who can combine strong software-engineering judgment with people leadership, product partnership, and the ability to navigate a highly cross-functional technical area.
The Core team is responsible for building, maintaining, and evolving the Rust-based engine that powers dbt Fusion. The team primarily works on the dbt V2 runtime itself, SQL language features powered by Static Analysis, and new ELT primitives.
The role sits at the center of several parts of the dbt product: the engine and orchestration, the IDE and developer experience, adapters and data warehouses, and our new compute offering, LakeCompute. You'll help the team make sound technical and product decisions while keeping a stable GA product moving forward.
About the TeamThe Core team is part of a broader organization that includes adapters, growth, the VS Code extension, compute, and other closely connected teams. It partners frequently with Product and with the teams responsible for orchestration, IDE experiences, adapters, and LakeCompute.
In this role, you can expect to:- Lead, coach, and develop a fluid team of approximately 8 engineers working on a critical part of the dbt product.
- Establish clarity across a technically demanding roadmap with multiple product and engineering stakeholders.
- Partner closely with Product to translate ambiguous requirements into realistic engineering scope, sequencing, and estimates.
- Help the team balance new feature development, engine maintenance, framework modernization, documentation, and the stability of a GA product.
- Guide end-to-end technical design across the engine and its integration points with orchestration, the IDE, adapters, warehouses, and late compute.
- Support engineers in making sound tradeoffs across product value, technical quality, performance, compatibility, and delivery risk.
- Actively contribute to technical design and implementation alongside the team.
- Work with peer engineering leaders to coordinate initiatives that span multiple teams and systems.
- Build an environment where engineers can do high-quality work, grow their scope, and take ownership of meaningful technical problems.
- Help shape the next phase of dbt Fusion as a language-aware transformation engine used by the broader data community.
Mandatory skills- Experience leading teams through multiple concurrent priorities and diverse integration points.
- Strong software-engineering fundamentals and prior experience as a senior/staff engineer, technical lead, or equivalent hands-on technical leader.
- Ability to lead or facilitate system design from problem definition through implementation and delivery.
- Ability to translate complex or ambiguous product requirements into credible engineering estimates, milestones, and tradeoffs.
- Demonstrated judgment in balancing roadmap delivery with reliability, maintainability, technical debt, and product quality.
- A hands-on technical orientation, including a willingness and ability to stay close to code and engineering details.
You are a good fit if you have:- Led a software team through the full development lifecycle: discovery, design, implementation, testing, release, operation, and iteration.
- Worked on products with substantial technical complexity, integration surfaces, or platform dependencies.
- Successfully partnered with Product and other engineering teams to create a stable roadmap and make difficult prioritization decisions.
- Experience in data transformation, orchestration, query engines, databases, developer tools, compilers, language tooling, or a closely related area. Direct dbt experience is helpful but not required.
- The ability to explain complex technical systems clearly to engineers, product partners, and candidates with different levels of technical depth.
- A track record of developing strong engineers while maintaining a high technical bar.
- Comfort operating in a fluid environment where team boundaries, priorities, and scope may evolve.
You'll have an edge if you have:- Experience with Rust or another systems programming language, compilers, query planning, language servers, IDE tooling, or developer platforms.
- Experience building or operating data transformation, orchestration, warehouse, or execution systems.
- Contributions to open-source projects or experience working with open standards and open technical communities.
- Familiarity with ecosystems such as Apache Arrow, Apache Iceberg, DuckDB, ADBC, or related data and execution technologies.
- Experience with SQL semantics, query optimization, transpilation across dialects, data lineage, governance, or developer-facing language features.
- Experience working in a remote-first or distributed organization with strong written communication practices.
- Startup or scale-up experience and comfort wearing multiple hats while the organization evolves.
The compensation range displayed on this job posting reflects the minimum and maximum target for new hire compensation for the target position and level, and may include sales incentives or target bonuses depending on the role. Our compensation ranges are determined by role, level, and location. Our job titles may span more than one career level. Within the range, individual compensation is determined by additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, relevant education or training, business need, market demands. The compensation range is subject to change and may be modified in the future. Your recruiter can share more about the specific compensation range for your location during the hiring process.
Oakland Pay Range
$240,901-$301,126.50 USD
Perks and Benefits- 100% employer-paid medical insurance*
- Generous paid time away from work, including paid vacation or flexible/unlimited vacation depending on role and country, plus paid sick time, inclusive parental leave, paid holidays, including a year-end Global Week of Rest, and volunteer days off.
- RSU stock grants*
- Professional development and training opportunities
- Company virtual happy hours, free food, and fun team-building activities
- Monthly cell phone stipend
- Access to an innovative mental health support platform that offers personalized care and resources in areas such as: therapy, coaching, and self-guided mindfulness exercises for all covered employees and their covered dependents.
*May vary by country and worker type - please reach out to your recruiter for more information
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