Head of Engineering

About the job

As our Head of Engineering, you will define, own, and deliver the technical roadmap for our MERN-stack platform. This includes driving architectural decisions, managing engineering processes, and mentoring a growing team of developers. You’ll be responsible for ensuring that our platform scales reliably, maintains top-tier performance, and supports our rapid growth.

Key Responsibilities

Strategic Decision-Making & Roadmap

• Develop and maintain the technical roadmap, ensuring alignment with overall business objectives.
• Evaluate new technologies, frameworks, and best practices to optimize performance, security, and scalability.
• Continuously refine tech strategy and execution plans based on product growth and market demands.

Technical Execution & Architecture

• Lead the design, implementation, and optimization of our MERN-stack architecture for high availability and scalability.
• Oversee complex technical initiatives such as microservices, event-driven systems, caching, and database tuning.
• Perform hands-on coding and code reviews, ensuring code quality, security, and maintainability.

Scalability & Performance

• Architect solutions to handle high volumes of traffic, user spikes, and continuous global expansion.
• Implement robust monitoring, logging, and load-testing practices to preemptively address bottlenecks.
• Pioneer strategies for caching, load balancing, and performance optimization to meet stringent SLA requirements.

Team Management & Development

• Recruit, mentor, and lead a high-caliber engineering team—promoting a culture of ownership, innovation, and collaboration.
• Conduct regular 1:1s, performance reviews, and coaching sessions to support career growth.
• Champion best practices in agile methodologies, code quality, and knowledge-sharing (pair programming, documentation, tech talks).

Project Planning & Delivery

• Collaborate cross-functionally (Product, Design, QA, etc.) to align on feature requirements, project timelines, and resource allocation.
• Continuously refine agile processes, sprints, and release cycles to ensure timely, high-quality product deliveries.
• Maintain transparent communication with stakeholders regarding progress, risks, and mitigation strategies.

Quality, Security & Reliability

• Establish and refine continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipelines and automated testing frameworks.
• Enforce security-by-design principles, ensuring compliance with data protection standards.
• Lead post-mortems for critical incidents, implementing lessons learned to enhance system resilience.

Continuous Improvement

• Stay current with emerging technologies, tools, and best practices relevant to MERN and SaaS architectures.
• Use data-driven insights to identify areas for optimization, experimentation, and iterative enhancements.
• Foster a culture of innovation, encouraging rapid feedback loops and continuous learning across the engineering organization.

Qualifications

Experience:

• 12+ years of software engineering experience, including 5+ years leading engineering teams.
• Proven ability to design and scale high-traffic, high-availability systems, ideally in a SaaS context.
• Significant hands-on expertise with the MERN stack (MongoDB, Express.js, React.js, Node.js).

Technical Mastery:

• Deep knowledge of distributed systems, microservices, event-driven architectures, and caching techniques.
• Familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure), DevOps, and CI/CD pipelines.
• Strong performance optimization skills and experience with proactive system monitoring.

Leadership & Management:

• Successful track record in building, mentoring, and retaining high-performing engineering teams.
• Adept at coordinating cross-functional efforts and maintaining a strong delivery cadence.
• Excellent communication skills to explain complex technical concepts to a variety of stakeholders.

Startup Mindset:

• Thrives in a fast-paced environment where priorities can shift rapidly.
• Emphasizes a solution-oriented approach, focusing on impact, speed, and iterative improvements.
• Driven to take ownership and lead the engineering function to meet aggressive growth targets.

Education/Background:

• Bachelor’s or Master’s in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent experience.
• Real-world startup experience can be a strong differentiator over formal credentials.

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