Director of Engineering- ICM

What you'll be doing:

Reporting to the CTO, you will lead at least two engineering pods, each focused on key application areas within our product. You’ll play a hands-on leadership role—guiding teams, shaping technical direction, and contributing directly to code and system design.

We believe in leading from the front. You don’t need to be the strongest engineer on the team, but you should be comfortable rolling up your sleeves regularly and setting a strong technical example.

You’ll be product- and outcome-focused, with a sharp sense of where to invest time and energy and where not to. You’ll work closely with Product Owners to deeply understand our business domains, help shape product vision, and drive meaningful results.

You’ll also help build your teams. Hiring great engineers is a critical part of this role, so experience attracting, assessing, and onboarding high-quality talent is important.

We genuinely value focus and efficiency. Meetings should be purposeful and structured. If you love excessive ceremonies, status updates, or meetings for their own sake, this role likely isn’t the right fit.

Our tech stack experience requirements are intentionally flexible. We expect strong engineers to adapt quickly. Experience with TypeScript, React, Python, Django, or .NET is a plus—but not a prerequisite.

The role’s key responsibilities are listed below:

• Own product outcome for our flagship incentive compensation management product.
• Lead a data engineering team and a web application team, each with 4-6 senior/staff engineers. Hire a third data team.
• Strong ability to understand and frame business problems, and translate them into high-impact technical solutions. Often identifying simpler or more scalable alternatives that better serve both immediate and future needs.
• Strong technical judgement to architect opinionated yet extensible enterprise software.
• Contribute hands-on to coding and system design
• Collaborate with Product Owners on feature ideation and prioritization
• Strong understanding of data modeling, data pipelines, and data processing systems (batch and/or real-time)
• Ability to make architectural tradeoffs across data storage, compute, and performance in high-scale environments
• Ensure clear communication across teams when it matters most
• Hire and grow high-performing engineers

What we're looking for:

• You’re excited to work at a startup and enjoy building processes from the ground up
• You’re a strong communicator and a creative storyteller
• You can confidently manage multiple stakeholders, both internal and external
• You ask thoughtful questions and bring genuine curiosity about people and their career paths
• You’re a culture builder and positive team influence
• You’re entrepreneurial, collaborative, and action-oriented
• You bring a high level of professionalism and respect for confidentiality
• You have meticulous attention to detail

What success looks like:

First 30 Days — Learn, Engage, and Contribute

• Build a strong understanding of Forma’s product, including the core “happy paths” across key user workflows
• Ramp on the technical stack, architecture, and development processes
• Establish trust and working relationships with your engineering teams, Product, and leadership
• Contribute hands-on to the codebase and begin participating in system design discussions
• Deliver and ship initial tasks across teams to gain familiarity with execution and deployment pipelines

Success looks like: You are actively contributing, understand how the system works at a high level, and are building credibility with the team.

60 Days — Own, Align, and Influence

• Develop a clear understanding of the broader product landscape and underlying system architecture (backend services, data pipelines, and application layers)
• Identify key technical and organizational bottlenecks impacting team velocity or product quality
• Build strong alignment with stakeholders on priorities, tradeoffs, and technical direction
• Begin participating in hiring, interviewing, and coaching to strengthen the team
• Contribute to system design and architectural decisions with increasing ownership

Success looks like: You are influencing technical direction, helping teams prioritize effectively, and contributing to team growth.

90 Days — Lead, Scale, and Deliver Impact

• Take full ownership of engineering outcomes across your teams, ensuring consistent delivery and high velocity
• Establish clear patterns for task prioritization, execution, and cross-team coordination
• Propose and drive meaningful improvements across architecture, processes, or team structure
• Lead the design and implementation of a significant system (e.g., backend service, data pipeline, or platform capability)
• Actively shape hiring strategy and build a high-performing, engaged engineering organization

Success looks like: You are operating as a trusted technical and organizational leader—driving execution, making strong decisions, and delivering scalable impact.

Additional Job Info:

• This position is for an existing vacancy