Senior Director, Security Engineering - Slack

Leadout Capital; Palo Alto (CA); On-site; USD 320,000 - 520,000; Full time

Job summary

Slack is seeking a transformative Senior Director of Security Engineering to lead a global security organization and evolve security from a messaging platform to an AI work OS. You will own platform defense, product security, identity, and AI/agent security while partnering with Slack and Salesforce to protect humans and autonomous agents.

You will drive a forward-looking security program, build faster teams to outpace threats, and mentor senior leaders, influencing governance, strategy and

Qualifications

• Extensive cybersecurity leadership experience across multiple domains (infrastructure, identity, application security, threat intelligence).
• Proven track record building and scaling enterprise security programs in SaaS environments.
• Crisis management and incident response expertise at scale.

Responsibilities

• Own and execute Slack Security program end-to-end across platform defense, product security, IAM, vulnerability management and incident response.
• Lead and scale a globally distributed security engineering organization.
• Serve as Incident Commander for critical security incidents and drive post-incident learning.

Skills

Cybersecurity leadership

Crisis management

Incident response

Security strategy

Cross-functional leadership

Security architecture

Security governance

Organizational change

Board-level communication

Education

Related technical degree

Job description

We are seeking a transformative security leader who can evolve Slack's security posture from protecting a messaging platform to securing an AI work OS where autonomous agents are first-class actors. As Senior Director of Security Engineering, you will lead a globally distributed security organization and own the full spectrum — from platform defense and incident response through product security, identity, and the emerging discipline of AI/agent security. You'll partner across Slack and Salesforce to ensure Slack remains the most trusted platform for both human users and the autonomous AI agents they deploy. This is not a maintenance role. We need someone who sees around corners, builds teams that move faster than adversaries, and has the conviction to drive a security program that's as forward-looking as the product it protects.

What You'll Build (Transform)

• Architect security for the agentic era — Define and execute the end-to-end security vision and roadmap for Slack. You will continuously evolve our security posture to stay ahead of sophisticated, AI-driven threat actors by establishing a complete security model for AI agents operating on Slack with clear benchmarks, driving accountability, and aligning platform defense with broader enterprise business goals. Evolve Slack’s identity and access management to consider emerging zero trust agentic use cases
• Build AI-powered defense capabilities — Evolve our AI and ML-driven detection, threat hunting, and automated response systems that stay ahead of the AI-augmented adversaries doubling down on proactive, autonomous threat detection that leverages LLMs to correlate signals across Slack's infrastructure at machine speed
• Transform the SDLC security model — Evolve from gate-based security reviews to security-as-code that makes the safe path the easy path for every engineer — including AI coding agents

What You'll Run (Operate)

• Own and execute the end-to-end Slack Security program across Platform Defense, Product Security, Infrastructure Protection, IAM, Vulnerability Management, and Security Incident Response
• Lead and scale a globally distributed security engineering organization, hiring, developing and retaining top talent including senior security leaders and senior level ICs
• Serve as Incident Commander for critical security incidents, providing strategic counsel to executive leadership and ensuring efficient recovery with thorough post-incident learning
• Collaborate closely with executive peers across Product, Engineering, Legal, and cross-functional security groups to champion Slack Security, ensuring Slack remains the most trusted and secure platform for users and autonomous AI agents alike.
• Proactively benchmark Slack's security posture against industry peers and establish Slack Security as a world-class program that the industry looks to as a reference
• Cultivate a security culture across the broader engineering org — making every engineer a security partner through training, tooling, and incentive alignment

Minimum Qualifications

• 15+ years of broad cybersecurity experience spanning multiple security domains (infrastructure security, application security, incident response, identity, threat intelligence), with at least 8+ years in senior leadership roles managing managers and coaching senior leaders
• Proven track record building and scaling enterprise security programs at consumer or enterprise SaaS scale — not just running existing programs, but transforming them in response to fundamental shifts in the threat landscape
• Deep expertise in crisis management and incident response, with demonstrated experience leading remediation of major incidents across both product and enterprise environments
• Experience leading through organizational change — uniting globally distributed, cross-functional teams into a cohesive, high-performing security culture
• Technical depth combined with strategic versatility — comfortable shifting between board-level security strategy and hands-on architecture reviews
• Excellent cross-functional leadership skills, with experience driving alignment across Product, Engineering, Legal, and Compliance without direct authority over all parties
• A related technical degree required

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience securing AI/ML systems, LLM-powered features, or agentic platforms — including threat modeling for prompt injection, tool-use authorization, agent data access, and AI supply chain risks
• Track record deploying AI/ML for defensive security — automated threat detection, LLM-assisted threat hunting, anomaly detection at scale, or autonomous incident response
• Experience with high-assurance compliance frameworks such as FedRAMP High and DoD Impact Level 5 (IL5), ideally in a product that had to maintain velocity while meeting these bars
• Deep familiarity with threat intelligence methodologies and active threat actor TTPs in the tech industry, with experience leading investigations to evict sophisticated threat actors from complex distributed environments
• Experience securing platform ecosystems where third-party developers, integrations, or agents extend the attack surface beyond your direct control
• Recognized thought leader in the security community — conference speaker, published researcher, or contributor to security standards and frameworks