Software Engineering Manager

Ford; United States; Hybrid; USD 133,000 - 251,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical coverage

Parental leave

Family care days

Vehicle discount program

Tuition assistance

Employee resource groups

Paid time off

Paid holidays

Job summary

Ford’s Vehicle Care engineering team is seeking an Engineering Manager to lead a multi-disciplinary group of 5–10 engineers, own the technical strategy, and partner with product and design to deliver impactful vehicle services.

You will ensure architectural quality, reliability, and observability while growing engineers, hiring talent, and delivering end-to-end software in a remote-friendly US role with on-site presence near Dearborn, MI as needed.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related OR a combination of education and experience.
• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience, including 3+ years directly managing software engineers, or equivalent experience.
• A consistent track record of hiring, developing, and leading effective engineering teams.
• Experience creating a healthy team environment that is supportive, challenging, inclusive, and accountable.
• Strong technical judgment grounded in experience building and operating complex software systems at scale.
• Experience leading significant technical initiatives with dependencies and impact across multiple teams.
• The ability to partner closely with product, design, data science, and business stakeholders to define, deliver, and measure product outcomes.
• A pragmatic approach to architecture and design, with a preference for simple, extensible solutions that can evolve across customers and use cases.
• A high bar for product quality and operational rigor, including reliability, observability, and sustainable production support.
• The ability to lead with autonomy, sound judgment, and calm in fast-moving and ambiguous environments.

Responsibilities

• Lead, coach, and develop engineers across experience levels, providing clear expectations, actionable feedback, autonomy, and meaningful growth opportunities.
• Build an inclusive, collaborative, and psychologically safe culture where diverse perspectives are valued.
• Hire and develop talent as the team and organization continue to grow.
• Partner with product managers, designers, and business stakeholders to translate customer needs into clear technical plans.
• Bring engineering into product discovery early, helping partners evaluate opportunities, assumptions, risks, and potential solutions.
• Shape the roadmap by balancing customer value with reliability, security, technical debt, and architectural investment.
• Navigate cross-team dependencies and communicate decisions and tradeoffs clearly to technical and non-technical partners.
• Maintain a strong technical pulse while empowering engineers to own implementation and design decisions.

Skills

People leadership

Engineering management

Technical judgment

Cross-team collaboration

Communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related

Tools

GCP

Java

Python

React

PostgreSQL

Firestore

GitHub

Dynatrace

Job description

Ford’s Vehicle Care engineering team is building the future of vehicle ownership. We create platforms and experiences that help customers understand, maintain, service, and get more value from their vehicles. Our work powers Ford and Lincoln Apps, dealer-facing tools, and emerging in-vehicle surfaces.

We operate at the intersection of connected vehicle data, service intelligence, AI, and customer-centered product design. Our systems turn vehicle and service data into proactive, personalized experiences for millions of customers around the world.

We are looking for an Engineering Manager who is both a people leader and a builder. In this role, you will lead a talented, multi-disciplinary engineering team, own the technical strategy, partner closely with product and design, and create an environment where engineers can do their best work. You will have end-to-end ownership of your technical architecture, operational health, product delivery and, most importantly, the growth and well-being of your engineers.

We are looking for an Engineering Manager who combines strong people leadership with technical judgment. You will lead a growing team of approximately 5–10 engineers, shape technical strategy, and partner closely with product and design. You will be accountable for your team’s delivery, architecture, and operational health and, most importantly, for creating an environment where engineers can grow and do their best work.

Our technology stack includes GCP, Java, Python, React, PostgreSQL, Firestore, Google ADK, GitHub, Dynatrace, and more. We value strong engineering fundamentals and technical judgment over experience with any specific tool or framework.

Responsibilities

Lead and Grow the Team

• Lead, coach, and develop engineers across experience levels, providing clear expectations, actionable feedback, autonomy, and meaningful growth opportunities.
• Build an inclusive, collaborative, and psychologically safe culture where diverse perspectives are valued.
• Hire and develop talent as the team and organization continue to grow.

Deliver Meaningful Customer Outcomes

• Partner with product managers, designers, and business stakeholders to translate customer needs into clear technical plans.
• Bring engineering into product discovery early, helping partners evaluate opportunities, assumptions, risks, and potential solutions.
• Shape the roadmap by balancing customer value with reliability, security, technical debt, and architectural investment.
• Navigate cross-team dependencies and communicate decisions and tradeoffs clearly to technical and non-technical partners.

Guide Engineering and Operations

• Maintain a strong technical pulse while empowering engineers to own implementation and design decisions.
• Guide architecture, system and API design, and technical tradeoffs for scalable, secure, and maintainable systems.
• Foster end-to-end ownership, including observability, incident response, performance, reliability, and a sustainable support model.
• Improve how the team builds and delivers software through automation, testing, continuous delivery, and fast feedback.
• Lead calmly through ambiguity and production challenges, using operational and delivery signals to help the team learn and improve.

Qualifications

You’ll have...

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related OR a combination of education and experience
• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience, including 3+ years directly managing software engineers, or equivalent experience.
• A consistent track record of hiring, developing, and leading effective engineering teams.
• Experience creating a healthy team environment that is supportive, challenging, inclusive, and accountable.
• Strong technical judgment grounded in experience building and operating complex software systems at scale.
• Experience leading significant technical initiatives with dependencies and impact across multiple teams.
• The ability to partner closely with product, design, data science, and business stakeholders to define, deliver, and measure product outcomes.
• A pragmatic approach to architecture and design, with a preference for simple, extensible solutions that can evolve across customers and use cases.
• A high bar for product quality and operational rigor, including reliability, observability, and sustainable production support.
• The ability to lead with autonomy, sound judgment, and calm in fast-moving and ambiguous environments.

Even better, you may have...

• Strong product and design instincts, with an ability to find elegant solutions to complex customer problems.
• Experience building platforms or shared capabilities used by multiple product teams.
• Experience building relationships and influencing technical direction across organizational boundaries.
• Experience leading a distributed team across locations or time zones.

Benefits

• Immediate medical, dental, vision and prescription drug coverage
• Flexible family care days, paid parental leave, new parent ramp-up programs, subsidized back-up child care and more
• Family building benefits including adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, fertility treatments, and more
• Vehicle discount program for employees and family members and management leases
• Tuition assistance
• Established and active employee resource groups
• Paid time off for individual and team community service
• A generous schedule of paid holidays, including the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day
• Paid time off and the option to purchase additional vacation time.

Salary

This position is a range of salary grade Leadership Level 6: $132,800 – $250,800

Location & Remote Policy

SOUTHEAST MI RESIDENTS: This role is posted as remote unless you reside within 50 miles of Dearborn, MI—in which case we request on-site presence up to 4 days a week.

Visa and Eligibility

Visa sponsorship is not available for this position.

Candidates for positions with Ford Motor Company must be legally authorized to work in the United States. Verification of employment eligibility will be required at the time of hire.

EEO Statement

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer committed to a culturally diverse workforce. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, religion, color, age, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability status or protected veteran status. In the United States, if you need a reasonable accommodation for the online application process due to a disability, please call 1-888-336-0660.