Senior Director, Engineering (R4493)

Shield AI•San Diego, CA

About The Position

Shield AI is seeking a Senior Director of Engineering to own and drive execution across the core Hivemind Platform engineering teams, including Forge, Pilot, Foundations, and Strategic Projects. In this role, you will serve as the single accountable leader for engineering delivery, technical execution, and organizational performance. You will be empowered to make prioritization and execution decisions required to deliver a coherent, scalable, and high-quality autonomy platform. This role exists to ensure the Hivemind Platform is executed with clarity, speed, and rigor at scale. You will run the engineering organization end-to-end, while partnering closely with Product, Program Management, Architecture, Systems Engineering, and Quality, to ensure delivery against business, customer, and mission needs.

Requirements

Bachelorâs or Masterâs degree in Computer Science, Robotics Engineering, Autonomy Systems or a related technical field
12+ years of experience in software-intensive systems, with significant experience leading engineering organizations
Proven track record owning delivery for complex systems across multiple teams
Demonstrated ability to make hard prioritization and tradeoff decisions and deliver results
Strong systems-level understanding across software platforms, autonomy, integration, and operations
Experience building, leading, and scaling senior engineering leaders
Exceptional communication skills with technical, executive, and cross-functional stakeholders

Nice To Haves

Experience leading platform or infrastructure organizations supporting multiple products or programs
Background in autonomy, robotics, aerospace, defense, or other safety-critical systems
Experience operating in environments with high assurance, certification, or mission-critical constraints

Responsibilities

Own Platform Engineering Outcomes:
Own delivery, execution velocity, and technical coherence across Forge, Pilot, Foundations, and Strategic Projects
Be accountable for platform delivery outcomes
Translate platform strategy and product direction into executable engineering plans and commitments
Lead the Platform Engineering Organization:
Directly manage and develop the leaders of Forge, Pilot, Foundations, and Strategic Projects
Set and uphold a high bar for technical rigor, ownership, and operational excellence
Build, scale, and sustain a high-performing engineering leadership team
Drive Cross-Team Execution and Tradeoffs:
Own cross-team prioritization and execution tradeoffs within the platform
Resolve conflicts decisively and transparently
Balance speed, quality, scalability, safety, and certifiability in delivery decisions
Partner Across the Organization:
Partner with Product Management to align engineering execution with platform and customer priorities
Work closely with Architecture to ensure platform evolution is executable and sustainably delivered
Coordinate with Quality, Systems Engineering, and Program Management to ensure integrated delivery
Establish Engineering Operating Discipline:
Define and operate the platform engineering execution model (planning, tracking, reviews, escalation)
Ensure clear decision rights, ownership, and accountability across teams
Provide visibility into progress, risks, and dependencies without unnecessary process overhead
Scale the Platform:
Ensure platform capabilities scale across missions, domains, customers, and autonomous platforms
Identify systemic execution risks and drive corrective action
Continuously improve engineering effectiveness and delivery predictability