Engineering Manager - EMS - Element Matrix Services (Worldwide Remote)

Job Description

Who We Are

Element is the startup which employs the core team behind matrix.org— the leading project for secure, open decentralised communication.

Matrix’s mission is to make messaging as open as email— allowing everyone to choose where their data is hosted, enjoy private conversations thanks to advanced encryption, and ultimately be in control of their own communication.

Matrix powers Element, our flagship messaging apps for the web, iOS & Android, along with Element Matrix Services (EMS), our SaaS platform for personal & professional use.

We build things for everyone, and we know we can’t succeed without a diverse team. Our hiring process is designed to be humane and give candidates the best chance to show us what you can do. If we ever fall down on this, please let us know.

The Role

You'll spend most of your time working on EMS, our SaaS platform for personal & professional use. You can take a look at our Synapse homeserver code here. Give it a spin!

EMS has already been adopted by organisations including Mozilla, KDE, Tezos, Tadhack & many more.

This role will manage the team in charge of improving the features, performance and reliability of our EMS platform, as well as generally making it as easy as possible for anyone to access secure, decentralised communication software. Do check out our public roadmap.

Our backend is written in Go (Dendrite, Scalar) and as well as Python (Synapse) and Node.js (Bridges), whilst on the frontend, React and JavaScript.

Since (almost) everything we do is open source you can get a great feel for exactly what it would be like to work on EMS, why not join our developer channel at #EMS:matrix.org to provide a window into the core team and the community. Come and say hi!

The core of the EMS team work from our London HQ, where this role will be based. We are open to remote applications, though you would need to be based in a European (or nearby) timezone.

Requirements

The most important thing is that you believe passionately in the mission of decentralisation of the internet. More specifically that you believe that communications should not be centralised in the hands of a small number of very large organisations and instead individuals should control their own data and choose who they share it with.

Additionally we are looking for someone who is:

• Smart, curious and enthusiastic
• Likes to ship early and often
• Take responsibility for the overall effectiveness of engineering delivery for your team/s.
• Shape and communicate the technical strategy for your area.
• Partner with your peers in the Product and Design organisations to ensure strong alignment between your team’s goals and the broader company strategy.
• Ensure that your engineers are well supported to deliver on their goals, course-correcting where necessary.
• Facilitate technical design sessions, retrospectives, 1:1s etc.
• In order to understand the challenges the team faces you will be expected to contribute code. At the current team size, this would mean maybe 10-20% of your time acting as an individual contributor.
• Take responsibility for the ongoing professional development of your engineers.
• Contribute to the hiring strategy and participate in interviews and hiring decisions.
• Act as a point of contact for other areas of the business.
• Relentlessly remove impediments blocking your team.
• A tireless advocate of code quality (understanding the need for trade-offs in the short term whilst keeping us honest in the long term)
• Enjoys working in an Agile/Lean development environment
• Is articulate and empathetic.
• Is comfortable with the pace, trade offs and ambiguity of an early stage startup (specifically: how to take care of yourself and get your work done without working crazy hours).

Your experience

• You have experience leading a high-performing team of engineers, including managing and shipping cross-functional or multi-team projects.
• You enjoy collaborating with Product Management, Technical Account Management and UX Design on the product discovery & delivery lifecycle.
• You are endlessly curious about the technologies your team works with and strive to keep your technical knowledge sharp. It is likely that you have worked as engineer with web technologies in the past, though you must feel comfortable knowing your greatest impact won't be as a technical contributor.
• You place a tremendous value on good communication and appreciate async- and remote-friendly working practices.
• You understand methodologies like Agile, XP, and Lean, and see their value, but don't believe there's only one right way to get work done.
• You have worked as a web developer in the past, experience with React and Typescript would be a plus but is not essential.
• You are comfortable with the pace and trade offs of an early stage startup (meaning: know how to take care of yourself and your team, get your work done without working around the clock, prioritise ruthlessly, be able to tolerate a little uncertainty and sometimes wear different hats).

If you have any questions before making an application reach out to Mischa (@mischawalmsley:matrix.org) via https://app.element.io/

Benefits

Our general approach is to treat people like adults and acknowledge that by being flexible we create an environment for people to do their best work. For more details here is our manifesto. That said specific points that differentiate us.

• Work on FOSS projects with high visibility and a large enthusiastic community
• Since our technology is relevant to anything that requires real-time comms, the role provides exposure to a wide range of domains from web and app dev through to VR, VoIP and IoT.
• Family friendly environment, many of the team have small children and we look to accommodate that as best we can.
• People tend to stay with the company for a long time, we take this as a sign that we have a cohesive supportive culture, that we have engaging challenging work and that people can develop their skills and careers here for the long term.

We build things for everyone, and we know we can’t succeed without a diverse team. Our hiring process is designed to be considerate and give candidates the best chance to show us what you can do. If we ever fall down on this, please let us know.

Element does not discriminate on the basis of race, sex, colour, religion, age, national origin, marital status, disability, veteran status, genetic information, sexual orientation, gender identity or any other reason prohibited by law in provision of employment opportunities and benefits.