Engineering Manager, Defense
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Key skills for this role
About the Role
Scale AI is seeking a highly technical Senior Manager, Defense Engineering to lead engineering efforts across the Middle East, supporting defense-related projects.
Key Skills for This Role
Responsibilities
- Manage and grow the engineering team in the region, driving technical delivery across defense and public sector engagements
- Design, build, and optimize backend services for advanced AI driven applications
- Lead full stack engineering efforts end to end from system design to production deployment
- Serve as the senior technical authority on defense related projects
- Architect and deploy AI agent frameworks and API integrations tailored to defense and government workflows
- Work cross functionally across internal engineering teams and external defense clients
- Own the full product lifecycle from conceptualization through production
- Deliver experiments and MVPs at high velocity to drive engagement with defense customers
- Inspire and mentor engineers, fostering a technically excellent and mission driven team environment
Requirements
- 10+ years of relevant software engineering experience with strong emphasis on backend systems and full stack development
- 5+ years of experience managing and leading engineering teams
- Demonstrated domain knowledge in the defense sector
- Deep expertise in AI and machine learning, specifically with AI agents, LLM powered applications, and agentic frameworks
- Hands on experience designing, building, and integrating APIs in production environments
- Full stack engineering proficiency
- Proven success leading and developing high performing engineering teams at scale
- Track record of shipping high quality products at scale in fast paced, high stakes environments
Full Job Posting
About Scale AI
- Scale's Global Public Sector team focuses on using AI to address critical challenges facing the public sector.
- Core work includes creating custom AI applications, generating training data for national LLMs, and upskilling/advisory services.
Role Overview
- We are looking for a highly technical and strategic Senior Manager, Defense Engineering to lead our engineering efforts across the Middle East region, specifically supporting defense related projects.
- This senior leader will drive delivery of custom AI applications for defense and national security clients.
What You'll Do
- Manage and grow the engineering team in the region, driving technical delivery across defense and public sector engagements.
- Design, build, and optimize backend services for advanced AI driven applications, with a strong focus on AI agents, evaluation tooling, and automation.
- Lead full stack engineering efforts end to end—from system design and architecture through to debugging, testing, and production deployment.
- Serve as the senior technical authority on defense related projects, applying domain knowledge to ensure solutions meet mission critical standards and security requirements.
- Architect and deploy AI agent frameworks and API integrations tailored to defense and government workflows.
- Work comfortably cross functionally across internal engineering teams and external defense and government clients.
- Own the full product lifecycle from conceptualization through production, ensuring high velocity delivery without sacrificing quality.
- Deliver experiments and MVPs at a high velocity and level of quality to drive engagement with defense customers.
- Influence the culture, values, and processes of a growing engineering team in the region.
- Inspire and mentor engineers, fostering a technically excellent and mission driven team environment.
- Collaborate with cross functional teams to define, design, and ship new product features and experiences tailored to defense requirements.
What We're Looking For
- 10+ years of relevant software engineering experience, with a strong emphasis on backend systems and full stack development.
- 5+ years of experience managing and leading engineering teams, with a proven track record of developing high performing teams in complex, mission driven environments.
- Demonstrated domain knowledge in the defense sector—understanding of defense operations, national security priorities, and the regulatory and security requirements unique to defense.
- Deep expertise in AI and machine learning, specifically with AI agents, LLM powered applications, and agentic frameworks.
- Hands on experience designing, building, and integrating APIs in production environments (cloud and on premises), including experience with AI/ML APIs and third party defense or government platform integrations.
- Full stack engineering proficiency—comfortable across the entire stack including backend services, APIs, data pipelines, and frontend delivery.
- Proven success leading, managing, and developing high performing Engineering teams at scale.
- Expertise in identifying product engagement patterns and trends for large scale applications, ideally in government or defense contexts.
- Track record of shipping high quality products and features at scale in fast paced, high stakes environments.
- Ability to turn complex defense business and mission requirements into pragmatic, scalable engineering solutions.
- Excellent problem solving skills, and ability to work independently and as part of a cross functional, international team.
- Experience working in or with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region is strongly preferred; Arabic language skills a plus.
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