Engineering Leader, Platform Responsibility - USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 209,000 - 616,000; Full time

Job summary

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is seeking a Platform Responsibility Lead to guide a diverse team of engineers, data scientists, and product operations. You will shape the roadmap, drive reliability, and ensure security across scalable services.

The role requires a strong technical background, people leadership, and ability to navigate complex stakeholder landscapes in a fast-paced environment.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of software engineering experience with 3+ years in leadership overseeing technical teams.
• Experience managing teams with both technical and non-technical personnel.
• Familiarity with ML lifecycle, data pipelines, and data science methods.
• Exceptional communication and interpersonal skills; able to influence senior leadership.
• Ability to balance strategic thinking with hands-on problem solving.

Responsibilities

• Provide leadership and technical oversight to engineers, data scientists, product managers, and product operations.
• Partner with policy, operations, and other engineering teams to define and execute the roadmap for platform reliability and security.
• Foster cross-functional collaboration and establish scalable, reliable systems and services.
• Set operational procedures, incident response protocols, and monitoring capabilities.
• Drive root-cause analysis and continuous improvement for system reliability and performance.
• Ensure compliance with data security policies across platforms and services.
• Manage interdependencies and alignment with other business units.

Skills

Leadership experience

Team management

Cross-functional collaboration

ML lifecycle familiarity

Communication skills

Strategic problem-solving

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS/Engineering or related field

Job description

Responsibilities

Team Intro: As the Platform Responsibility Lead, you will be responsible for providing leadership, guidance, and technical oversight to a diverse group of engineers and cross-functional specialists across product management, data science, and product operations. You will foster a culture of excellence, continuous improvement, and cross-functional collaboration, ensuring that our efforts directly contribute to the success of the business line you support. This role requires a strong technical background, exceptional people management skills, and the ability to navigate complex collaboration landscapes.

• Build, develop, and scale a high-performing organization of engineers, product managers, data scientists and product operations. Foster a positive, inclusive, and collaborative team environment that encourages innovation, learning, and accountability.
• Partner with XFN policy and operations teams, leadership, and other engineering teams to define and execute the roadmap, supporting the business needs.
• Facilitate effective communication and XFN collaboration to ensure integrated and efficient solutions.
• Manage interdependencies and drive alignment with other business teams and departments.
• Establish and enforce robust operational procedures, incident response protocols, and monitoring capabilities.
• Oversee the design, development, deployment, and maintenance of scalable, reliable, and secure systems and services.
• Drive a culture of proactive problem-solving, root cause analysis, and continuous improvement in system reliability and performance.
• Ensure the adherence to company Compliance and Data Security policies.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 5+ years of experience in software engineering, with at least 3+ years in a leadership or management role overseeing technical teams.
• Proven experience managing teams that include a combination of tech and non-tech personnel.
• Familiarity with the machine learning lifecycle, data pipelines, and data science methodologies.
• Exceptional communication and interpersonal skills, with a proven ability to influence senior leadership and navigate complex, multi-stakeholder environments.
• Ability to balance strategic thinking with hands‑on problem‑solving.

Preferred Qualifications

• Familiarity with Trust and Safety policies and principles with an understanding of large-scale risk management.
• Experience with agentic, LLM-enabled workflows and a track record of crafting and deploying automated solutions at scale.

About USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is dedicated to the safety and security of millions of Americans who create, discover, and connect with what they love on the apps we operate. The Joint Venture has been established in compliance with the Executive Order signed by President Trump on September 25, 2025. Our foundation is a comprehensive data privacy and cybersecurity program we operate under defined safeguards to protect national security and secure U.S. user data, apps and the algorithm. We safeguard the U.S. content ecosystem, holding decision‑making authority for trust and safety policies and moderation. USDS Joint Venture helps ensure Americans can continue to express their creativity, discover new hobbies and interests, and build thriving communities and businesses on a global scale.

On‑site presence across teams allows the company to operate with greater speed, alignment, and agility — especially in areas like real‑time decision‑making, team development, and integrated execution. As such, the company is shifting from a hybrid work model to a fully in‑person schedule up to 5 days a week.

Why Join Us

Inspiring creativity is at the core of TikTok's mission. Our innovative product is built to help people authentically express themselves, discover and connect – and our global, diverse teams make that possible. Together, we create value for our communities, inspire creativity and bring joy - a mission we work towards every day.

We strive to do great things with great people. We lead with curiosity, humility, and a desire to make impact in a rapidly growing tech company. Every challenge is an opportunity to learn and innovate as one team. We're resilient and embrace challenges as they come. By constantly iterating and fostering an "Always Day 1" mindset, we achieve meaningful breakthroughs for ourselves, our company, and our users. When we create and grow together, the possibilities are limitless. Join us.

Diversity & Inclusion

TikTok is committed to creating an inclusive space where employees are valued for their skills, experiences, and unique perspectives. Our platform connects people from across the globe and so does our workplace. At TikTok, our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy. To achieve that goal, we are committed to celebrating our diverse voices and to creating an environment that reflects the many communities we reach. We are passionate about this and hope you are too.

USDS Reasonable Accommodation

USDS is committed to providing reasonable accommodations in our recruitment processes for candidates with disabilities, pregnancy, sincerely held religious beliefs or other reasons protected by applicable laws. If you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation, please reach out to us at https://tinyurl.com/USDS-RA

Job Information

【For Pay Transparency】Compensation Description (Annually)

• The base salary range for this position in the selected city is $208800 - $616000 annually.
• Compensation may vary outside of this range depending on a number of factors, including a candidate’s qualifications, skills, competencies and experience, and location. Base pay is one part of the Total Package that is provided to compensate and recognize employees for their work, and this role may be eligible for additional discretionary bonuses/incentives, and restricted stock units.
• Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and the country work location. Employees have day one access to medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401(k) savings plan with company match, paid parental leave, short-term and long-term disability coverage, life insurance, wellbeing benefits, among others. Employees also receive 10 paid holidays per year, 10 paid sick days per year and 17 days of Paid Personal Time (prorated upon hire with increasing accruals by tenure).
• The Company reserves the right to modify or change these benefits programs at any time, with or without notice.
• For Los Angeles County (unincorporated) Candidates:
• Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act. Our company believes that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship on the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of the conditional offer of employment:
• Interacting and occasionally having unsupervised contact with internal/external clients and/or colleagues;
• Appropriately handling and managing confidential information including proprietary and trade secret information and access to information technology systems;
• Exercising sound judgment.