Director of Software Development
About the Role
Our client is seeking a Director of Software Development will lead and grow their engineering team, setting technical direction while remaining close enough to the code to guide decision-making, remove technical roadblocks, and contribute when needed. This is a hands-on leadership role that combines people management, technical strategy, and software delivery.
The ideal candidate will bring a strong engineering background along with a forward-looking understanding of how AI technologies are transforming the software development lifecycle (SDLC), including code generation, testing, code review, documentation, and deployment. You will work closely with cross-functional stakeholders to deliver scalable, reliable, and secure software solutions.
What You'll Do
- Lead, mentor, and grow a software development team, building processes and a culture that scale with organizational growth.
- Recruit, hire, and develop engineers while establishing clear career paths and performance expectations.
- Define technical direction and architectural standards across the engineering organization in partnership with senior technical and business stakeholders.
- Stay hands-on by reviewing code, contributing to critical projects, and supporting implementation efforts when needed.
- Evaluate and integrate AI-assisted development tools and practices, including AI-powered code generation, automated testing, AI-assisted code review, and developer productivity solutions.
- Own software delivery by planning roadmaps, managing technical risk, and ensuring reliable execution.
- Champion engineering best practices related to code quality, testing, security, documentation, maintainability, and operational excellence.
- Partner with cross-functional teams to align technical execution with organizational objectives.
- Guide decisions related to engineering platforms, development tooling, infrastructure, and development workflows.
- Communicate team performance, delivery progress, and technical risks to senior leadership.
What We're Looking For
- 5+ years of experience growing and leading software development teams, including hiring, mentoring, coaching, and performance management.
- Proven ability to write, review, and maintain production-quality software; this is not a purely managerial role.
- Strong software engineering fundamentals and experience designing and architecting scalable, secure, and maintainable systems.
- Current, working knowledge of how AI technologies are being applied across the SDLC, including code generation, testing, code review, documentation, and deployment, with experience evaluating or implementing these capabilities within engineering teams.
- Experience leading teams through periods of growth, transformation, or increasing scale.
- Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to translate complex technical concepts for diverse audiences.
- Experience working in environments that require strong attention to reliability, security, governance, or operational standards is considered an asset.
- Comfort operating in a fast-moving environment where priorities may evolve over time.
Nice to Have
- Experience building and operating distributed systems at scale.
- Familiarity with cloud-native architectures, modern DevOps practices, and continuous delivery methodologies.
- Experience supporting globally distributed applications or multi-region deployments.
- Exposure to organizations with elevated security, governance, compliance, or operational requirements
