Software Engineering Manager - AI Enablement and Developer Tooling

Rocket; Detroit (MI); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Rocket is seeking a Software Engineering Manager for AI Enablement and Developer Tooling in Detroit. You will lead a team that builds tooling, accelerators, and shared systems to help engineers ship AI-powered software efficiently.

You will stay hands-on, review code, and raise the bar on observability and production readiness, while partnering with security, product, and leadership to align AI strategy and infrastructure investments.

Qualifications

• Led a team whose output was consumed by other engineering teams
• Experience managing technical teams, hiring, and setting technical direction
• Strong depth in distributed systems, cloud infrastructure, or software delivery
• Hands-on coding ability and ability to reason through problems in a codebase
• Credible understanding of production AI: LLMs, RAG, model APIs, evaluation, governance, cost
• Proven ability to create clarity in ambiguous spaces and drive ownership
• Excellent communication and cross-team influence with engineers, security, product, and executives

Responsibilities

• Lead, mentor, and grow a team owning AI enablement, developer tooling, and accelerators
• Stay hands-on: review code, prototype, and set engineering quality bar by example
• Build internal tools, automation, workflows, and reference implementations to boost productivity
• Drive adoption of AI capabilities and production-ready guidance across teams
• Raise the bar on observability, resilience, and reduction of operational toil
• Turn ambiguous problems into clear ownership and measurable outcomes with leadership alignment

Skills

Team leadership

Distributed systems

Cloud infrastructure

Hands-on coding

AI/LLM familiarity

Communication

Cross-team influence

Job description

Servicing Technology builds and runs the systems Rocket Mortgage clients use to manage their mortgage after closing - payments, escrow, payoffs, and the support experiences around them. As Software Engineering Manager (AI Enablement and Developer Tooling), you will lead the team that builds the tooling, accelerators, and shared engineering systems that make it faster and safer for every team in the Organization to build and operate AI-powered software.

You remove friction for the engineering teams you support through self-service tooling, reusable patterns, automation, and strong feedback loops. This is a builder's role in a space that is still being defined: you will shape what this team owns, earn credibility with senior engineers, and influence architectural decisions well beyond your direct reports.

About The Role

• Lead, mentor, and grow a team that owns AI enablement, developer tooling, and reusable accelerators for Servicing Technology
• Stay hands-on - review code, prototype, and work with AI-assisted development yourself, setting the engineering quality bar by example rather than by directive
• Build the internal tools, automation, workflows, and reference implementations that remove friction and measurably improve engineering productivity across Servicing teams
• Drive real adoption of AI capabilities - shared patterns, evaluation, experimentation support, and production-readiness guidance - so teams ship AI-powered software confidently rather than experimentally
• Raise the bar on observability, resilience, incident learning, automation, and reduction of operational toil across Servicing Technology
• Turn ambiguous problems into clear ownership, decisions, and measurable outcomes, partnering with engineering, security, product, and senior leadership to align on AI strategy and infrastructure investment

About You

Minimum Qualifications

• Have led a team whose output was consumed by other engineering teams - a shared capability, tool, or platform - rather than a single application or an operational function
• Engineering leadership experience managing technical teams, including hiring, developing engineers, and setting technical direction
• Strong technical depth in distributed systems, cloud infrastructure, or software delivery - enough to challenge architecture and earn credibility with senior engineers
• Hands-on coding ability - you still write and review code, and can reason through a problem in a codebase alongside your engineers
• Credible, practical understanding of modern production AI: LLMs, RAG, agents, model APIs, evaluation, lifecycle management, governance, and cost
• Proven ability to create clarity in ambiguous spaces - establishing ownership, driving work through completion, and showing measurable outcomes
• Excellent communication and cross-team influence, with the ability to explain complex technical tradeoffs to engineers, security partners, product, and executives

Preferred Qualifications

• Built or led developer tooling, shared engineering capabilities, or developer productivity programs at scale
• Productionized AI or LLM capabilities, or led AI enablement initiatives across multiple engineering teams
• Drove measurable adoption of a shared capability across multiple teams - not just delivery of it
• Strong awareness of how the wider industry is solving these problems, with a track record of adapting proven practices thoughtfully rather than copying them; contributions to the broader engineering community (open source, writing, speaking, standards) are a plus

Also useful, though not required: agent frameworks, AI evaluation and tracing, model routing or inference-cost optimization, and AI security, governance, and safety practices.

The question we keep coming back to:

show us something you built that materially changed how other engineers build or operate software.

What You’ll Get

Our team members fuel our strategy, innovation and growth, so we ensure the health and well-being of not just you, but your family, too! We go above and beyond to give you the support you need on an individual level and offer all sorts of ways to help you live your best life. We're proud to offer eligible team members perks and health benefits that will help you have peace of mind. Simply put: We've got your back. Check out our full list of Benefits and Perks.

About Us

Rocket is a Detroit-based company made up of businesses that provide simple, fast and trusted digital solutions for complex transactions. The name comes from our flagship business, now known as Rocket Mortgage, which was founded in 1985. Today, we’re a publicly traded company involved in many different industries, including mortgages, fintech, real estate and more. We're insistently different in how we look at the world and are committed to an inclusive workplace where every voice is heard.

This job description is an outline of the primary responsibilities of this position and may be modified at the discretion of the company at any time. Decisions related to employment are not based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, military or veteran status or any other characteristic protected by state and federal law. The company provides reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities in accordance with applicable state and federal laws. Applicants requiring reasonable accommodations in completing the application and/or participating in the application process should contact a member of the Human Resources team, at [e-mail].