Software Engineering Manager
About The Position
Yext is hiring a Software Engineering Manager for its Knowledge Graph team within Product Engineering. The team builds and maintains the core infrastructure, APIs, and workflows that turn customer information into a connected, usable source of truth and help brands model, manage, and connect knowledge across products and experiences. The work includes representing complex entities, processing large volumes of changing data, building reliable distributed systems, and creating interfaces that other teams can use confidently. The manager will lead and develop software engineers, partner with Product and Engineering leadership to set direction, and translate priorities into actionable plans. The position combines team leadership and delivery ownership with enough technical engagement to guide architecture, design, implementation, and tradeoffs. The manager will foster engineering quality, prepare the team to respond to production incidents, coordinate across teams, recruit and onboard engineers, improve team practices, and support responsible use of AI-assisted development tools. Yext works in an agile environment with two-week sprints and regular demos. The role is based in Yext’s Chelsea, Manhattan office, and employees are expected to work in person at least three days per week, with flexibility around which days.
Requirements
- BA/BS in Computer Science or a related field, or equivalent college-level education.
- At least 5 years of professional software engineering experience.
- At least 1 year of team or technical leadership experience.
- Experience coaching engineers, providing direct and constructive feedback, and supporting professional development.
- Experience translating product or business priorities into technical plans and guiding a team to successful delivery.
- Ability to remain technically engaged to guide design decisions, evaluate tradeoffs, and help engineers solve difficult problems.
- Strong communication and collaboration skills, including the ability to create clarity amid ambiguous priorities or requirements.
- Track record of building healthy, effective engineering teams while maintaining high standards for quality and accountability.
- Experience using AI-assisted development tools and critically evaluating their output in a responsible engineering workflow.
- Sound judgment regarding data privacy, intellectual property, security, and confidential information when using AI tools.
- Strong technical judgment and foundation in software architecture, design, data structures, and algorithms.
- Fluency in Java, Go, C++, Python, or a similar programming language; Yext primarily codes in Java and Go.
- Experience recruiting, interviewing, and onboarding software engineers.
- Openness to new technologies, new ways of working, and creative solutions.
- Comfort working in a fast-paced environment.
Responsibilities
- Lead and develop software engineers through regular coaching, actionable feedback, and career-growth support.
- Partner with Product and Engineering leadership to turn product priorities and longer-term goals into clear, achievable team plans.
- Own team execution and delivery by setting priorities, dividing initiatives into manageable work, and maintaining a sustainable development cadence.
- Resolve ambiguity, remove blockers, manage competing priorities, and limit unnecessary organizational distractions for engineers.
- Maintain a strong technical understanding of team systems and guide architecture, design, implementation, and technical tradeoffs.
- Promote engineering quality through design discussions, code reviews, testing, operational readiness, and continuous improvement.
- Prepare the team to respond to production incidents, coordinate leadership during incidents, and drive follow-up work.
- Build a team environment that encourages ownership, collaboration, learning, raising concerns, and challenging assumptions.
- Coordinate dependencies and shared initiatives with Product Engineering and partners across the company.
- Recruit and interview engineers and develop effective onboarding for new team members.
- Identify and implement improvements to team systems, processes, and ways of working.
- Model thoughtful use of AI-assisted development tools across design, research, implementation, testing, debugging, and code review.
- Ensure AI-generated work is validated and meets standards for correctness, security, maintainability, and engineering quality.
- Encourage experimentation with AI capabilities and workflows, share successful approaches, and identify opportunities to improve engineering effectiveness.
Benefits
- Medical benefits
- Dental benefits
- Vision benefits
- Life insurance
- Short-term disability
- Long-term disability
- 401(k) retirement plan
- Vacation leave
- Sick leave
- Potential eligibility for variable pay programs based on performance relative to goals and targets
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Manager
