Senior Engineering Manager, Data Engineering

Are you a seasoned engineering leader with deep experience in distributed systems and event-driven architectures? Do you thrive on building successful, thriving teams while defining architectural standards that scale across a growing platform? Are you excited to shape the foundation of unified data access, streaming infrastructure, and durable state systems in a modern cloud-native environment? If so, we invite you to be a part of our innovative team.

As a Senior Engineering Manager spanning Data Engineering at Ridgeline, you will oversee a team responsible for building and evolving the unified data access and event-driven interaction layer across the firm. This team governs how services interact with durable state systems, streaming infrastructure, and federated query engines while maintaining strong guarantees around reliability, performance, and observability. You will provide technical leadership to teams developing innovative, enterprise-grade systems using cutting-edge technologies—including AI tools like GitHub Copilot and ChatGPT—to enhance development velocity, architectural clarity, and operational excellence. Your work will directly improve consistency, scalability, and long-term maintainability across the platform.

At Ridgeline, how we work matters as much as what we build. Ridgeliners act like owners, choose growth over comfort, and communicate with transparency. We assume positive intent, bias toward action, and bring solutions—not just problems. We celebrate wins, learn from setbacks, and thrive in a resilient, collaborative, high-performing culture.

If this excites you, we’d love to meet you.

You must be work authorized in the United States without the need for employer sponsorship.

The impact you will have:

• Oversee and grow a team responsible for defining standardized patterns for data access, event propagation, and streaming interactions
• Establish architectural standards that reduce direct coupling to storage systems and messaging infrastructure
• Guide consistency across synchronous low-latency CRUD and asynchronous event-driven interaction models
• Improve reliability, performance, and observability across data access and streaming systems
• Partner with senior engineers to shape long-term architectural direction across data engineering
• Reduce redundant integration patterns and consolidate access and event abstractions
• Mentor engineers and cultivate a culture of technical thoroughness, operational excellence, and ownership
• Collaborate with product and engineering leadership to align platform investments with company objectives
• Hire, coach, and retain top engineering talent while fostering a transparent and growth-oriented environment
• Contribute to a collaborative culture rooted in learning, teaching, resilience, and shared success

What we look for:

• 8+ years of software engineering experience with at least 3+ years managing engineering teams
• Strong background in distributed systems and backend platform architecture
• Experience operating or managing large-scale messaging systems such as Kafka
• Experience with change data capture technologies such as Debezium and event-driven architectures
• Familiarity with replication services or systems that propagate state changes across durable stores
• Experience improving reliability and performance of streaming pipelines and event processing systems
• Experience building or managing abstraction layers that standardize access to storage and messaging systems
• Demonstrated ability to guide cross-team initiatives and influence without direct authority
• Experience operating high-availability systems with strict reliability and performance requirements
• Excellent communication skills and a passion for mentoring engineers and technical leaders
• Willingness to learn about cutting-edge technologies while cultivating expertise in the investment management domain
• Strong problem-solving skills and a serious interest in having fun at work

Bonus:

• Experience with schema registries and event contract governance
• Experience with multi-region replication and disaster recovery strategies
• Background in query federation engines such as Trino or Presto
• Familiarity with regulated environments or financial systems
• Experience evolving custom replication services into standardized backbone solutions

About Ridgeline

Ridgeline is the first front-to-back system of record for investment managers. Founded by visionary entrepreneur Dave Duffield (co-founder of both PeopleSoft and Workday), the company was created to modernize an industry held back by outdated, disconnected technology. Powered by a single, real-time data set and embedded AI, Ridgeline helps firms automate complexity, accelerate collaboration, and deliver tailored client experiences at scale, without added headcount or risk. Ridgeline is headquartered in Lake Tahoe, with offices in New York, Reno, and the Bay Area, and is recognized by Fast Company as a “Best Workplace for Innovators,” by Frost & Sullivan as a “Technology Innovation Leader,” and by The Software Report as a “Top 100 Software Company.”

Ridgeline is proud to be a community-minded, discrimination-free equal opportunity workplace.

Ridgeline processes the information you submit in connection with your application in accordance with the Ridgeline Applicant Privacy Statement. Please review the Ridgeline Applicant Privacy Statement in full to understand our privacy practices and contact us with any questions.

Compensation and Benefits

The typical starting salary range for new hires in this role is $212,000 - $250,000. Final compensation amounts are determined by multiple factors, including candidate experience and expertise and may vary from the amount listed above.

As an employee at Ridgeline, you’ll have many opportunities for advancement in your career and can make a true impact on the product.

In addition to the base salary, Ridgeline employees can participate in our Company Stock Plan subject to the applicable Stock Option Agreement. We also offer rich benefits that reflect the kind of organization we want to be: one in which our employees feel valued and are inspired to bring their best selves to work. These include unlimited vacation, educational and wellness reimbursements, and $0 cost employee insurance plans. Please check out our Careers page for a more comprehensive overview of our perks and benefits.

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