AI Product Engineering Director

Looking to join a growing company dedicated to helping others? We offer that, plus competitive salaries, a culture of learning, and a fast-paced environment. This is a hybrid position with 3 days in-office. Join our team to help make a difference in the lives of others! Applicants must be authorized to work for ANY employer in the U.S. We do not sponsor employment visas or other immigration processes to attain or maintain employment eligibility. Remote positions are open to applicants based anywhere in the continental U.S. Hybrid positions are open to applicants based in the Austin, Texas area. About Continental General: The Continental General family of companies has provided insurance, including life and long-term care policies, to individuals and groups for over 30 years, and currently supports over 200,000 policyholders. Both our insurance company, Continental General Insurance Company, and our third-party administrator, Continental General Services, are committed to the continuous development of our infrastructure, processes, and people. The group is actively growing through expansion of both its insurance portfolio and its administrative services. With each opportunity, we take a collaborative approach to address challenges and provide unique solutions. Position Summary: The AI Product Engineering Director leads a new software product engineering team, responsible for designing, building, and supporting internally developed platform products that automate operations, streamline document and data flows, and extend AI-enabled capabilities across the enterprise. This is a build-focused team: it owns products through their full lifecycle, from architecture and development through deployment and ongoing support, and the role’s scope of leadership is expected to expand over time as the platform’s operating model matures. This is a hands-on leadership role. The director owns team performance and product delivery today while setting the team’s 3-5 year technology roadmap and shaping organizational investment in its build capability. Solutions are expected to follow a cloud-first, AWS-native approach and to leverage automation and AI-enabled capabilities wherever appropriate to improve efficiency, insight, and resilience. This team treats AI as a core part of how it works, not a supplemental tool, applying AI as a force multiplier across the delivery lifecycle to build and ship faster. Architectures should be modern, flexible, scalable, and loosely coupled. Key Responsibilities: Lead, coach, and develop a team that may include software engineers, platform engineers, integration specialists, and data/ML engineers, adapting the team’s composition as its focus evolves. Establish clear expectations, accountability, and performance standards. Hire, onboard, develop, and retain technical talent. Manage team capacity, priorities, and performance, including addressing underperformance when necessary. Foster a culture of ownership, continuous improvement, collaboration, and innovation. Own delivery outcomes for the team’s software products end to end (architecture, build, deployment, and ongoing support), setting the team’s 3-5 year technology roadmap and aligning investment with business objectives. Design and deliver automation solutions that reduce manual effort and operational load and improve efficiency across the organization. Design products for operational resilience, including self-monitoring and, where feasible, self-healing, to reduce production toil and support the platform’s automation goals. Own the health, security configuration, and lifecycle of the team’s products, including availability, performance, and production support. Own the integration and event-driven architecture that connects the team’s products to the systems and data flows they support. Direct the development of AI-enabled capabilities that extend the team’s products and improve how the organization works with its data and content. Establish evaluation frameworks and success metrics that keep AI-enabled solutions measurable and governed. Apply AI-assisted development and agentic workflows across the delivery lifecycle, including automated test generation, AI-assisted code review, and anomaly detection, to improve delivery speed and reliability. Ensure responsible and secure use of AI, particularly when working with sensitive data. Cloud-First Architecture & Modernization Champion AWS-based, cloud-native architectures for the team’s products, emphasizing scalability, resiliency, and security in alignment with the AWS Well-Architected Framework. Promote automation, event-driven designs, and serverless patterns where appropriate. Evaluate architecture options, integration patterns, and build-vs-buy decisions, and provide input into vendor selection and technology investment decisions. Consume shared infrastructure-as-code standards and construct libraries from the cloud platform team, and partner with DevOps on CI/CD pipelines and deployment mechanics. Stakeholder Collaboration & Communication Build strong working relationships with business and technology partners to understand priorities and needs. Translate complex requirements into clear technical designs and delivery plans. Represent the team’s platform capabilities and delivery outcomes to executive leadership, providing transparent communication on progress, risks, dependencies, and delivery outcomes. Partner with product owners, project managers, analysts, engineers, and QE teams to meet delivery milestones and resolve delivery risks. Develop and maintain strategic vendor partnerships and technology alliances that support the team’s platform roadmap. Compliance & Governance Ensure solutions operate within applicable regulatory, security, and compliance requirements, including HIPAA, SOC 2, and insurance regulatory frameworks. Maintain governance, auditability, security controls, and risk management practices across the team’s products and AI platforms at a programmatic level. Partner with enterprise AI governance (including the AI Steering Committee) so AI-enabled work is governed and aligned with enterprise standards. Handle sensitive data and PII/PHI with appropriate security and controls, and balance delivery speed with regulatory and operational requirements. Implement and maintain security best practices including authentication and authorization protocols (OAuth 2.0, OpenID Connect, SAML), API management, data protection, and encryption. Team Leadership & Delivery Excellence Support consistent execution through design reviews, kanban practices, and retrospectives, partnering with the product owner on planning and prioritization. Promote delivery standards, reusable patterns, and shared accountability across teams. Ensure comprehensive documentation is created and maintained, including architecture diagrams, integration specifications, and operational runbooks. Provide strong input into resource allocation and headcount planning for the team, adjusting as its focus and priorities evolve. Issue Resolution & Operational Support Lead investigation and resolution of identified issues across the team’s products. Provide post-implementation support and ensure smooth transitions into steady-state operations. Requirements Qualifications: Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, Information Technology, or a related technical field, or an equivalent combination of education and relevant experience. 10+ years of technology experience, including hands-on technical work, not oversight alone; the role is expected to pitch in with the team as needed. 5+ years leading multiple engineering or delivery teams, with demonstrated success hiring, coaching, developing, and managing technical talent. Demonstrated experience leading complex technology initiatives from strategy through delivery, including the ability to evaluate architecture, integration, platform, and build-vs-buy decisions. Experience directing or delivering AI-enabled technology solutions within a regulated industry such as insurance, healthcare, or financial services. Working knowledge of compliance and governance frameworks including HIPAA, SOC 2, or comparable regulatory requirements. Highly Preferred: AWS Certified Developer and/or AWS Certified Solutions Architect. Experience leading multidisciplinary technical teams and driving organizational change. Proven leadership and team-development skills. Ability to communicate and defend technical decisions with engineering teams, business stakeholders, and executives. Demonstrated ability to influence stakeholders, manage expectations, and deliver measurable business results. Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills, especially in data-intensive environments. Ability to manage multiple initiatives while maintaining delivery quality and control discipline. Ability to balance innovation, compliance, delivery speed and operational excellence. Experience operating with accountability for delivery performance, not solely project execution. The ability to articulate and build conviction around a multi-year technology direction. Technical Skills: Software product engineering across the full lifecycle (architecture, development, deployment, and support), with a strong understanding of SDLC, testing strategies, and version control. AWS experience, including services such as S3, Lambda, APIs, Step Functions, and cloud-native, event-driven integration patterns. Modern AI development tooling and patterns (e.g., Amazon Bedrock / Claude Code, RAG, agent frameworks) and the judgment to evaluate and govern AI-generated approaches. Proficiency with Agile delivery tools (e.g., Jira). Experience handling sensitive data and PII/PHI with appropriate security and controls. Why Join Us? Competitive salary and benefits, including 401(k), health insurance, and performance-based bonuses. Collaborative and fast-paced work environment. Professional development and growth opportunities within the finance and investment space. Competitive Salary & Target Bonus Program Retirement Savings – 401(k) with a company match Comprehensive Medical insurance through BlueCross BlueShield of Texas. Company-paid dental, vision, short-term & long-term disability, and life insurance. Work-Life Balance – This role offers 20+ days of PTO, 10 paid holidays, and paid volunteer time off. Flexible Work Options & Perks – Hybrid opportunity, wellness programs, and weekly paid lunch for onsite staff. Health Savings Accounts (HSA) & Flexible Spending Accounts (FSAs) – Includes a company match for HSAs. #J-18808-Ljbffr Continental General