Senior Engineering Manager - Release Engineering

MercuryMercury·Remote(San Francisco, CA, New York, NY, Portland, OR, or Remote within Canada or United States)
Software Development
Excel

WFA Digital Insight

The demand for skilled engineering managers in the fintech sector has surged, with a 25% increase in job postings over the past year. As companies like Mercury continue to scale, the need for experts who can lead high-performing teams and optimize release pipelines has never been more pressing. With the rise of remote work, candidates can now access these opportunities from anywhere, but they must possess a unique blend of technical expertise, leadership acumen, and collaborative mindset.

Job Description

About the Role

As a Senior Engineering Manager at Mercury, you will be responsible for leading the Release Engineering team, which plays a critical role in ensuring the smooth delivery of software updates to customers. Your team will own the CI/CD platform, build infrastructure, deployment tooling, and practices that enable 400+ engineers to deliver with confidence. You will partner closely with the Backend Developer Experience team to deliver the full software delivery lifecycle from code commit to production. The Release Engineering team is the backbone of Mercury's software delivery process, and as the leader of this team, you will be responsible for ensuring that the release pipeline is fast, reliable, observable, and secure. You will drive the strategy and execution for improving build performance, test reliability, deployment safety, and developer velocity. Mercury is a rapidly scaling fintech company, and the Release Engineering team must be able to keep pace with the demands of the business. You will need to balance long-term platform investments with the day-to-day reliability needs of the engineering team.

What You Will Do

  • Lead and grow a team of four engineers focused on CI/CD infrastructure, build systems, deployment automation, and developer tooling
  • Create a strong culture of operational excellence, with measurable improvements to pipeline reliability, build times, and deployment confidence
  • Own Mercury's release pipeline end-to-end — from pull request merge to production — ensuring it is fast, reliable, observable, and secure
  • Drive the strategy and execution for improving build performance, test reliability, deployment safety, and developer velocity
  • Partner closely with Platform, Security, and Product Engineering teams to design and deliver systems that meet the demands of a rapidly scaling fintech
  • Establish and evangelize release engineering best practices across Mercury's engineering org — defining standards for deployment frequency, change failure rate, and MTTR
  • Balance long-term platform investments with the day-to-day reliability needs of 400+ engineers shipping code every day
  • Build and maintain tooling that enforces compliance checkpoints and audit trails as part of the release pipeline — without slowing teams down
  • Hire, mentor, and retain top-tier engineers; help them grow into technical leads and raise the overall bar for the team

What We Are Looking For

  • 7+ years of software engineering experience, including 4+ years managing engineering teams in high-growth or high-availability environments
  • Deep hands-on experience with CI/CD systems (e.g., Buildkite, GitHub Actions, Jenkins, CircleCI) and the infrastructure that supports them
  • Strong background in build systems (Bazel, Buck2), containerization (Docker, Kubernetes), and infrastructure-as-code (Terraform, Pulumi, or similar)
  • A track record of meaningfully improving release velocity and reliability — you measure what matters and use data to drive decisions
  • Experience operating in regulated or security-sensitive environments, ideally fintech, payments, or banking
  • Excellent cross-functional communication skills — you can translate between engineering depth and business impact, and you partner effectively with Security, Compliance, and Product leaders
  • A pragmatic philosophy: you believe release infrastructure should be a force multiplier for product engineers, not a bureaucratic hurdle
  • The ability to attract, develop, and retain exceptional talent — you take hiring and team development seriously

Nice to Have

  • Experience with Excel and other data analysis tools
  • Knowledge of cloud-based infrastructure and services (AWS, GCP, Azure)
  • Familiarity with agile development methodologies and version control systems (Git, SVN)
  • Certification in CI/CD or related fields (e.g., AWS DevOps Engineer)

Benefits and Perks

  • Competitive salary and equity package
  • Comprehensive health, dental, and vision insurance
  • Flexible PTO and remote work options
  • Professional development opportunities and conference sponsorships
  • Access to cutting-edge technologies and tools
  • Collaborative and dynamic work environment
  • Recognition and reward programs for outstanding performance

How to Stand Out

  • Develop a strong understanding of CI/CD pipelines and infrastructure to stand out in the application process.
  • Showcase your experience with build systems, containerization, and infrastructure-as-code in your resume and cover letter.
  • Prepare to discuss your approach to measuring and improving release velocity and reliability in the interview.
  • Highlight your ability to communicate complex technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.
  • Research Mercury's technology stack and be prepared to ask informed questions about the role and the company.
  • Be prepared to provide specific examples of your experience operating in regulated or security-sensitive environments.

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