Head of Product & Engineering

One Degree is a national nonprofit building technology to improve access to social services and public benefits. The Head of Product & Engineering leads the product and engineering functions, setting technical direction, developing teams, and delivering technology in partnership with the CEO and organizational stakeholders.

Responsibilities:

• Directly manage and develop engineering, product, design, and devops staff. Set clear expectations, provide feedback and coaching, support performance and growth, and build a culture of ownership, quality, learning, and steady delivery
• Guide day-to-day engineering work, remove blockers, and help the team make realistic commitments connected to organizational priorities
• Assess the team’s strengths, capacity, and practices, and shape the engineering structure and hiring plan with the CEO and executive team, within approved budget and priorities
• Turn organizational and product priorities into a clear technical direction and roadmap, including architecture, platforms, data, integrations, security, privacy, reliability, and responsible use of AI
• Partner with product lead to shape product strategy, establish priorities, and balance user and partner needs, technical feasibility, staff capacity, cost, time to market, and long-term maintainability
• Balance investment in new products with support for existing products, technical debt, bug fixes, security updates, and partner commitments. Identify and address risks before they threaten users or delivery
• Work hands-on with the engineering team to design and build solutions, review code, prototype new capabilities, troubleshoot complex technical challenges, and accelerate product delivery. Be comfortable contributing production code when needed
• Establish pragmatic engineering practices for planning, technical design, development, testing, deployment, documentation, and maintenance
• Build a delivery rhythm that makes engineering commitments, progress, risks, and decisions visible and supports reliable releases
• Assess build-versus-buy options, infrastructure and vendor costs, support models, and scalability so technical choices are sustainable for a nonprofit organization
• Serve as a strategic partner to the CEO as a member of the executive team, to help shape organizational strategy, identify opportunities and risks, and translate One Degree’s vision into technology and product priorities
• Exercise independent judgment and take ownership of consequential technology, product, and organizational decisions, escalating issues when they have broader strategic, financial, or operational implications
• Represent One Degree’s technology strategy with board members, funders, partners, and other stakeholders, communicating complex technical concepts and tradeoffs clearly to nontechnical audiences
• Partner across One Degree to make sure technology plans reflect community needs, product priorities, partner commitments, and the organization’s mission

Requirements:

• are a thoughtful, hands-on leader who enjoys setting direction and doing the work to move it forward
• have managed engineers and know how to help a team make progress through clear expectations, coaching, and sound technical judgment
• are an experienced engineering leader ready to take full ownership of a product and engineering organization
• can balance early-stage building with the care and improvement of products people already rely on
• exercise sound executive judgment, make difficult decisions independently, and know when to engage others on issues with broader organizational implications
• are comfortable with ambiguity and can create useful structure without adding unnecessary process
• care about building technology with and for communities, and bring humility, curiosity, and respect for different perspectives
• Approximately 7-10 years of software engineering or technology experience, with increasing responsibility. We value relevant depth and impact more than a particular title or an exact number of years
• Demonstrated experience managing engineers, including setting goals, providing feedback, supporting development, and helping a team deliver
• Demonstrated experience building and launching new software products or capabilities from concept to production, ideally in a startup or similarly resource-constrained environment
• Strong technical judgment and experience making or guiding decisions about software architecture, systems, infrastructure, security, and product delivery
• Demonstrated ability to independently lead complex technical initiatives, translate organizational goals into actionable priorities, make difficult resource tradeoffs, and take accountability for results
• Experience leading technical work from early planning through implementation and ongoing support, with the ability to contribute hands-on when the work calls for it
• Experience partnering with product leaders and cross-functional teams to translate user and organizational needs into plans, manage tradeoffs, and communicate progress and risks
• Clear communication skills and the ability to make technical concepts useful to nontechnical audiences
• You do not need to have held a Head of Product and Engineering or CTO title before
• We are looking for an experienced engineering leader with demonstrated technical judgment, strong people management skills, and a track record of building and delivering products
• What matters most is your ability to take ownership, lead a team, and deliver results
• Unfortunately, we cannot provide employment sponsorship at this time
• Familiarity with APIs, data flows, integrations, and cloud-based systems
• experience in a mission-driven or social impact organization is a plus