Engineering Manager II, Creatives

StackAdapt; United States; On-site; USD 182,000 - 251,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary

401K

Work from home reimbursements

WeWork access

Parental leave

Mental health program

Job summary

StackAdapt is seeking a Senior Backend Engineering Lead to guide the creative pipeline team. You will own delivery of scalable, low-latency services and mentor engineers in a fast-paced, agile environment.

You will drive architecture discussions, participate in incident resolution, and collaborate across Bidding, Data Science, and Product to ship high-impact features across programmatic advertising systems. This role embraces remote-friendly work from the USA or Canada.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of backend development in distributed, high-throughput systems.
• 1+ years of people management or 2+ years as tech lead / mentor.
• Proficiency in at least one backend language (Golang preferred).
• Hands-on leadership style with code reviews and production incident involvement.
• Clear, transparent communication with technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Lead a team of backend engineers who own the creative pipeline and ship reliably.
• Translate roadmap milestones into well-scoped sprints and manage delivery.
• Run agile rituals and monitor sprint health to prevent burnout and missives.
• Provide 1:1 coaching, feedback, and growth support to engineers.
• Participate in code reviews, architecture discussions, and incident resolution.
• Collaborate with Bidding, Data Science, and Product on dependencies.
• Assist in interviews and onboarding of new team members.

Skills

Backend leadership

Golang

Distributed systems

Code reviews

Scrum Kanban

Mentoring

Strong CS fundamentals

Communication

Tools

AWS

Kubernetes

Kafka

Aerospike

Job description

StackAdapt is the leading technology company that empowers marketers to reach, engage, and convert audiences with precision. With 465 billion automated optimizations per second, the AI-powered StackAdapt Marketing Platform seamlessly connects brand and performance marketing to drive measurable results across the entire customer journey. The most forward-thinking marketers choose StackAdapt to orchestrate high-impact campaigns across programmatic advertising and marketing channels.

About the Team:

The Creative team manages all aspects of the creatives pipeline at StackAdapt, from serving creatives on bid requests to dynamic creative selection, creative approval and audit workflows, and applying complex business rules. We interact with several downstream services and stakeholders, including Bidding, Data Science, and Product.

Our systems are built in Golang and handle millions of requests per second with an SLA of 100ms. We leverage AWS, Kubernetes, Kafka, Aerospike, and other modern tools and databases. We are a software services team, not a data engineering team.

Watch our talk at Amazon Tech Talks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRqu-a4gPuU

StackAdapt is a Remote First company; we are open to candidates located anywhere in Canada or the United States for this position.

What You'll Be Doing:

• Lead a team of backend engineers who own the creative pipeline, supporting their day-to-day execution and removing blockers so the team ships reliably.
• Execute on roadmap milestones defined with Product and senior engineering leadership; break initiatives down into well-scoped sprints and track delivery, flagging risks and delays to stakeholders early.
• Run the team's agile rituals (stand-ups, planning, retros) and continuously monitor sprint health — velocity, workload balance — to prevent burnout and keep commitments realistic.
• Conduct regular 1:1s, give timely tactical feedback, build psychological safety, and support engineers in executing on their growth plans; surface performance concerns to leadership early.
• Stay close to the technology: participate in code reviews and architecture discussions, uphold coding and testing standards, and help the team make sound, scalable component-level design decisions.
• Coordinate with peer teams (Bidding, Data Science, Product) on immediate cross-team dependencies affecting creative serving and selection.
• Participate in incident resolution and support the team's on-call rotation; ensure production issues are followed through to root cause.
• Participate in interviews and provide hiring feedback; help onboard new team members smoothly.
• Encourage adoption of approved AI tooling (code generation, debugging, documentation) to raise team velocity.
• Model StackAdapt's values in daily work and foster a culture of trust, transparency, and technical excellence.

What You'll Bring to the Table:

• Experience in adtech or martech, experience with (and not exclusively to) creative serving in a programmatic advertising space, understanding of different advertising channels and how they work together to serve creatives to users.
• Experience with Dynamic Creative Optimization (DCO), and ad markup and rendering.
• 1+ years of people management experience, or 2+ years as a tech lead / mentor for a backend team, with a desire to grow into a career manager.
• 5+ years of backend development experience in distributed systems, microservices, and high-throughput, low-latency services.
• Proficiency in at least one backend language (Golang preferred; Java, Kotlin, C++, Rust, or similar).
• A hands-on leadership style — comfortable reviewing code, debating architecture, and diving into production incidents alongside the team.
• Strong grasp of computer science fundamentals, data structures, and algorithms.
• Working knowledge of modern development methodologies (Scrum, Kanban) and a track record of delivering on committed milestones.
• Clear, transparent communication with both technical teams and non-technical stakeholders (Product, Project Management).
• Hands-on experience with our stack.

Nice to Have:

• Frontend development experience, understanding of web technologies and how creatives are served and rendered in the browser, and frontend device.
• Experience operating systems under global compliance and privacy frameworks.

The compensation range listed for this role reflects the expected base salary for candidates located in the posting country based on a global rate. It is informed by market data and the approved budget for this position. StackAdapt maintains different compensation ranges for roles across other countries and regions, and final offers will be aligned to the candidate’s current location. We do not ask candidates about current or prior salary history, and we will not use such information, if volunteered, in setting an offer.This range represents base salary only. Depending on the role, candidates may also be eligible for additional compensation such as annual bonuses, commissions, equity awards, and a comprehensive benefits package.Factors Influencing Final Compensation:The final compensation offer will be determined by a variety of factors, which may include, but are not limited to: the candidate's specific experience, technical skills, knowledge, abilities, and relevant education, licensure, and certifications.Other business factors, such as organizational needs and budget alignment, may also be considered in the final offer.

Canada Base Salary Band: $196,000 CAD - $269,500 CAD

USA Base Salary Band: $182,400 USD - $250,800 USD

StackAdapter's Enjoy:

• Highly competitive salary
• Retirement/ 401K/ Pension Savings globally
• Competitive Paid time off packages including birthday's off!
• Access to a comprehensive mental health care program
• Health benefits from day one of employment
• Work from home reimbursements
• Optional global WeWork membership for those who want a change from their home office and hubs in London and Toronto
• Robust training and onboarding program
• Coverage and support of personal development initiatives (conferences, courses, books etc)
• Access to StackAdapt programmatic courses and certifications to support continuous learning
• An awesome parental leave program
• A friendly, welcoming, and supportive culture
• Our social and team events!

Please note: Benefits and perks may vary depending on your country of employment and the nature of your engagement. In locations where StackAdapt does not have a legal entity, employment and benefits are administered in accordance with local regulations and partner policies.

StackAdapt is a diverse and inclusive team of collaborative, hardworking individuals trying to make a dent in the universe. No matter who you are, where you are from, who you love, follow in faith, disability, superpower status, ethnicity, or the gender you identify with (if you’re comfortable, let us know your pronouns), you are welcome at StackAdapt. If you have any requests or requirements to support you throughout any part of the interview process, please let our Talent team know.

We use artificial intelligence (AI) to streamline the resume reviews of candidates and assess their fit based on the criteria outlined in the job posting. We do not use AI to make any final hiring or interview decisions.

About StackAdapt

We've been recognized for our diverse and supportive workplace, high performing campaigns, award-winning customer service, and innovation. We've been awarded:G2 Top Software for 2026
2026 Best Workplaces™ for Young Talent and in Canada by Great Place to Work®
#1 DSP on G2 and leader in a number of categories including Cross-Channel Advertising2026 Winner in the (CTV/OTT) Product/Platform category for the 2026 ADWEEK Tech Stack AwardsTo learn more about our privacy practices, please see our Privacy Policy.