Vice President, Engineering

Job Description

Job Description

About EWG and the Opportunity

The Environmental Working Group (EWG) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to empowering people to live healthier lives in a healthier environment.

EWG drives impact through scientific research, consumer tools, and advocacy, translating complex data into accessible, trusted guidance for millions of people each year. Core digital platforms such as Skin Deep®, Food Scores®, and the Guide to Healthy Cleaning are powered by extensive datasets and play a critical role in advancing EWG's mission.

Technology is central to EWG's impact. Our digital platforms make complex scientific information accessible to consumers, helping people make informed decisions about the products they use and the environments in which they live. This creates a unique opportunity for an engineering leader to shape technology that serves a large public audience while advancing meaningful environmental and public health outcomes.

EWG is seeking a Vice President of Engineering to lead the next phase of modernization for our technology and data infrastructure.

This is a newly established leadership position with the opportunity to influence EWG's long-term technology direction, strengthen our engineering capabilities, and help evolve the digital products and data systems that support our mission.

The Vice President of Engineering will report to the Executive Vice President, and work closely with the Chief Experience Officer and other organizational leaders to ensure engineering priorities align with product strategy, user needs, and EWG's broader goals.

This leader will directly manage EWG's engineering team and oversee the evolution of core platforms, data systems, and engineering practices, with a focus on scalability, reliability, automation, and the thoughtful application of AI and emerging technologies.

This is a hands-on executive leadership role for a seasoned technologist who combines deep engineering expertise with exceptional communication and leadership skills. The ideal candidate has spent a significant portion of their career designing, building, and debugging complex systems and remains engaged in technical work while leading teams and setting strategy.

They must be able to translate complex technical concepts for leadership, board members, funders, and cross-functional stakeholders. Success in this role requires the ability to combine technical credibility, strategic thinking, and operational leadership, remaining close enough to the work to guide architectural decisions, mentor engineers, and identify emerging opportunities while maintaining a focus on organizational outcomes.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the modernization of EWG's core technology stack, platforms, and data systems, assessing current architecture, workflows, and technical risks and defining a phased roadmap for modernization.
• Reduce dependence on manual, spreadsheet-based, and expert-dependent workflows by implementing scalable systems and automation.
• Define and own the technical roadmap, translating organizational goals into prioritized, measurable milestones.
• Design and improve data ingestion, validation, transformation, and processing pipelines to increase consistency, speed, and trust in organizational data.
• Establish clear engineering standards and practices, including testing, QA/QC, validation, release processes, documentation, and technical planning.
• Improve engineering planning, estimation, prioritization, and execution discipline across teams, ensuring work aligns with defined scope, priorities, and organizational goals.
• Evaluate and integrate AI-powered tools that enhance consumer-facing products, including search, recommendations, and personalized guidance, to deepen user engagement and expand EWG's reach.
• Identify practical opportunities to apply AI and emerging technologies to data processing, classification, internal workflows, and product capabilities.
• Oversee the integrity, governance, reliability, and scalability of EWG's data infrastructure, and support the evolution of data models to enable scalable analysis and product capabilities.
• Evaluate build-versus-buy decisions and help the organization make sound investments in platforms, tools, and vendors.
• Partner closely with the Chief Experience Officer to ensure engineering execution aligns with product priorities, user needs, and organizational goals.
• Collaborate with organizational leadership and cross-functional teams to identify opportunities where technology can strengthen EWG's research, consumer tools, and mission impact.
• Foster a culture of accountability, quality, and continuous improvement.
• Remain hands-on as a technical contributor by writing, reviewing, and debugging code alongside the team and leading by example on engineering quality and best practices.
• Directly manage EWG's development team of engineers, including hiring, mentoring, performance management, and day-to-day team leadership.
• Communicate technology strategy, modernization priorities, engineering investments, risks, and progress to EWG leadership, the board of directors, funders, and external stakeholders, translating complex technical concepts into clear business and mission impact.

What Success Looks Like in the First 12–18 Months

• A clear modernization roadmap is in place and delivering measurable progress against strategic priorities.
• The engineering team is operating with stronger delivery practices, greater transparency, and improved cross-functional collaboration.
• Data quality, validation, and governance processes have matured to support EWG's growing portfolio of information products.
• AI and automation initiatives are delivering tangible efficiency gains and reducing reliance on manual workflows.
• EWG's data platforms and consumer-facing products are more scalable, accurate, and capable of advancing the organization's mission.

Education and Experience Required

• 15+ years of experience in engineering, platform, or technology leadership.
• Experience leading organizations through significant systems modernization or transformation.
• Experience applying AI and machine learning or intelligent automation to products, platforms, or internal operations in practical, measurable ways.
• Strong background in data platforms, APIs, cloud architecture, and scalable systems design.
• Demonstrated ability and comfort working as a hands-on technical contributor, including writing and reviewing production code, in addition to managing and leading engineering teams.
• Experience implementing automation and workflow systems that improve operational efficiency and reliability.
• Track record of building and leading high-performing technical teams.
• Strong cross-functional leadership skills, with the ability to work effectively with both technical and nontechnical stakeholders.
• Excellent judgment, communication, and decision-making skills.
• Ability to translate strategy into execution in complex, evolving environments.

Location

Washington, DC preferred, with a hybrid in-office schedule; open to remote arrangements for exceptional candidates.

Compensation

Annual salary range of 180,000–300,000. Salary is commensurate with experience.

EWG offers a collaborative, mission-driven environment where employees have the opportunity to contribute to meaningful work with a broad public impact.

Total Rewards

In addition to competitive pay, EWG employees enjoy a robust total rewards package that includes:

• Comprehensive medical and dental benefits.
• Generous paid annual leave.
• Generous paid sick leave.
• Employer-paid disability and life insurance.
• Paid family and parental leave.
• A tax-deferred 403(b) retirement plan with employer matching contributions.
• Flexible telework arrangements.
• A casual, collaborative, mission-driven work environment.

 

EWG’s commitment to diversity and inclusion:

EWG celebrates diversity and is committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We are proud to foster a work environment that supports, inspires and respects all individuals. EWG does not discriminate against any employee or applicant on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex, citizenship, ancestry, marital status, family responsibilities, physical or mental disability, military or veteran status, medical c