Director of Engineering for an Exciting and Game Changing Automotive SaaS

At Dealr, Inc., we’re reshaping the automotive industry with two dynamic offerings: dealr.cloud and Dealer Title Solutions (DTS). As a forward-thinking SaaS company, we provide dealr.cloud, an all-in-one management solution that’s helping independent dealerships streamline their operations and grow beyond state lines. Meanwhile, DTS, born from our rich heritage of automotive expertise, is transforming Colorado’s title and registration processes with a sleek, electronic approach.

Why join us? Our Colorado-based team is passionate, talented, and customer-focused. We’re proud to offer innovative, user-friendly software solutions that revolutionize dealership operations—whether it’s through dealr.cloud’s comprehensive management capabilities or DTS’s seamless electronic title processing. We’re growing rapidly and expanding our reach, with a stable market share and a commitment to driving continuous improvement.

By joining our team, you’ll be an integral part of our journey toward innovation, directly shaping the future of the industry and enabling dealership success every day.

Check us out:

dealr.cloud: https://dealr.cloud

Dealer Title Solutions: https://dealertitlesolutions.com

As the Director of Engineering at Dealr, you play a pivotal role in building and leading the newly established Engineering department. Reporting directly to the CEO, you will be hands-on in the codebase while concurrently driving strategic technical decisions and fostering a high-quality engineering culture. In this full-stack role, you’ll work closely with the Product Manager and other stakeholders to align development priorities, manage project timelines, and ensure successful execution of key initiatives. Your technical expertise, leadership, and ability to balance high-level strategy with detailed code contributions will be crucial as you shape and grow the engineering team from the ground up.

As a key technical leader, you are responsible for ensuring the quality and reliability of our codebase, implementing development best practices, and establishing processes that promote efficiency and scalability. In addition to driving day-to-day technical operations, you will be a key player in product development, working closely with the CEO and Product Manager to translate product visions into actionable technical plans.

The new engineering department will consist of this role and a Senior Software Engineer, whom we plan to hire simultaneously. You will report to the CEO who is solely responsible for the product design and development of the entire platform to date. You will be coming into an established company with over 30 employees and in a stable growth stage. We’re entirely self-funded through revenue and have been bootstrapped through the startup stage into our current stable position. As we set ourselves for further growth, it’s critical we have further development capacity and the ability to move code responsibility off our CEO. The CEO will remain “head of technology” and “head of product,” however those roles will primarily consist of making strategic decisions for the code base. This role will work closely with our Product Manager, who has been with the company for 4 years and is a technical leader in the organization; the Product Manager will communicate the majority of product requirements and bring an intense awareness of how the product currently operates.

This is a full-time position. Dealr Inc provides a 3-2 hybrid work model in which employees are given the opportunity to work from their dedicated home workspace for two days per week on Tuesdays and Fridays after the first month of in-office training. The typical work schedule will be from 8:00am - 5:00pm weekdays with additional hours as necessary. This salaried position requires at least 40 hours per week and may require on-call time for infrequent issues.

What you’ll do:

• Build and lead the engineering department: Establish and implement the foundational processes, tools, and culture for a high-functioning engineering team. Develop a roadmap for the growth of the department as Dealr scales.

• Hands-on coding and technical leadership: Actively contribute to the codebase, working on both front-end and back-end development, and ensuring the overall architecture supports scalability, maintainability, and performance.

• Drive technical strategy and decision-making: Collaborate with the CEO and other stakeholders to make key architectural decisions and set the direction for the platform’s future development. Ensure technical decisions align with the long-term goals of the business.

• Facilitate code review and quality assurance: Oversee code reviews to maintain high standards of quality, consistency, and security. Set up guidelines for coding best practices and ensure adherence to them across the team.

• Manage development timelines and project delivery: Act as the primary project manager for the engineering department, coordinating with the Product Manager and stakeholders to define development priorities, manage timelines, and ensure on-time delivery of high-quality releases.

• Collaborate on product vision and development: Work closely with the Product Manager to understand project requirements and user stories, define technical solutions, and ensure alignment between technical implementation and product vision.

• Develop testing and release processes: Establish CI/CD pipelines, automated testing frameworks, and release management processes that ensure efficient, reliable, and secure product deployments.

• Establish and manage technical infrastructure: Oversee cloud infrastructure, ensuring scalability, cost-efficiency, and reliability across all deployed environments. Ensure the infrastructure is capable of supporting future growth and complexity.

• Mentor and develop engineering talent: As the department grows, recruit, mentor, and develop junior engineers, fostering a culture of continuous improvement, collaboration, and technical excellence.

• Ensure cross-functional collaboration: Work closely with other departments, such as Product, Sales, and Support, to ensure engineering efforts align with business needs and provide technical guidance for various cross-functional projects.

• Monitor and manage technical debt: Regularly review the state of the codebase to identify and prioritize areas of technical debt, and ensure the team proactively addresses these to improve system performance and stability.

• Champion innovation and best practices: Stay up-to-date with industry trends and technologies, continuously driving improvements to engineering practices, tooling, and infrastructure to enhance team productivity and product quality.

Who you are:

• A Strategic Leader: You can think both tactically and strategically, guiding the technical direction of the company while managing day-to-day operations.

• Hands-On Technical Expert: You’re not just a manager—you’re actively engaged in coding, architecture, and problem-solving. You lead by example with your technical expertise.

• A Skilled Project Manager: You are highly organized and can manage multiple projects, teams, and timelines. You excel at keeping projects on track and ensuring that milestones are met.

• A Great Collaborator: You work closely with stakeholders, especially the Product Manager, and communicate clearly across departments to ensure alignment and smooth execution of projects.

• A Code Quality Advocate: You are passionate about high-quality code, automation, and best practices, ensuring that every release meets rigorous standards of reliability and performance.

• A Mentor and Builder: You’re excited to grow and lead a team, providing guidance and fostering a positive, productive engineering culture where everyone thrives.

Minimum Requirements:

• Years of Experience: 7+ years of experience, including 3+ in a leadership role.

• Experience with VCS: Advanced knowledge of Git and GitHub for codebase management.

• Development Environment: Deep experience with macOS and JetBrains IDEs.

• Cloud Infrastructure: Extensive experience with AWS, including ECS and RDS.

• Backend Development:

  • Expert-level proficiency in PHP and API architecture.

  • Strong experience with NodeJS microservices.

• Frontend Development: In-depth knowledge of AngularJS (v1) and experience with VueJS.

• Database: Extensive experience with MySQL and PostgreSQL.

• CI/CD & Testing: Proven experience implementing CI/CD and automated testing.

• Project Management: Experience managing development timelines and cross-functional projects.

• Security & Scalability: Strong understanding of security, infrastructure, and scaling.

• Formal Education: Bachelor’s degree in a technology-related field.