Director Software Engineering

The Walt Disney Company • Seattle, NY

20h • Hybrid

About The Position

Disney Entertainment and ESPN Product & Technology is a global organization of engineers, product developers, designers, technologists, and data scientists. The team builds and advances the technological backbone for Disney’s media business globally, marrying technology with creativity to build world-class products, enhance storytelling, and drive velocity, innovation, and scalability. Technologists are designing and building the products and platforms that will power our media, advertising, and distribution businesses for years to come. Disney’s technology and products serve as a signature doorway for fans' connections with the company’s brands and stories, including Disney+, Hulu, ESPN, ABC, and ABC News. The team develops and implements groundbreaking products and techniques that shape industry norms and solve complex technical problems. Product Engineering is a unified team responsible for the engineering of Disney Entertainment & ESPN digital and streaming products and platforms, encompassing product engineering, media engineering, quality assurance, and the engineering behind personalization, commerce, lifecycle, and identity.

Requirements

• 12+ years of engineering experience building consumer-scale applications, with deep expertise in either native mobile development (Swift, Kotlin, Apple/Android frameworks) or modern web platforms (TypeScript/Node.js, tooling, edge/CDN systems) with demonstrated fluency partnering with leaders in the other. Expertise in both is preferred.
• 4+ years of experience leading engineering managers and building high-performing organizations across multiple teams.
• Experience owning platform services that other engineering teams depend on such as SDKs, component libraries, configuration, CI/CD systems, or developer portals.
• Experience partnering with senior stakeholders across Product, Design, and business leadership to define and drive a roadmap that balances business objectives with long-term engineering health.
• Effective collaboration and communication skills, able to discuss technical topics clearly and engage in productive technical discussions.
• Track record of identifying and removing systemic organizational bottlenecks and championing engineering standards and best practices across multiple teams.
• Demonstrated ability to own and drive alliance-level OKRs, holding teams and stakeholders accountable for outcomes.
• Experience developing and implementing operational policies and engineering performance standards at an organizational scale.
• High emotional intelligence, experience maintaining composure under high-pressure situations and meeting tight deadlines.
• Strong project management skills, seeing projects through from inception to completion.
• Bachelor’s degree or better in Computer Science or a related technical field or equivalent job experience.

Nice To Haves

• Expertise in both native mobile development and modern web platforms is preferred.

Responsibilities

• Direct and oversee multiple teams through managers: accountable for performance, operations, and outcomes.
• Ensure growth at every level and cultivate a future bench of leaders.
• Drive vision and strategy for systems/products across mobile foundation and core services.
• Own org-level OKR(s).
• Facilitate architectural decisions in collaboration with Principal engineers.
• Own significant cross-functional initiatives end-to-end: driving priorities through organizational dependencies, removing systemic bottlenecks, and ensuring nothing stalls waiting for someone else to act.
• Set technical direction across both mobile foundation (iOS/Android) and core services (edge, config), ensuring shared platform investments such as observability, release safety, and developer tooling are prioritized coherently across stacks.
• Build and maintain relationships across organizations and external partners, influencing business direction and ensuring engineering teams have the resources needed to deliver.
• Shape and operationalize engineering strategy: establishing performance standards, developing organizational policies, and embedding a culture of ownership across teams.

Benefits

• A bonus and/or long-term incentive units may be provided as part of the compensation package, in addition to the full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits, dependent on the level and position offered.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director