Director of Engineering, AI-Driven Defense

IFS; Itasca (IL); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible paid time off

401K with Company contribution

Flexible spending accounts

Life insurance and disability benefits

Tuition assistance

Community involvement and volunteering

Job summary

IFS is seeking a Director of Engineering for our Defense solutions in the United States. You will lead autonomous engineering teams that build AI-enabled software for defense operators, balancing technical depth with people leadership.

This role demands hands-on coding, architectural judgment, and the ability to hire, mentor, and retain engineers who can own the full delivery lifecycle. You’ll drive AI fluency across teams, enforce modern practices like CI/CD and secure-by-default design, and

Qualifications

• Experience leading software engineering teams in complex domains.
• Track record of delivering software at scale in defense or regulated environments.
• Strong cloud-native, API-first architecture and CI/CD practices.
• AI fluency and hands-on AI tooling experience.

Responsibilities

• Lead and grow engineers across the full career ladder.
• Set architectural direction and technical bar for Defense portfolio.
• Own delivery outcomes with emphasis on reliability and security.
• Drive AI adoption and practical AI capabilities in products.
• Collaborate with Product, Design, Architecture and leadership.

Skills

Technical depth

People leadership

Cloud-native architectures

AI fluency

Full-lifecycle ownership

Communication

Eligibility for US defense work

Tools

Go

Python

Java

C#

TypeScript

Job description

IFS is seeking a Director of Engineering for our Defense solutions in the United States. You will lead autonomous engineering teams that build AI-enabled software for defense operators, balancing technical depth with people leadership.

This role demands hands-on coding, architectural judgment, and the ability to hire, mentor, and retain engineers who can own the full delivery lifecycle. You’ll drive AI fluency across teams, enforce modern practices like CI/CD and secure-by-default design, and