Engineering Manager – Data Platform, Lakehouse Foundation

Lyft • Toronto, ON

4d • CA$172,000 - CA$215,000 • Hybrid

About The Position

As the Engineering Manager for the Lakehouse Foundation team, you will lead a group of engineers responsible for the foundational data layer that all of Lyft's data systems and emerging AI workloads are built on. The team owns catalog and metadata management, table formats and storage, and the access patterns and gateways through which other engineering teams interact with Lyft's data. As Lyft converges on a unified lakehouse architecture, this team builds and operates the single source of truth that powers analytics, machine learning, experimentation, and every business decision made from data. You will play a key role in shaping the team's technical direction, partnering with peer Data Platform teams on a multi-year platform evolution, and developing engineers who operate with autonomy on systems of significant scale and complexity.
Lyft's Infrastructure teams build the foundational systems that the rest of engineering depends on to move fast, ship reliably, and scale efficiently. These are high-leverage roles where the work you and your team do has a multiplicative effect across the company. We're looking for experienced leaders who can balance the discipline of operating critical infrastructure with the curiosity to keep evolving how Lyft builds.
Engineering at Lyft is a place where managers and engineers operate with high ownership and strong technical judgment. Our engineers expect their managers to be honest, available, and focused on the work that matters: developing their teams, removing obstacles, and giving people the support they need to do their best work. We build teams that are inclusive, technically rigorous, and have a strong sense of ownership for what they build.

Requirements

• 3+ years of experience as an Engineering Manager, leading teams of 5+ engineers including senior individual contributors
• Experience managing data infrastructure or platform teams. Direct experience with lakehouse architectures (Databricks, Snowflake) and modern table formats (Delta, Iceberg, Hudi) strongly preferred
• Track record of leading teams through multi-quarter platform migrations or major architectural transitions, with demonstrated ability to make strategic decisions under ambiguity and navigate cross-team dependencies
• Experience operating as the primary cross-org partner on initiatives that span multiple engineering teams, including aligning technical direction with peer teams, vendors, and senior stakeholders
• Track record of developing engineers, including senior individual contributors on a staff trajectory, by matching them to ambitious technical scope and supporting their growth
• Experience leading geographically distributed teams across time zones, including building communication practices that keep distributed teams operating as one integrated organization
• Technical background sufficient to contribute meaningfully to architecture and design discussions, evaluate technical tradeoffs, and provide credible direction to senior engineers
• Experience building inclusive teams with strong ownership culture
• Excellent written and verbal communication, including the ability to operate at the strategic level with senior leadership and at the technical level with engineers

Nice To Haves

• Direct experience with lakehouse architectures (Databricks, Snowflake) and modern table formats (Delta, Iceberg, Hudi) strongly preferred

Responsibilities

• Lead a team responsible for Lyft's foundational data layer, including catalog and metadata management, table formats (Iceberg/Delta), and the gateway and access patterns that all other data systems build on
• Drive the team's contribution to Lyft's multi-year lakehouse modernization, including the migration to Unity Catalog and the convergence of metadata across the data stack
• Partner with peer Data Platform teams (Compute, Data Trust & Governance, Data Orchestration, Streaming) and engineering organizations across Lyft to ensure the foundation evolves coherently with the systems built on top of it
• Define and own the team's technical direction, balancing platform-level investment with the day-to-day reliability needs of a foundational layer that thousands of pipelines and queries depend on
• Mentor and guide the professional and technical development of engineers across levels, including senior individual contributors operating at staff level and engineers early on in their careers
• Ensures the team operates with strong ownership, makes effective decisions in ambiguous and high-stakes situations, and demonstrates technical rigor in a domain where mistakes propagate across the company's data systems
• Foster a culture of cross-team engagement, where engineers proactively partner with customers and adjacent teams rather than working in isolation
• Provide ongoing feedback and coaching, recognize individual contributions, and ensure each engineer has clear expectations and support to grow in their role
• Own your team's deliverables and ensure that the foundational systems they own remain reliable, scalable, and well-understood by the broader engineering organization

Benefits

• Extended health and dental coverage options, along with life insurance and disability benefits
• Mental health benefits
• Family building benefits
• Child care and pet benefits
• Access to a Lyft funded Health Care Savings Account
• RRSP plan with company match to help save for your future
• In addition to provincial observed holidays, salaried team members are covered under Lyft's flexible paid time off policy. The policy allows team members to take off as much time as they need (with manager approval). Hourly team members get 15 days paid time off, with an additional day for each year of service
• Lyft is proud to support new parents with 18 weeks of paid time off, designed as a top-up plan to complement provincial programs. Biological, adoptive, and foster parents are all eligible.
• Subsidized commuter benefits and Lyft ride credits

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager
• Education Level: No Education Listed