Director, Engineering

LILT is the leading AI solution for enterprise translations. Our stack made up of our Contextual AI Engine, Connector APIs, and Human Adaptive Feedback enable global organizations to adopt a true AI translation strategy, focusing on business outcomes instead of outputs. With LILT, innovative, category-defining organizations like Intel, ASICS, WalkMe, Canva, Bloomberg, Walmart, AWS, and Philips are using AI technology to deliver multilingual, digital customer experiences at scale.

At a high level, LILT’s AI technology foundation is similar to ChatGPT and Google Translate, before our patented Contextual AI Engine, connector-first approach, and human-adapted feedback.

Get the best of both worlds at LILT! Dive into dynamic in-office energy 2 days a week, sparking creativity and forging bonds with your awesome team. Then, seamlessly shift gears and crush your to-do list from the comfort of your home base for the rest of the week. It's the perfect harmony of productivity and personal freedom. Want a peek inside? Visit our Careers page!

This position is based out of our DC, Indy, Emeryville, or Boston office and you will be expected to work in the office in a hybrid capacity. For the D.C. and Boston metropolitan areas, you will start as fully remote and then transition to hybrid once offices are opened in those locations. 

U.S. citizenship and residency is a precondition of employment. 

The Engineering Team at LILT

LILT is a high-performance, large-scale multilingual translation and creation system. We invest in and prioritize workflow (i.e., usability and interface design) and backend AI systems. Since the translation workforce is distributed worldwide, there are interesting cloud engineering problems to solve. We have a strong preference for building our own backend technology, so you’ll be implementing and working with the latest natural language processing (NLP) techniques and ideas.

What you’ll do

As Director, Engineering, you’ll lead our backend and infrastructure teams. You will be responsible for supporting the career development of our managers and leaders building and deploying core backend services that are the foundation for all LILT products. You’ll work closely with our product and project management organizations to ensure we are building the right software for the private and public sectors, translator community, and services team in a reliable and predictable fashion. 

We are looking for candidates who have a strong technical vision and can help guide teams and design organizational structure over the long term but aren't afraid of rolling up their sleeves and getting down in the weeds on a technical challenge. You'll need to be open to experimenting, and iterating on processes as the company grows. You'll need to be empathic, supportive, and excited to teach as well as learn. 

Key Responsibilities:

• Strategic Leadership:

  • Support and execute on the Engineering Vision: Setting the technical direction for the team, through quarterly OKRs, based on the organization’s direction while aligning the team with LILT’s overall goals and business objectives.

  • Prioritize Projects & Resources: Determine which projects to pursue and allocate limited resources (people, budget, technology) effectively to support LILT’s overall goals and business objectives.

  • Build & Manage High-Performing Teams: Recruit, hire, and develop talented engineers, fostering a healthy, positive, and productive work environment.

• Operational Excellence:

  • Innovation: Constantly evolve our software development processes and drive adoption of AI technology to bring a competitive advantage to LILT. 

  • Ensure Project Delivery: Oversee the execution of engineering projects and ensure projects are completed ahead of schedule, below budget, and meet LILT’s high quality standards.

  • Implement & Maintain Engineering Processes: Establish and enforce HIGH engineering best practices, methodologies, and “Raising the Bar” standards across the organization, effectively managing the tech debt backlog while adding functionalities.

  • Manage Risks & Dependencies: Identify and mitigate technical risks while managing dependencies between different projects, teams, and departments.

• Communication & Collaboration:

  • Communicate Effectively: Clearly communicate, upward and downward, technical decisions and priorities to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.  Ensure team members understand the meaning, importance, and timeliness.

  • Collaborate with Cross-Functional Teams: Wor