Experience: 8–12 years

Reports to: CTO / Founder

Why this role exists (read this carefully)

We are past the “everyone codes and vibes” stage. This role exists to turn engineering effort into predictable business outcomes. If you’re looking to just manage Jira tickets or coast on past tech glory—don’t apply.

What you’ll actually do (not what you’ll say in interviews)

1. Own delivery. No excuses.

• End-to-end ownership of sprint planning, execution, and release quality
• Ruthlessly remove blockers—technical, people, or process
• Ensure timelines are realistic and met
• If delivery slips, you explain why and what changes, not who to blame

2. Build and lead engineers (not babysit)

• Hire, mentor, and retain strong engineers
• Identify underperformers early and act decisively
• Set engineering standards for code quality, reviews, testing, and documentation
• Turn good engineers into dependable ones

3. Stay technical (this is non-negotiable)

• Hands-on involvement in architecture and critical code paths
• Review PRs and challenge bad design decisions
• Make pragmatic tech trade-offs—no overengineering for ego
• Ensure systems scale without becoming fragile or unmaintainable

4. Partner with product & business

• Translate product requirements into clear technical plans
• Push back on vague specs and unrealistic timelines
• Balance speed vs stability like a grown-up
• Align engineering priorities with revenue, customers, and ops

5. Improve systems, not just ship features

• Continuously improve CI/CD, infra, monitoring, and incident response
• Reduce tech debt deliberately—not “when we have time”
• Build processes that survive people churn

What you must bring to the table

Experience & skills

• 8–12 years of software development experience
• 3+ years leading teams (5–15 engineers)
• Strong background in web/backend systems (Node.js / Java / Python / similar)
• Solid understanding of databases, APIs, cloud infrastructure (AWS/GCP/Azure)
• Proven track record of shipping production software at scale

Mindset (this matters more than tools)

• You take ownership, not credit
• You’re comfortable saying “no” and defending it
• You hate chaos but don’t worship process
• You think in systems, not tasks
• You care about business impact—not just clean code

What will disqualify you instantly

• “I don’t code anymore”
• Blaming product, QA, or juniors for delivery failures
• Obsession with titles over outcomes
• Waiting for instructions instead of taking charge
• Overengineering to look smart

What success looks like in 12 months

• Delivery is predictable
• Engineers trust your decisions
• Product teams want to work with you
• Tech debt is controlled, not exploding
• You’ve built at least one strong successor under you