Director, Production Engineering

A&E Networks; Stamford (CT); Hybrid; USD 170,744 - 199,771; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Healthcare coverage

401(k) matching

Other benefits

Job summary

A+E Global Media in Stamford, CT, leads a hybrid production engineering function spanning on‑prem and cloud ecosystems. The Director oversees post‑production and studio/media systems engineering, ensuring resilience, security, and scalable workflows across New York, Stamford, and Los Angeles.

The role guides two engineering teams, aligns technology strategy with business goals, and advances cloud adoption and modernization across the enterprise.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering or computer science or related field, or equivalent experience.
• 10+ years supporting media production and/or television network facilities.
• 5+ years building and supporting media systems and cloud-based workflows, with AWS preferred.
• 5+ years in a lead architect or management role.
• Experience supporting post-production equipment tech and data networks.
• Experience working with users to resolve complex issues and with developers/engineers.

Responsibilities

• Provide budgets, sourcing, and purchasing of new technical equipment for engineering management.
• Lead and develop Engineering staff to improve teamwork, training, and alignment with business objectives.
• Guide staff in using technical judgement to foster innovation and decision-making.
• Optimize resource utilization to meet department responsibilities.
• Identify opportunities to improve processes and document system workflows.
• Evaluate technologies and provide architectural guidance to ensure scalable solutions.
• Support culture, diversity, and inclusion across responsibilities.

Skills

Leadership

Strategic thinking

Communication

Problem solving

Cross-functional collaboration

Technical storytelling

Education

Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering or computer science or related field

Equivalent experience in analytics or related field

Tools

AWS

Arch Platform Technologies

GCP

Azure

Aspera

Signiant

SAN/NAS storage management

Job description

Work Locations

With the exception of some select roles that have in‑office requirements, A+E Global Media operates on a flexible model that allows for remote, hybrid or full time in office work (in certain locales).

Office locations include New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Stamford, CT.

Our list of eligible states in which employees may work remotely includes: California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

Role

The Director, Production Engineering is responsible for the strategic leadership, operational oversight, and continuous evolution of the Media Engineering organization across a hybrid production, post‑production and processing ecosystem spanning both on‑premises facilities and cloud‑based infrastructure. This includes responsibility for production and broadcast technology environments in New York, Stamford, and Los Angeles, as well as media‑centric services and workflows operating within AWS and other cloud platforms.

This role provides vision, direction, and governance for all day‑to‑day Media Engineering functions, ensuring operational excellence, service reliability, security, scalability, and continuous improvement across mission‑critical production systems and workflows. The Director is accountable for maintaining highly available, resilient, and performant technology platforms that support the organization’s evolving business, production, and content delivery requirements, especially as many of these functions move to cloud‑based systems and workflows.

This leader is responsible for two engineering teams – a team focused on post‑production engineering supporting all video editing and graphic design environments, and a team focused on studio and media systems engineering, supporting the daily flow of content through all media systems as well as live events and live signal distribution and routing needs. In partnership with Technology, Production Operations, and business stakeholders, the Director drives the alignment of technology strategy, resources, processes, and service delivery models to support enterprise objectives. This includes leading the ongoing modernization of production infrastructure, advancing cloud adoption initiatives, optimizing hybrid operational models, and ensuring the organization is positioned to meet future business and technological demands.

Responsibilities

• Provide budgets, sourcing, and purchasing of new technical equipment and/or services to engineering management
• Manage Engineering staff daily and provide leadership to teams in an effort to improve all facets of teamwork including but not limited to training, team alignment to core values and business objectives, job satisfaction, and communication
• Position Engineering staff members to exercise judgement based on their technical and tactical experiences to facilitate development of their innovative and creative decision‑making skills
• Assure that resources are being utilized in the most efficient manner in order to fulfill all responsibilities of the department
• Identify and recommend process improvement opportunities as well as document system workflows and dependencies to make support processes easy to follow and maintain
• Where applicable, evaluate technologies and do research to determine what solutions are best for a given need. When necessary, be able to step in and provide technical and architectural guidance on engineering projects to ensure teams are on the right track building solutions that will serve the organization well and scale over time.
• Support the department’s efforts around culture, diversity and inclusion throughout all areas of responsibility.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, Computer Science or related field, or equivalent experience. Degrees in analytical fields including business and physical sciences are also highly applicable.
• 10+ years supporting media production and/or television network facilities.
• 5+ years of experience building and supporting media systems and workflows that leverage the cloud, with a preference for a track record of working in AWS.
• 5+ years of experience in a lead architect or management role, with a preference for having managed other managers and teams.
• Experience supporting Post‑production equipment technology and data networks.
• Experience working directly with users to understand and resolve complex issues.
• Experience working with developers and software engineers.
• Experience with designing and orchestrating daily support responses, training and documentation.
• A strategic thinker who demonstrates initiative, innovation, and the ability to work independently.
• Communication skills, both oral and written, must be exemplary. Presentation skills require the ability to inform people with varying levels of technical and operational experience.

Preferred Qualifications

• AWS Certification such as AWS Certified Solution Architect
• Experience with cloud‑based post production and video editing systems, including workstation management tools like Arch Platform Technologies
• Knowledge of multiple hyper‑scaler and cloud environments (GCP, Azure, etc.)
• Experience working in an Agile/SCRUM environment.
• Knowledge of AutoCad and other technical drawing tools
• Experience creating and documenting test cases
• Experience in scoping large scale projects and budgeting for them
• Experience with media‑related WAN acceleration and file transfer orchestration tools, including Aspera and Signiant.
• In‑depth experience with video production and post‑production technologies including various interconnection and networking protocols
• Solid knowledge of key components involved in storage systems including SAN, NAS and archive systems (LTO).

Compensation

Annual Pay Range: $170,744 – $199,771

Annual Incentive Target: 17.50%

The annual/hourly pay range displayed serves as a good faith estimate of the minimum and maximum base pay range for this role. Compensation for the role will be based on a number of different factors such as a candidate’s qualifications, skills, competencies, location, and experience. A+E offers a competitive total compensation package, which includes healthcare coverage, 401(k) matching, and a range of other benefits.

Equal Employment Opportunity

A+E Global Media proudly provides equal employment opportunity for all employees and job applicants, and makes employment decisions consistent with this principle. The company’s employment actions and decisions – including recruitment, hiring, training, promotion, demotion, compensation, transfer, layoff, and termination – are made without regard to an employee’s race, color, religion, creed, age, national origin, ancestry, sex (which includes pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, and related medical conditions), gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, marital status, alienage or citizenship status, physical and/or mental disability, medical condition, family and medical leave status, genetic information, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.

A+E Global Media is a joint venture of the Hearst Corporation and The Walt Disney Company. We are proud to be an affirmative action/equal opportunity employer/disabled/veterans.