Director, Software Engineering (AI Engineering Platform)

Job Description

ROLE SUMMARY

The Director of Software Engineering owns the AI Engineering Platform, one of the core engineering domains within Platform Engineering. This leader is accountable for the strategy, roadmap, delivery, and operational health of the platform capabilities that enable AI/ML and agentic workloads to be built, deployed, and run reliably across the enterprise. They lead a multi-disciplinary engineering team, set technical direction in partnership with Architecture, and drive adoption and outcomes in partnership with the shared Delivery and Activation & Operations functions.

This is a hands-on leadership role that balances people leadership, technical judgment, and cross-organizational influence - including managing critical dependencies on the Agentic Platform, Data Platform, and Infrastructure teams that sit outside this org.

WHAT YOU WILL OWN

The AI Engineering Platform end to end: its vision and multi-quarter roadmap, the engineering team that builds it, the services and tooling it exposes to internal customers, and the reliability, cost, and adoption metrics that define its success. You are the single accountable owner for this domain.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Strategy & Roadmap. Define and continuously evolve the AI Engineering Platform strategy in alignment with Platform Engineering's goals. Translate ambiguous business and product needs into a clear, prioritized engineering roadmap and communicate it to leadership, peers, and stakeholders.

Technical Leadership. Set technical direction for the domain in close partnership with the Architecture function (Cross-Platform, Governance, Capability Definition, Integration). Ensure sound design, engineering quality, security, and scalability across the platform. Make and defend build-vs-buy and vendor decisions.

Delivery & Execution. Partner with the shared Delivery function (Execution, Dependencies, Escalations, Intake, Roadmaps & Programs) to deliver commitments predictably. Manage cross-team dependencies - especially the external Agentic Platform, Data Platform, and Infrastructure teams - and proactively resolve blockers and escalations.

Adoption & Operations. Work with Activation & Operations (Adoption, Embedded Engineering, Platform Support, Success, Metrics) to drive platform adoption, support internal customers, and improve the developer experience. Own the operational health, reliability, and cost-efficiency of the platform.

People Leadership. Build, lead, coach, and grow a high-performing, multi-disciplinary engineering team. Hire and retain top talent, set clear expectations and career growth paths, and foster an inclusive, accountable, high-trust culture.

Stakeholder Management. Serve as the primary point of contact for the AI Engineering domain across Platform Engineering and with partner organizations. Communicate status, risks, and trade-offs clearly to both technical and executive audiences.

QUALIFICATIONS

Required

• Proven experience leading software engineering teams at a manager-of-managers or senior manager/director level, ideally within platform, infrastructure, or developer-tooling organizations.

• Strong technical background in software engineering, with the ability to set architectural direction and earn the trust of senior engineers.

• Demonstrated ownership of a platform, product, or domain end to end - strategy through operations.

• Experience delivering AI/ML, data, or agentic platform capabilities, or closely adjacent large-scale distributed systems.

• Track record of managing complex cross-team dependencies and driving outcomes through influence rather than authority.

• Excellent communication skills with technical and executive stakeholders.

Preferred

• Experience building internal platforms or developer-experience products with measurable adoption goals.

• Familiarity with MLOps, model serving, LLM/agent infrastructure, or AI developer tooling.

• Experience partnering with architecture and governance functions in a matrixed organization.

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EEOC Statement

FIS is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, genetic information, national origin, disability, veteran status, and other protected characteristics. The EEO is the Law poster is available here supplement document available here

For positions located in the US, the following conditions apply. If you are made a conditional offer of employment, you will be required to undergo a drug test. ADA Disclaimer: In developing this job description care was taken to include all competencies needed to successfully perform in this position. However, for Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) purposes, the essential functions of the job may or may not have been described for purposes of ADA reasonable accommodation. All reasonable accommodation requests will be reviewed and evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

Sourcing Model

Recruitment at FIS works primarily on a direct sourcing model; a relatively small portion of our hiring is through recruitment agencies. FIS does not accept resumes from recruitment agencies which are not on the preferred supplier list and is not responsible for any related fees for resumes submitted to job postings, our employees, or any other part of our company.