Senior Director Software Engineering

Empower • Overland Park, KS

23h • $151,800 - $220,050 • Hybrid

About The Position

The Senior Director Software Engineering will lead a software engineering function at the business unit or corporate level, providing strategic and technical direction across multiple teams, managers, and professional employees. This role will oversee complex software systems and applications throughout the development lifecycle, establish priorities and standards, manage resources and budgets, and develop short and long-term business strategies. The Senior Director Software Engineering will also build leadership capability, manage key stakeholder relationships, and drive accountable execution across teams and initiatives.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or Information Systems, or equivalent experience.
• Broad technical expertise across software systems, applications, and multiplatform environments.
• Experience overseeing complex software systems and applications throughout the software development lifecycle.
• Experience managing managers and professional employees, including hiring, developing, motivating, coaching, and directing people.
• Experience managing project workloads, competing priorities, resources, schedules, risks, budgets, and delivery commitments.
• Experience managing operating costs, labor, and departmental financial performance.
• Experience managing relationships with internal stakeholders, external clients, and third-party vendors.
• Ability to solve complex problems, make decisions with broad operational impact, and use analysis, experience, judgment, and input from others as appropriate.
• Ability to provide strategic direction, establish goals and performance expectations, allocate resources, and hold leaders and teams accountable for results.
• Strong ability to build trusting relationships, provide constructive feedback, influence outcomes, and work effectively across multiple levels of an organization.

Nice To Haves

• Master's degree in a related systems or business field.
• Ten (10) years of experience, including at least four (4) years of experience directly managing people, including hiring, developing, motivating, and directing people as they work.
• Experience developing managers, strengthening leadership pipelines, mentoring rising leaders, and creating opportunities for professional growth and organizational learning.
• Experience identifying organizational risks, improving operational efficiency, and aligning systems, services, and resources across complex or global environments.

Responsibilities

• Lead software engineering teams responsible for the architecture, technical design, development, implementation, maintenance, support, repair, and enhancement of complex software systems and applications.
• Provide subject matter expertise across multiplatform applications and determine appropriate courses of action in partnership with systems and business leadership.
• Direct the software development lifecycle, including design, coding, testing, documentation, installation, maintenance, and support of proprietary and purchased software systems and applications.
• Establish and oversee policies, procedures, and expectations for system performance, quality assurance, testing, and technical documentation, ensuring solutions meet established business and customer requirements.
• Evaluate and make decisions regarding application enhancements, technical improvements, and changes based on system needs and organizational priorities.
• Manage project and development workloads across teams, including priorities, schedules, resources, risks, delivery expectations, and adjustments necessary to meet commitments.
• Execute deliverables through subordinate managers, ensuring initiatives are completed on time, within predefined requirements, and within approved budgets while maintaining accountability for team and project performance.
• Communicate project status, risks, dependencies, and impacts to key stakeholders and manage relationships with internal departments, external clients, and third-party vendors.
• Oversee organizational design, resource allocation, and leadership structure for assigned departments or work units, setting clear short and long-term goals and delegating responsibilities based on capabilities and capacity.
• Develop short and long-term business strategies, prioritize initiatives, allocate resources, balance workloads, and manage leadership expectations related to deliverables and timelines.
• Recommend and implement improvements to policies, processes, systems, services, and operating practices while identifying, evaluating, and mitigating operational and delivery risks.
• Apply an enterprise and global perspective to identify opportunities to improve or align systems, services, resources, and processes, and establish measures to evaluate performance and risk.
• Manage departmental operating costs and budgets, including labor, financial performance, budget development, monitoring, and analysis of discrepancies.
• Make leadership decisions related to hiring, pay, performance, appraisals, employee development, work schedules, and discipline while coaching employees, developing leaders, addressing performance gaps, and fostering professional growth and organizational learning.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Benefits

• Medical, dental, vision and life insurance
• Retirement savings – 401(k) plan with generous company matching contributions (up to 6%), financial advisory services, potential company discretionary contribution, and a broad investment lineup
• Tuition reimbursement up to $5,250/year
• Business-casual environment that includes the option to wear jeans
• Generous paid time off upon hire – including a paid time off program plus ten paid company holidays and three floating holidays each calendar year
• Paid volunteer time — 16 hours per calendar year
• Leave of absence programs – including paid parental leave, paid short- and long-term disability, and Family and Medical Leave (FMLA)
• Business Resource Groups (BRGs) – BRGs facilitate inclusion and collaboration across our business internally and throughout the communities where we live, work and play. BRGs are open to all.

What This Job Offers

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