Director of Engineering - Product & UI Platforms

over 1 year old

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About Kraken

As one of the largest and most trusted digital asset platforms globally, we are empowering people to experience the life-changing potential of crypto. Trusted by over 8 million consumer and pro traders, institutions, and authorities worldwide - our unique combination of products, services, and global expertise is helping tip the scales towards mass crypto adoption. But we’re only just getting started. We want to be pioneers in crypto and add value to the everyday lives of billions. Now is not the time to sit on the sidelines. Join us to bring crypto to the world.

To ensure Kraken is the right fit for you, please ensure you read Kraken Culture Explained to find out more about us!

Engineering at Kraken

At Kraken, Engineering and technological innovation have been the lifeblood of our business since our inception. For more than ten years, Kraken has been committed to building a crypto platform with the highest standards for security, performance and reliability. We search tirelessly for the most talented people in the industry to help us build an organization that facilitates Krakens huge ambitions within the crypto space.

We believe strongly in creating a meritocracy where real world experience, technical abilities and tangible business outcomes trump all other metrics of success. Seats on our teams are based on this ideation of merit, and progression within the company is based on the meaningful results delivered. Everybody with the Engineering organization is mission oriented and results driven, we put “accelerating the worldwide adoption of cryptocurrency” above all else and we index heavily on tangible business results over ‘busy work’, It’s not about how much code was written, it’s about how much impact what was delivered with as little as code as possible, or even better solving a problem without writing any new code. All engineers are expected to always put the company, and their team, first and by working together and answering the question “What is best for Kraken and my team?” we can achieve anything, after all “none of us is as smart as all of us” - Kenneth H. Blanchard.

About the Role

We are looking for an experienced Director of Engineering to help build and lead our Product Platform & UI Platform teams, with the end goal of running a large organization dedicated to facilitating the needs of our Client Experience teams and engineers within the company, whether that is by delivering headless feature SDKs or by improving the developer experience of all engineers at Kraken. You will have a deep impact across a wide variety of different products and technologies, running remote teams that span multiple locations and time zones and will be ultimately responsible for the budgeting, staffing, planning, and execution of your engineering teams.

To be successful in this role, you should have experience running a large organization, building teams from the ground up, identifying and mentoring leaders from inside your organization, an understanding of the differences between product/feature teams and platform teams, and a practical experiencing of the right amount of process required to enable large numbers of engineers to operate at scale without being overbearing. Previous experience working on the ground as a senior (or above) level software engineer for a significant portion of your career is also a must.

Whilst at Kraken you will be expected to:

Deliver business impact. You’ll work with your cross functional partners, and adjacent engineering teams to come up with success metrics, build and execute on concrete action plans.

Build an influential culture of engineering excellence. You’ll ensure everybody on your team understands, and adheres to, Kraken’s engineering excellence standards whilst maintaining the right balance between delivery speed and product quality.

Lead a group of engineering talent. You’ll deliver results while attracting and retaining top talent, refining the team structures as they scale.

Set the team vision. You’ll understand the direction of the company, align and translate it into an actionable plan for your teams.

Build trust and foster a collaborative team culture. You’ll identify future leaders and help them grow in each of your focus areas.

Collaborate with and influence other teams. You’ll share and communicate roadmaps with external teams, understand and align team goals to collectively deliver results efficiently.

Have an excellent executive presence. You’ll communicate the team's vision/plan effectively and represent your organization and it’s POV in the overall Kraken Engineering organization.

Basic Requirements:

A minimum of 10 years proven experience building software in professional engineering teams.

A minimum of 5 years of engineering management, building and leading software engineering teams.

A minimum of 3 years of experience leading a large engineering organization.

Solid understanding of the difference between product/feature teams and platform teams, with hands-on experiences with running platforms teams at scale.

Preferred Requirements:

Experience working at a large, well established technology focused company.

Results-driven. Kraken is an outcomes driven organization and we speak, live and breathe through results. You should share the passion, with a strong focus on generating efficiency and value for Kraken Engineering.

Meritocracy advocate. You believe merit (abilities and experience) is above all other metrics when assessing the engineers both within the organization and when hiring new members.

Engineer-centric mindset. The platforms we are building are going to be leveraged by hundreds of Kraken engineers across many teams, you must be mindful of how these are going to be leveraged and used to improve productivity.

Team builder. Proven track record demonstrating the ability to attract, hire, empower and develop the best managers and engineers.

Continuously improving. You relentlessly pursue continuous improvement in every aspect of what you do, from how you work to the knowledge of our industry and your craft. You're never fully satisfied and never settle, always striving to get better and never resting on the successes of yesterday.

Highly organized, creative, motivated, and passionate about achieving results.

Familiarity with continuous delivery practices and how to best leverage the ability to ship low cost changes quickly.

Location Tagging: #EU #US #LI-LM1 #CANADA

We’re powered by people from around the world with their own unique and diverse experiences. We value all Krakenites and their talents, contributions, and perspectives, regardless of their background. We encourage you to apply for roles where you don't fully meet the listed requirements, especially if you're passionate or knowledgable about crypto!

As an equal opportunity employer we don’t tolerate discrimination or harassment of any kind. Whether that’s based on race, ethnicity, age, gender identity, citizenship, religion, sexual orientation, disability, pregnancy, veteran status or any other protected characteristic as outlined by federal, state or local laws.