Engineering Manager, Core Services - Live Game Backend

Riot Games; Mercer Island (WA); On-site; USD 170,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical insurance

Dental insurance

Life insurance

Parental leave

401k with company match

Open PTO policy

Job summary

Riot Games is seeking an Engineering Manager, Services for VALORANT Core Services to lead a team responsible for the core game services powering VALORANT.

You will mentor engineers, drive performance management, and shape the technical vision while delivering reliable, scalable backend services and coordinating with Riot and Tencent teams.

This role emphasizes leadership, collaboration, and a strong focus on players' experience across regions.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional software engineering experience in services.
• 2+ years directly leading an engineering team.
• Experience setting technical direction and architecture.
• Proficiency in C#, Java, or Golang.
• Experience with Agile or Lean development processes.
• Experience with cloud computing and backend systems.

Responsibilities

• Manage a team of 5-10 Software Engineers across experience levels.
• Ensure VALORANT Players receive a consistently great services experience in Riot and Tencent regions.
• Serve as a hands-on engineering leader, comfortable contributing across all phases of the product lifecycle, including implementation.
• Develop a technical vision for your team, working with production and product partners to ensure consistency with overall product goals. Communicate this vision to your team clearly.
• Advocate for Players, your team, and internal development customers when deciding what to build and why. Coordinate with other teams across Riot and Tencent working on Services technology.
• Ensure high technical quality of what your team produces. Establish mechanisms to ensure your engineers have room to invent while maintaining a technical backstop for them.
• Foster a collaborative, challenging, and satisfying environment for your development team. Find and surface issues, opportunities, and address them head-on. Celebrate wins.
• Coach and develop your engineering team to grow in their roles, develop technical skills, and improve their effectiveness.
• Champion and model Riot’s values, setting the tone for your team and peers.
• Participate in your team’s on-call rotation.

Skills

Team leadership

Backend services

Cloud computing

C#

Java

Golang

Lean/Agile

Communication

Tools

Azure/AWS

Job description

Riot Games is seeking an Engineering Manager, Services for VALORANT Core Services to lead a team responsible for the core game services powering VALORANT.

You will mentor engineers, drive performance management, and shape the technical vision while delivering reliable, scalable backend services and coordinating with Riot and Tencent teams.

This role emphasizes leadership, collaboration, and a strong focus on players' experience across regions.