Senior Director - Engineering

The big picture: Axios is a modern media company built around clarity, trust, and smart, essential coverage. As AI reshapes how companies operate, Axios has an opportunity to become more AI-native in how we build products, improve workflows, and help teams move faster with better judgment. We are hiring a Sr. Director of Engineering to lead the people, systems, and practices behind reliable products. 

Why it matters: This leader will develop engineering managers and senior technical leaders while closely guiding teams using AI to build and experiment. Working closely with the CTO, you will turn company technology direction into clear engineering decisions and execution.

Go deeper: The role spans engineering across Axios products, platforms, and workflows, from our CMS and axios.com to newsletters, Local products, internal tools, and systems supporting the Newsroom and business teams. Product, Newsroom, and business leaders set the goals. Engineering builds the systems and capabilities that help achieve them. The right leader will speed decisions, shorten the path from idea to product, spot risks early, and escalate issues before they grow. Responsibilities include:

• Partner closely with the CTO and engineering leaders to shape engineering strategy and technical direction.
• Lead and develop engineering managers and senior technical leaders, supporting clear accountability and a healthy culture. Develop and retain strong talent, and hire thoughtfully as needs evolve.
• Strengthen planning, delivery, quality, and reliability. Help teams make faster decisions, move ideas into products, spot risks, and escalate issues early.
• Partner with Product, Design, Newsroom, and business leaders to turn priorities into technical plans and match engineering capacity to the most important work.
• Bring strong judgment to architecture, platforms, and reliability, especially when tradeoffs span teams.
• Own the operating standards, guidelines, and practices that help engineering teams plan, build, test, release, operate, and learn effectively.
• Establish shared benchmarks and baselines for engineering health.
• Lead vendor evaluation and selection for engineering tools, platforms, and services, balancing capability, cost, security, reliability, support, and long-term fit.
• Help define modern engineering leadership inside an AI-native media company and shape how Axios builds, learns, and delivers at speed.

Worthy of your time: This leader must be a close partner to the CTO and senior leaders who can explain technical details clearly and dive deep with engineers on technical and architectural questions. Success means faster decisions, a shorter path from idea to product, strong engineering leadership, reliable systems, and an organization that sees around corners. What we’re looking for:

• You have led and developed engineering managers and senior technical leaders, setting clear expectations and addressing performance directly.
• You have helped teams use AI to improve how they build, test, and operate software and to experiment with new product capabilities.
• You translate technical details for executives and nontechnical partners while going deep with engineers on technical and architectural questions.
• You quickly understand unfamiliar areas, ask the right questions, and know when to bring in expertise, invest in platforms, simplify systems, or accept a short-term tradeoff.
• Ideally, you have led teams responsible for high-traffic digital products and the platforms behind them.
• You have a strong vision for how AI and technology will change engineering practices, product development, platforms, and internal workflows.

Starting salary for this role is in the range of $250,000 - $270,000 and is dependent on numerous factors, including but not limited to location, work experience, and skills. This range does not include other compensation benefits. Axios' compensation philosophy takes into account the cost of labor differentials across the country. Because this is a remote-optional job posting, this salary range takes into account all possible locations within the United States, but candidates will only be eligible for the salary range for their location.

Axios is committed to embracing artificial intelligence as a core part of how we work. All team members are expected to actively develop AI literacy and use AI tools to enhance their productivity, creativity, and efficiency. We invest in ongoing learning to ensure every employee is equipped to responsibly and effectively integrate AI into their daily workflows.

What Axios brings to the table besides salary:

• 401(k) with employer match
• Robust PPO and high-deductible health insurance options on the Blue Cross Blue Shield network
• Employer Health Savings Account (HSA) contribution for the high-deductible health plan option
• Dental and vision coverage
• Primary caregiver 12-week paid leave
• Generous vacation policy, plus holidays
• One mental health day per quarter
• Annual learning and development stipend
• $100 monthly work-from-home stipend
• Tele-mental health services through Headspace
• OneMedical membership, including telehealth services
• Personal health advocacy resources through HealthAdvocate 
• Inclusive fertility, hormonal health and family-forming benefits through Carrot Fertility
• Access to the Axios “Family Fund”, which was created to allow employees to request financial support when facing financial hardship or emergencies 
• Increased work flexibility for parents and caretakers 
• Virtual company-sponsored social events
• A strong and positive work environment
• A commitment to an open, inclusive, and diverse work culture

 Equal Opportunity Employer Statement

Axios is an equal opportunity employer that is committed to diversity and inclusion in the workplace. We prohibit discrimination and harassment of any kind based on race, color, sex, religion, sexual orientation, age, gender identity, gender expression, veteran status, national origin, disability, genetic information, pregnancy, or any other protected characteristic as outlined by federal, state, or local laws.

This policy applies to all employment practices within our organization, including hiring, recruiting, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, leave of absence, compensation, benefits, training, and apprenticeship. Axios makes hiring decisions based solely on qualifications, merit, and business needs at the time.