Director of Engineering - Infrastructure

Harmattan AI; Paris; On-site; EUR 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

Harmattan AI in Paris is seeking a Director of Engineering for Infrastructure to elevate teams and standardise engineering practices. In this role, you will manage performance reviews, oversee recruitment, and enhance internal tooling to support engineering excellence.

The ideal candidate will have a strong background in Computer Science or Engineering, with proven leadership experience in platform-engineering. This high-impact position requires exceptional communication skills and the ability to thrive in a fast-paced environment.

Qualifications

• Strong academic record in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field.
• Experience transitioning from Individual Contributor to management.
• Direct experience leading platform-engineering or developer-experience teams.

Responsibilities

• Oversee performance reviews and training initiatives.
• Own the recruitment process to build an effective engineering team.
• Develop standardised work processes across engineering teams.
• Audit and improve internal tooling for engineering efficiency.
• Contribute to organisational structure for cross-functional delivery.
• Collaborate with leadership on company vision and execution.

Skills

Leadership

Communication

Technical engagement

Soft skills

Education

Computer Science or Engineering degree

Job description

About Us

Harmattan AI is a next-generation defense prime building autonomous and scalable defense systems. Following the close of a $200M Series B, valuing the company at $1.4 billion, we are expanding our teams and capabilities to deliver mission-critical systems to allied forces.

Our work is guided by clear values: building technologies with real-world impact, pursuing excellence in everything we do, setting ambitious goals, and taking on the hardest technical challenges. We operate in a demanding environment where rigor, ownership, and execution are expected.

About the Role

As the Director of Engineering for Infrastructure at Harmattan AI, you will act as a vital management layer between R&D modules and leadership, focusing on elevating our people and standardising our engineering excellence. This is a "hands-off" people management role designed to relieve pressure on senior leadership by building high-performing teams, improving internal tooling, and standardising work processes across the company without sacrificing execution speed. You will be a visionary partner to our leadership, contributing to organisational structure and the long-term technical vision. In this role, you will lead our Engineering Infrastructure team in Paris — the foundation that all of R&D runs on, covering CI/CD, test-bench systems, internal developer tools, and the engineering-facing tooling that keeps every other team productive. Every engineering team in the company is your customer.

Responsibilities

• People Management & Mentorship: Act as a dedicated people manager for engineers, overseeing performance reviews, career growth, and training initiatives.

• Recruitment: Own the recruitment process as the number one priority, building and maintaining an effective engineering team to meet our ambitious growth plans in a competitive platform-engineering and developer-experience talent market.

• Process Standardisation: Develop and implement standardised work processes across CI/CD, test-bench, and developer-tooling teams to ensure high-quality output and consistency.

• Engineering Infrastructure: Audit and improve internal tooling—deciding between off-the-shelf and custom solutions—to ensure engineers have the best resources to succeed.

• Organisational Strategy: Contribute to the organisational structure by reorganising modules and initiating changes to optimise cross-functional (XFN) delivery.

• Vision & Execution: Collaborate with leadership to build the company vision, bringing fresh ideas to the table rather than just executing existing plans.

Candidate Requirements

• Educational Background: A strong academic record in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related technical field.

• Proven Leadership: Previous experience as an Individual Contributor (IC) who has successfully transitioned into a management role, allowing you to deeply understand the technical challenges your team faces.

• Experience: Direct experience leading a platform-engineering or developer-experience team at a hardware-plus-software company, with proven ownership of CI/CD, build infrastructure, and hardware test infrastructure (hardware-in-the-loop and software-in-the-loop testing, lab automation). You have served at least 50 engineering customers in a previous role and know how to balance feature requests against platform health.

• Technical Engagement: While this is a management-focused role, you should still possess a desire to "keep your hands dirty" and remain engaged with the technical aspects of the work.

• Soft Skills & Communication: Exceptional soft skills and communication abilities, with a "high-bar" for excellence and a natural ability to elevate those around them.

• Commitment: 100% dedication to Harmattan AI's mission of building autonomous defence systems and a readiness to thrive in a fast-paced, high-pressure environment.

We look forward to hearing how you can help shape the future of autonomous defense systems at Harmattan AI.