Senior Software Engineering Manager, Software Applications

General Motors; Austin (TX); On-site; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

General Motors is seeking a Senior Software Engineering Manager in Austin, TX to guide the engineering strategy and delivery across a diverse portfolio of platforms and integrations. This role combines hands-on technical leadership with team building, talent growth, and ownership of critical software initiatives.

You will drive modernization, architecture decisions, and high-quality delivery while coaching engineers, reviewing designs, and solving complex problems.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Information Technology, or related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 10+ years in software engineering with 5+ years of technical people leadership.
• Proven experience leading engineering teams and managers for complex enterprise portfolios.
• Hands-on software design, coding, code review, debugging, and solving technical problems.
• Experience modernizing legacy systems while delivering for business-critical apps.
• Strong understanding of distributed systems, APIs, event-driven patterns, and enterprise architecture.
• Experience establishing engineering standards, SDLC practices, and delivery discipline.
• Ability to lead across ambiguity and influence senior stakeholders with business impact.
• Strong coaching and mentoring to raise engineers' effectiveness.
• Excellent communication with engineering and business audiences.

Responsibilities

• Lead multiple engineering teams responsible for design, build, modernization, and support of software applications.
• Own technical direction across platforms, APIs, and legacy systems modernization.
• Translate business needs into scalable engineering solutions with product and operations partners.
• Drive modernization, decomposition, and reduction of technical debt for legacy apps.
• Make architecture decisions, review designs, and uphold engineering quality standards.
• Contribute hands-on through design reviews, debugging, and hands-on problem solving.
• Establish and enforce testing, observability, CI/CD, version control, secure coding, and readiness practices.
• Build and develop software engineers and technical leaders through coaching and mentoring.
• Drive incident response and escalation for critical production issues.
• Manage delivery across multiple workstreams with clear prioritization and stakeholder communication.

Skills

Hands-on coding

Code reviews

Debugging

Software design

Mentoring & coaching

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS/CE/IT or related

Tools

CI/CD

Observability

Automated testing

Job description

Job Description The Role

We are seeking a Senior Software Engineering Manager to lead the engineering strategy, delivery, and technical execution of software applications across a diverse portfolio of business-critical platforms, products, integrations, and modernization initiatives. This is a hands-on engineering leadership role. The successful candidate must bring the same technical depth, engineering judgment, and delivery credibility expected of a Principal Software Engineer, while also leading teams, growing talent, and driving execution across a complex application portfolio. This role is not intended for an architect-only or people-only leader. The right candidate is expected to stay close to the code, lead technical design, perform code reviews, solve complex engineering problems, and coach engineers through direct technical engagement and example.

What You Will Do

• Lead multiple engineering teams responsible for the design, build, modernization, integration, and support of software applications
• Own technical direction across a portfolio that includes modern platforms, business-critical applications, integrations, APIs, and legacy systems
• Partner with product, business, architecture, operations, and delivery leaders to translate business needs into scalable engineering solutions
• Drive modernization strategies for legacy applications, including decomposition, platform evolution, integration simplification, and reduction of technical debt
• Act as the senior technical leader for the organization by making sound architecture decisions, reviewing designs, and setting a high bar for engineering quality
• Contribute directly when needed through design reviews, debugging, code reviews, solution modeling, technical spike work, and hands-on problem solving
• Establish and enforce strong software engineering practices including testing, observability, CI/CD, version control discipline, secure coding, and operational readiness
• Build strong engineering teams by hiring, coaching, mentoring, and developing software engineers and technical leaders
• Create a culture of accountability, technical excellence, continuous learning, and customer-focused delivery
• Lead incident response and escalation management for critical production issues, ensuring fast resolution and durable corrective action
• Manage delivery across multiple workstreams with clear prioritization, measurable outcomes, and transparent communication to stakeholders

What Makes This Role Different

This leader is expected to operate with principal-level engineering capability, not simply manage engineers. The role requires strong technical credibility across application architecture, software delivery, integration patterns, modernization, and production support. The leader must be able to challenge designs, improve implementation approaches, and personally help teams through difficult technical situations. Success in this role depends on balancing strategic leadership with direct engineering engagement.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Information Technology, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• 10+ years experience in software engineering, with progressive responsibility across application development, and 5+ years of technical people leadership experience
• Proven experience leading engineering teams and engineering managers responsible for complex enterprise application portfolios
• Deep hands-on experience in software design, coding, code review, debugging, and technical problem solving
• Demonstrated success modernizing legacy systems while supporting ongoing delivery for business-critical applications
• Strong understanding of distributed systems, application integration, APIs, event-driven patterns, data flows, and enterprise architecture
• Experience establishing and improving engineering standards, development lifecycle practices, and delivery discipline
• Ability to lead across ambiguity, influence senior stakeholders, and align technical decisions with business outcomes
• Strong coaching and mentoring capability, with a track record of raising the technical effectiveness of engineers and managers
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to explain complex technical issues clearly to both engineering and business audiences

Preferred Qualifications

• 12+ years experience in software engineering, with progressive responsibility across application development, and 7+ years of technical people leadership experience
• Experience supporting complex customer-facing, operational, or enterprise business domains
• Experience with legacy platform transformation, including mainframe-connected or deeply integrated enterprise systems
• Experience with cloud platforms, DevOps tooling, automated testing, observability, and modern software delivery practices
• Experience leading globally distributed engineering teams
• Experience operating in environments that require both speed of delivery and high operational reliability
• GM does not provide immigration-related sponsorship for this role. Do not apply for this role if you will need GM immigration sponsorship now or in the future. This includes direct company sponsorship, entry of GM as the immigration employer of record on a government form, and any work authorization requiring a written submission or other immigration support from the company (e.g., H1-B, OPT, STEM OPT, CPT, TN, J-1, etc).
• This role is categorized as hybrid. This means the selected candidate is expected to report to a specific location at least 3 times a week {or other frequency dictated by their manager}. This job may be eligible for relocation benefits.

About GM

Our vision is a world with Zero Crashes, Zero Emissions and Zero Congestion and we embrace the responsibility to lead the change that will make our world better, safer and more equitable for all.

Why Join Us

We believe we all must make a choice every day - individually and collectively - to drive meaningful change through our words, our deeds and our culture. Every day, we want every employee to feel they belong to one General Motors team.

Benefits Overview

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Non-Discrimination and Equal Employment Opportunities (U.S.)

General Motors is committed to being a workplace that is not only free of unlawful discrimination, but one that genuinely fosters inclusion and belonging. We strongly believe that providing an inclusive workplace creates an environment in which our employees can thrive and develop better products for our customers. All employment decisions are made on a non-discriminatory basis without regard to sex, race, color, national origin, citizenship status, religion, age, disability, pregnancy or maternity status, sexual orientation, gender identity, status as a veteran or protected veteran, or any other similarly protected status in accordance with federal, state and local laws.

Applicants in the recruitment process may be required, where applicable, to successfully complete a role-related assessment(s) and/or a pre-employment screening prior to beginning employment. To learn more, visit How we Hire.

Accommodations

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