Engineering Manager: Lead API-First Distributed Systems

kin; United States; Remote; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary and RSUs

401(k) with company match up to 4%

Medical, dental, and vision coverage

Company-funded HSA contributions

Company-paid life insurance and short‑

Flexible PTO (exempt employees)

Paid parental leave

Job summary

Kin is seeking an Engineering Manager to lead a full-stack team responsible for distributed, API-first systems on AWS. You will act as a player-coach, guiding architecture, delivery, and a high-performing team across front-end and back-end domains.

In this remote-first role, you’ll balance rapid product development with long-term reliability, setting engineering standards, and collaborating with Product to ship roadmap initiatives while driving architectural excellence.

Qualifications

• Minimum 8 years of hands-on software development experience with strong CS fundamentals
• Proven experience managing or leading a team of engineers in a fast-paced environment
• Demonstrated success acting as a player-coach who contributes meaningfully to the codebase
• Experience building distributed systems and decomposing monoliths into modular services
• Hands-on experience with API-first and schema-first workflows (OpenAPI/Swagger, contract testing)
• Experience with relational and NoSQL databases, message queues/brokers, and distributed system design patterns
• Ability to design systems with clear service ownership, reliability, and modularity
• Excellent command of the full SDLC: analysis, design, development, testing, deployment, and support
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to convey complex technical concepts clearly

Responsibilities

• Lead and develop a high-performing full-stack engineering team, fostering ownership, accountability, and continuous growth
• Serve as a hands-on player-coach, contributing meaningful production code while setting technical direction
• Drive delivery of roadmap initiatives from concept through production with predictable, high-quality execution
• Champion API-first design and schema-first development practices (OpenAPI/Swagger, contract testing, interface-driven development)
• Guide the decomposition of monolithic systems into modular, distributed services with clear ownership boundaries
• Establish best practices for observability, resilience, and distributed communication (tracing, retries, idempotency, error handling)
• Lead architectural discussions to ensure long-term maintainability, reliability, and performance
• Partner cross-functionally with Product, PMO, and other engineering teams to align technical strategy with business priorities
• Participate in recruiting, interviewing, and hiring to strengthen the engineering organization

Skills

8+ years

Team leadership

Player-coach

Distributed systems

API-first

Databases

System design

SDLC

Communication

Job description

Kin is seeking an Engineering Manager to lead a full-stack team responsible for distributed, API-first systems on AWS. You will act as a player-coach, guiding architecture, delivery, and a high-performing team across front-end and back-end domains.

In this remote-first role, you’ll balance rapid product development with long-term reliability, setting engineering standards, and collaborating with Product to ship roadmap initiatives while driving architectural excellence.