Engineering Manager

About the role

You will lead a focused product engineering team responsible for the core infrastructure that powers Cardless, shaping how credit card and loyalty programs are built and operated for our partners. You will own the end to end delivery of critical features, ensuring that the platform remains reliable, scalable, and secure under real transaction loads. You will act as a hands on technical leader, diving into system design for complex payments and money movement challenges while establishing the frameworks that allow your team to operate autonomously. You will partner closely with the Head of Engineering to define hiring strategies, technical roadmaps, and long term organizational plans that align with our ambitious growth goals. You will work directly with external partners, compliance teams, and cross functional stakeholders to translate intricate requirements into robust, production grade systems. You will bring clarity to ambiguous problems by defining the right questions, setting technical standards, and fostering a culture where the team can move quickly without compromising quality. You will champion the thoughtful adoption of AI tooling across the team, establishing standards for how these tools enhance developer productivity and evolve our engineering practices.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Lead and grow a high performing engineering team at the intersection of payments, money movement, and financial infrastructure.
• Own the technical health, execution, and culture of your team, guiding everything from sprint planning to architectural direction.
• Dive deep into system design and complex technical decisions as a hands on partner, while stepping back to implement frameworks that enable autonomous scale.
• Collaborate with the Head of Engineering on hiring strategy, technical roadmap, and organizational planning to support long term ambitions.
• Engage directly with external partners, compliance, and cross functional stakeholders to convert complex requirements into reliable systems.
• Define problems in ambiguous situations, set technical standards, and build a team capable of moving fast without breaking critical systems.
• Drive the thoughtful integration of AI tooling to boost developer productivity and to shape how engineering solutions are designed and built.
• Mentor engineers, elevate technical craft, and create an environment where continuous learning and ownership are expected.
• Balance delivery pressure with quality, ensuring code, communication, and outcomes meet the high standards expected at Cardless.
• Represent the team in cross company initiatives, aligning priorities and sharing insights to drive coherent platform evolution.
• Partner with security and compliance leaders to ensure all solutions adhere to regulatory requirements and industry best practices.
• Measure and improve team health, identifying barriers to productivity and enabling sustainable, high quality execution.
• Facilitate clear prioritization discussions, balancing strategic platform work with urgent partner and customer demands.
• Contribute to the broader engineering culture by sharing practices that enable consistency, resilience, and innovation across product teams.

Requirements

• Bring several years of engineering management experience, ideally leading backend teams that build complex, high scale systems.
• Engage credibly in system design discussions, challenging architectural choices and earning the trust of senior engineers.
• Demonstrate experience in fintech, payments, credit or debit card infrastructure, or money movement, understanding the compliance and regulatory realities of this space.
• Show a track record of scaling teams as well as systems, including growing people, defining processes, and building cultures that consistently ship.
• Exhibit strong cross functional instincts, navigating ambiguity comfortably alongside product, compliance, operations, and external partners.
• Maintain high standards for quality in code, communication, and outcomes, reflecting a disciplined approach to engineering excellence.
• Embrace the evolving role of AI in software development, with a track record of applying these tools to improve developer productivity and system design.
• Thrive in a fast moving environment where ownership, clarity, and results oriented execution are essential.

Nice to have

• Preferred familiarity with developer productivity tools and how they integrate into modern engineering workflows.
• Experience contributing to open source or technical communities that demonstrate thought leadership.
• Exposure to loyalty and rewards programs within consumer platforms.

Practical notes

This role requires 5 days a week in office located in San Francisco, CA.