Director of Product Engineering

Role Description

Aduro is seeking an experienced Director of Product Engineering to lead and grow our product engineering team. This is a people-first leadership role for someone who thrives on building high-performing teams, championing strong engineering culture, and creating the conditions for talented developers — and the AI systems they now work alongside — to do their best work.

You will step into a team that is energized and taking real ownership. Your job is to build on that momentum:

• Strengthen the processes, structures, and practices that enable the team to excel.
• Serve as a strategic partner to leadership on architecture and technical direction.
• Govern and scale AI across the software delivery lifecycle.

This role reports directly to the CPTO. You will partner closely with our interim Head of Engineering through an active period of team development, and you will assume durable leadership of the product engineering team as that transition completes.

Qualifications

• 10+ years in software engineering, with 6+ years in engineering leadership (Engineering Manager, Senior Engineering Manager, Director, or equivalent).
• Demonstrated experience leading through other leaders (Engineering Managers, Lead Developers, Staff+ engineers) and scaling delivery across multiple workstreams.
• A strong track record running the full people-leadership cycle: hiring, onboarding, performance management, coaching, and career development and leveling.
• Experience building and operating durable engineering processes: planning and estimation, sprint or iteration rituals, prioritization, incident management, and continuous improvement.
• Demonstrated experience operationalizing AI across an SDLC at team or organizational scale — not just personal tool use — with defined standards for quality and review.
• Judgment for output validation and AI-system governance: reviewing AI-assisted code and architecture for correctness, security, and fit; and defining agent scope, guardrails, and escalation paths.
• The ability to engage meaningfully in architectural discussions and technical trade-offs without needing to be a hands-on developer.
• Experience guiding teams through transitions — organizational, technical, or cultural — with a calm, structured approach.

Requirements

• Coach, mentor, and develop engineers at all levels, with particular focus on empowering Lead Developers and reinforcing a culture of ownership and accountability.
• Foster an inclusive, high-trust environment where engineers feel supported, challenged, and invested in the team's success.
• Keep the team aligned, motivated, and focused through periods of growth and change.
• Evaluate, refine, and build on the processes and structures currently being established with the team.
• Drive continuous improvement in how the team plans, ships, and iterates — championing best practices in Agile/Scrum, code review, documentation, and delivery.
• Ensure the team has the right tools, workflows, and operational support to work efficiently and sustainably.
• Set and maintain architectural direction in partnership with engineers and leadership.
• Own the governance model for agentic systems in partnership with the CPTO and security/data governance.
• Establish standards for evaluating AI-assisted and AI-driven work.
• Ensure technical debt is tracked, prioritized, and addressed in a structured way.
• Work closely with Product, Design, Data Engineering, and other stakeholders to align engineering capacity and priorities with business goals.
• Translate business requirements into clear engineering objectives.
• Partner with Talent Acquisition and leadership to grow the team thoughtfully.
• Develop a deliberate team-composition strategy for the AI era.
• Develop career paths and growth frameworks that reward ownership, sound judgment, and technical excellence.

Benefits

• Competitive salary
• Health/Dental/Vision Insurance
• Life Insurance
• Short-Term Disability
• Long-Term Disability
• Paid Time Off (PTO) & company holidays
• 401k with Employer Match
• Company-wide social events and programs
• Dog-friendly office in downtown Denver

What Success Looks Like in Year One

• The team's momentum has been sustained through the leadership transition, with Lead Developers operating with expanded ownership and clear growth paths.
• AI is operationalized across the software delivery lifecycle, with written standards for review, quality, and what "done" means for AI-assisted work.
• Platform capabilities that enable AI-powered workflows are moving forward with clear direction.
• A governance model for agentic systems is defined and operating, with guardrails the team understands and follows.
• A deliberate team-composition and hiring strategy is in place and actively shaping how the team grows.