Team Lead - Engineering

Xero; United States; Remote; USD 173,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

An established industry player is looking for a dynamic engineering manager to lead a talented team of software engineers. In this role, you will cultivate a high-performing culture, ensuring that your team can deliver exceptional software solutions. You will support your team's growth and development while maintaining strong relationships with stakeholders. This innovative company values diversity and inclusion, offering a range of benefits to support employee wellbeing and career development. If you're passionate about fostering a collaborative environment and driving engineering excellence, this opportunity is perfect for you.

Benefits

Generous Paid Leave

Health and Dental Benefits

Wellbeing Programs

Flexible Working

Career Development Opportunities

Qualifications

• Experience managing software delivery using Lean-Agile techniques.
• Strong knowledge of modern software delivery practices.
• Experience in digital product or SaaS environments.

Responsibilities

• Manage a group of engineers to ensure high-quality software delivery.
• Maintain a predictable and sustainable delivery pipeline.
• Drive engineering initiatives and support team development.

Skills

Coaching & Mentoring

Growth Mindset

High Emotional Intelligence (EQ)

People Leadership

Teamwork

Outstanding Communication Skills

Time Management Skills

Job description

Our Purpose

At Xero, we’re here to help you supercharge your business. We do this by automating routine tasks, surfacing actionable insights, and connecting businesses with the right data, advisors, and apps. When that happens, we’re not only making life better for small businesses; we’re building a stronger economy that can change the world.

How you'll make an impact

• You will manage a group of engineers while directly contributing to the team’s successful outcomes by supporting excellent engineering and delivery practices that enable rapid delivery of high-quality software. You will support your direct reports in becoming excellent Xeros, empowering them to deliver high-quality software to customers and fostering a world-class engineering culture.
• You’ll maintain a working environment where your team can do their best work predictably and sustainably. You’ll ensure the team has all necessary information and feedback loops to discover and deliver valuable, usable, and buildable outcomes. You’ll monitor and support the operational health of your team and products, aiming for resilience.
• You will support your team in honing their engineering skills and growing as individuals to meet the capabilities required. Your focus will be on driving engineering initiatives and ensuring progress towards goals.

What you'll do

• Engineering:
• Maintain positive relationships with your product peers and your team.
• Ensure your team’s delivery pipeline is predictable and sustainable, raising and addressing blockers as needed.
• Ensure accurate, fit-for-purpose, and sustainable delivery systems. You’ll be responsible for providing informed estimates, delivery forecasting, capacity planning, and reporting.
• Ensure the health of your team’s products is well understood, discoverable by the wider organization, and addressable if issues arise.
• Understand and advocate for Xero Engineering Standards, facilitating an engineering approach that is compliant and fosters excellent engineering.
• Assist in developing roadmaps and plans with your peers in Product and your team to deliver business outcomes efficiently.
• Maintain current knowledge of engineering technologies used in Xero’s software applications. Stay updated on emerging practices, techniques, and frameworks.
• Work with engineers and CX teams to troubleshoot and resolve production issues, ensuring post-incident learnings are collected and acted upon.
• Coach and enable your team for effective and efficient delivery.

Culture & People

• Lead, develop, and grow a high-performing team through coaching, mentoring, and setting clear direction aligned with Xero’s strategic objectives.
• Support each team member in identifying, growing, and developing engineering capabilities and career opportunities.
• Build strong relationships with stakeholders to develop a high-performing cross-functional leadership team at the pod level. Engage in authentic conversations about wellbeing, capabilities, and engagement.
• Attract, recruit, and retain capable individuals, enhancing team diversity.
• Implement talent management initiatives such as recruitment, growth, and performance management, fostering a culture of engagement and continuous improvement.
• Create a culture of psychological safety and inclusion, monitoring team health and empowering members to share ideas and concerns.
• Drive continuous improvement by reviewing and implementing best practices.
• Facilitate team events like off-sites and team-building activities.
• Help cultivate a fun, appreciative, innovative, and results-driven culture aligned with Xero values.

What you'll bring with you

• Critical competencies:
• Coach & mentor—offer knowledge at the right time and in the right way, understanding how people learn.
• Growth mindset—believe that competency can be developed through dedication and hard work, demonstrating resilience and a love for learning.
• High EQ—self-aware, self-regulated, motivated, empathetic, with strong interpersonal skills. Lead by example in building an inclusive and positive team culture.
• Understanding of Xero's Engineering Standards and ability to coach teams to adhere to them.
• People Leadership—demonstrate honesty and integrity, set objectives, communicate expectations clearly, and support others’ development.
• Teamwork—establish collaborative relationships with peers and stakeholders.
• Outstanding communication and time management skills.

Experience

• Managing software delivery and/or teams using Lean-Agile techniques.
• Strong knowledge of modern software delivery practices and lifecycle.
• Ability to balance individual needs with business objectives.
• Experience with coaching and mentoring teams.
• Experience in digital product or SaaS environments.
• Domain experience in FinTech is highly desirable.
• Experience developing SDKs with UI data layers or BFF capabilities for internal APIs and data orchestration.

$173,000 - $190,000 a year

Why Xero?

We value diversity of thought and foster a culture of respect, fairness, and inclusion. We encourage candidates from underrepresented groups to apply, even if their experience doesn’t align perfectly with every requirement. Our benefits include generous paid leave, health and dental benefits, wellbeing programs, flexible working, career development, and more, reflecting our human values.