Assistant Director, Software Engineering-Real Estate

Relha LLC; Milwaukee, Northern (WI, KY); On-site; USD 176,000 - 264,000; Full time

Job summary

Northwestern Mutual in Milwaukee, WI seeks an Assistant Director of Software Engineering-Real Estate to lead end-to-end technical quality and delivery across UI, services, and data platforms. You will guide engineers, partner with product managers and architects, and drive secure, scalable solutions aligned with business goals.

You will set technical direction, raise standards, and build engineering talent while managing risk and ensuring high delivery velocity in a hybrid environment.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of software and data engineering experience, with strong full-stack and data platform expertise.
• Experience leading engineers directly or ready to step into people leadership.
• Proven technical leadership across multiple teams or complex initiatives.
• Strong experience building modern web apps with React.
• Strong experience building backend services and REST APIs.
• Strong data warehousing practices.
• Experience with performance tuning, cost-aware design, and data governance.
• Experience designing secure, scalable, observable systems in enterprise environments.
• Mentor engineers and elevate engineering maturity.
• Strong communication with technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Define and communicate technical direction for Real Estate team, aligned with architecture, security, and delivery standards.
• Translate product outcomes into technical designs and implementation plans.
• Lead solution design across UI, services, and data platforms with clear interfaces.
• Drive decomposition and sequencing for initiatives spanning apps, APIs, pipelines, and warehouses.
• Set engineering standards for code quality, testing, CI/CD, observability, and operations.
• Own technical risk management including architecture, integration, performance, and security risks.
• Ensure API and data integrations are reusable and well-documented.
• Improve data reliability and warehouse performance through model quality and transformations.
• Support production stability with incident response and root-cause analysis.
• Mentor engineers, coach growth, and manage performance.
• Foster ownership-driven engineering culture and regular reviews.
• Collaborate on hiring, onboarding, and succession planning.

Skills

Databases & Data Platforms

Data Interpretation

Adaptive Communication

Talent Development & Planning

Coaching & Mentoring

Product Roadmap

Job description

Assistant Director, Software Engineering-Real Estate

The Assistant Director, Software Engineering, owns end‑to‑end technical quality and delivery execution across UI, services, and data platforms. This role is accountable for technical direction, delivery excellence, and people leadership for the Real Estate engineering teams.

In this role, you will lead engineers directly while partnering closely with Product Managers, Architects, and business stakeholders to deliver secure, scalable, and supportable solutions aligned with team’s objectives. You are both a technical authority and a people leader—setting direction, raising standards, and developing engineering talent.

What You'll Do in the Role:

Define and communicate technical direction for Real Estate team, ensuring alignment with enterprise architecture, security, and delivery standards.

Translate product and business outcomes into pragmatic technical designs and implementation plans.

Lead solution design across front‑end (React), backend services (Node.js, REST APIs), and data platforms (dbt, Snowflake) with clear interface contracts and data lineage.

Drive technical decomposition and sequencing for initiatives spanning applications, APIs, pipelines, and warehouse models.

Establish and enforce engineering standards for code quality, testing, CI/CD, observability, reliability, and operational readiness.

Own technical risk management, including early identification of architecture, integration, performance, and security risks.

Ensure API and data integrations are resilient, well‑documented, and reusable across teams.

Improve data reliability and trust by guiding data warehouse model quality, transformation design, and warehouse performance optimization.

Support production stability by guiding incident response, root‑cause analysis, and preventive engineering improvements.

Serve as direct people leader for engineers, responsible for coaching, growth, performance management, and career development.

Build a strong engineering culture centered on ownership, quality, learning, and constructive feedback.

Lead regular technical and delivery reviews, fostering a healthy review and mentorship culture.

Develop team capability through coaching, pairing, and intentional skills development.

Partner with Engineering Management on hiring, onboarding, and succession planning.

Set clear expectations and accountability for technical excellence, delivery outcomes, and operational readiness.

Cross‑Functional Collaboration

Partner closely with Product Managers to balance delivery speed, quality, and long‑term maintainability.

Coordinate cross‑team dependencies and release readiness for shared components, platforms, and data pipelines.

Collaborate with Enterprise Architecture and other investment delivery teams’ Technical Leads to align standards, patterns, and roadmaps.

Communicate effectively with both technical and non‑technical stakeholders, providing clarity under ambiguity.

What You’ll Bring to the Role:

8+ years of software and data engineering experience, with strong full‑stack and data platform expertise.

Prior experience leading engineers directly (or demonstrated readiness to step into people leadership).

Proven technical leadership across multiple teams or complex cross‑functional initiatives.

Strong experience building modern web applications with React.

Strong experience building backend services and designing REST APIs.

Strong experience with data warehousing best practices.

Experience with database performance tuning, cost‑aware design, and data governance controls.

Experience designing secure, scalable, and observable systems in enterprise environments.

Demonstrated ability to mentor engineers and elevate engineering maturity.

Strong communication skills with both technical and non‑technical stakeholders.

Experience modernizing legacy applications and data pipelines.

Experience with platform migration programs and phased cutover strategies.

Experience defining shared engineering standards across multiple teams.

Skills You Have:

• Databases & Data Platforms: Advanced
• Data Interpretation: Advanced
• Adaptive Communication: Advanced
• Talent Development & Planning: Advanced
• Coaching & Mentoring: Expert
• Product Roadmap: Advanced

#LI‑Hybrid

Compensation Range:

Pay Range - Start:

$176,000.00

Pay Range - End:

$264,000.00

Geographic Specific Pay Structure:

Structure 110:

Structure 115:

Northwestern Mutual is an equal opportunity employer that welcomes talented individuals of all backgrounds. We are committed to creating and maintaining an environment in which each employee can contribute creative ideas, seek challenges, assume leadership and continue to focus on meeting and exceeding business and personal objectives.