Engineering Manager

We're seeking a technically strong engineering manager to lead a team of software engineers building scalable, secure, and high-performance backend systems that power Disney's digital experiences across brands like Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN. This role is ideal for a hands-on leader who brings both deep technical expertise and a passion for growing and mentoring engineering talent.

As an engineering manager, you'll be responsible for setting direction, driving execution, and fostering a healthy team culture while also providing informed technical guidance and helping your team navigate complex engineering challenges. Your background as a seasoned engineer enables you to engage in architectural discussions, review designs with a critical eye, and make strategic decisions that align with business and technical goals.

The ideal candidate has a track record of building and supporting high-impact engineering teams, along with strong backend development experience. You don't need to write code every day, but you should be able to dive deep when needed, ask the right technical questions, and advocate for sound engineering practices. Curiosity, adaptability, and a collaborative mindset are key.

Responsibilities:

• Focus on major areas of work, typically 20% or more of the role's % of the time.
• Lead and guide a team of engineers to deliver key functionality, providing technical direction and fostering team effectiveness.
• Architect and provide design guidance for mission-critical, highly available applications, services, and libraries using Java, Python, and Scala, or other languages as appropriate.
• Build and evolve secure systems across cloud and on-prem environments, integrating with a wide variety of external systems.
• Build and maintain functionality across a range of areas: backend services, front-end UI, APIs, and command-line tools.
• Drive operational excellence through observability, alerting, and reliability practices.
• Maintain comprehensive documentation to support internal adoption, governance, and compliance auditing.

Requirements:

• Minimum and Preferred. Inclusive of licences/certs (include functional experience as well as behavioural attributes and/or leadership capabilities).
• 7+ years of professional software development experience.
• 2+ years of management/team lead experience.
• Proven experience in architecting and implementing complex, distributed systems.
• Demonstrated success delivering highly available, mission-critical services in production environments.
• Proficiency in at least one modern programming language.
• Hands-on experience with modern architectural paradigms such as microservices, event-driven systems, and containerisation (e. g., Docker, Kubernetes).
• Skilled at producing architectural artefacts, including system diagrams, technical documentation, and design decision records.
• Solid understanding of software design patterns and system design principles, with the ability to both apply best practices and critically assess them when needed.
• Proficiency with cloud platforms such as AWS, GCP, or Azure, with a preference for AWS experience.
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively across technical and non-technical teams.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related technical field preferred.
• Demonstrated curiosity and enthusiasm for exploring new technologies through hands-on experimentation or proof-of-concept projects.
• Strong interest in tackling complex, fast-evolving technology or business challenges.
• Passion for automation, scalable systems, data-driven solutions, and creative technical innovation.
• Experience designing and building internet-scale platforms or systems with high availability and performance requirements.
• Contributions to open-source projects or a portfolio of personal work (e. g., GitHub) that reflects your technical interests and abilities.

Required Education:

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, information systems, software, electrical or electronics engineering, or a comparable field of study and/or equivalent work experience.