Director, Software Engineering

We believe in the power and joy of learning

At Cengage Group, our employees have a direct impact in helping students around the world discover the power and joy of learning. We are bonded by our shared purpose – driving innovation that helps millions of learners improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.   

Our culture values diversity, engagement, and discovery

Our business is driven by our strong culture, and we know that creating an inclusive and diverse workplace is absolutely essential to the success of our company and our learners, as well as our individual well-being. We recognize the value of diverse perspectives in everything we do, and strive to ensure employees of all levels and backgrounds feel empowered to voice their ideas and bring their authentic selves to work. We achieve these priorities through inclusive programs, benefits, and initiatives that are integrated into the fabric of how we work every day. To learn more, please see https://www.cengagegroup.com/about/inclusion-and-diversity/.   

What you'll do here:

As a Director of Software Engineering in our Product Technology and Innovation organization, you will be responsible for the delivery of innovative, market leading platforms/products that continue to improve the education technology industry. Specifically, you will lead our Core Systems Delivery Services teams that provide discovery, delivery, and onboarding capabilities for Cengage Group platforms. As a successful technology leader, you will build and lead remote software engineering organizations using agile principles to architect and deliver high availability enterprise software. You will partner closely with product and design teams, lead through data driven insights, obsess about customer outcomes in every decision made, and drive measurable improvements in user engagement. We want to take you with us on this journey to transform the education industry. If you are excited about digital transformation and want to work in a fast-paced environment and an exciting industry, this role is for you!   

Responsibilities

• Responsible for working with multiple leaders, including the Core Systems Platform Technology leadership team and business partners in crafting a clear, convincing technical strategy and roadmap(s) to achieve the business unit goals.

• Responsible for collaborating across multiple functions to align on priorities for scaling and building our products globally across multiple markets.

• Deliver products that scale to support our millions of customers worldwide. Stay up to date with emerging technologies and industry trends, and integrate relevant advancements into our product roadmaps.

• Partner with multi-functional leaders to standardize and improve development, testing and release processes to ensure quality products are delivered on time.

• Drive ongoing product and technology strategy reviews in conjunction with the Product Leaders and senior stakeholders and drive strategic technological discussions.

• Lead high performing engineering teams, develop an internal and external pipeline of high caliber talent and inspire leaders to deliver against priorities.

• Create a high-performance, transparent environment focused on accountability and results.

• Develop a culture of continuous learning and professional development, providing opportunities for team members to grow and excel in their roles.   

Skills you will need here:

Required

• 5 years of leadership experience, including developing technology strategies and driving innovation.

• 10 years of progressive software development experience.

• Experience building, developing, motivating and leading a global workforce of employees and contractors across different time zones.

• Expertise in AWS (EC2, S3, Lambda, RDS, CloudFormation), cloud-native development (Kubernetes, Docker, microservices), and Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, AWS CDK).

• Strong experience modernizing monolithic architectures, implementing hybrid cloud strategies, and creating APIs to bridge legacy systems with cloud-native platforms.

• Proven ability to design and build scalable, secure, high-availability enterprise systems, leveraging CI/CD pipelines and automated testing frameworks for global user bases.

• Skilled in agile methodologies (Scrum, Kanban, SAFe), fostering high-performing engineering teams, and using tools like Jira or Azure DevOps to ensure efficient delivery and alignment with business priorities.

• Experience with development methodologies and project lifecycle principles, with a proven track record of successfully planning, organizing, prioritizing, executing, and delegating work.

• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.   

Preferred

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science or related field, or equivalent combination of education and recent, relevant work experience.   

Cengage Group's Higher Education business, Cengage, supports learning and student success by providing materials and digital solutions to faculty and students enrolled in two-year, four-year and vocational programs. We currently serve more than 10 million of the 18 million students in US higher ed. Setting a new standard of service for our customers, we deliver quality, easy-to-use course materials from textbooks and eBooks to courseware such as MindTap and WebAssign. In the US, we offer Cengage Unlimited and Cengage Unlimited for Institutions. We help instructors be better teachers, we help institutions solve problems, and we empower students to leverage the power and joy of learning to transform lives.   

Cengage Group does not discriminate based upon race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, veteran status, marital status, parental status, cultural background, organizational level, work styles, tenure and life experiences, or for any other reason.   

Cengage Group is committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities in our job application procedures. If you need assistance or an accommodation due to a disability, you may contact us at accommodations.ta@cengage.com or you may call us at +1 (617) 289-7917.    

About Cengage Group

Cengage Group, a global education technology company serving millions of learners, provides affordable, quality digital products and services that equip students with the skills and competencies needed to be job ready. For more than 100 years, we have enabled the power and joy of learning with trusted, engaging content, and now, integrated digital platforms. We serve the higher education, workforce skills, secondary education, English language teaching and research markets worldwide. Through our scalable technology, including MindTap and Cengage Unlimited, we support all learners who seek to improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.     

Compensation

At Cengage Group, we take great pride in our commitment to providing a comprehensive and rewarding Total Rewards package designed to support and empower our employees. Click here to learn more about our Total Rewards Philosophy.

The full base pay range has been provided for this position. Individual base pay will vary based on work schedule, qualifications, experience, internal equity, and geographic location.  Sales roles often incorporate a significant incentive compensation program beyond this base pay range.

$138,200.00 - $221,100.00 USD