Assistant Director, Software Engineering

About the Job:

We are seeking an experienced and technically strong Assistant Director to lead execution, delivery, and evolution of the Data De-Identification (DDI) initiative, a critical component of our broader Testing Transformation strategy. This role requires a deeply technical and hands-on engineering leader with experience designing and delivering data de-identification solutions, including techniques such as data masking, truncation, tokenization, synthetic data generation, data scanning, and remediation. The Assistant Director will be responsible for applying these techniques at scale across complex enterprise systems to ensure secure and compliant handling of sensitive data.

Reporting to the Senior Director, this role is responsible for driving day-to-day engineering leadership, technical direction, and roadmap execution for DDI solutions. The Assistant Director will lead a team of engineers and vendor partners to build scalable, secure, and high-impact solutions that improve how sensitive data is handled across prevent, detect, and remediate pillars.

This role requires a hands-on technical leader who has practical experience working on similar data protection, privacy, or de-identification initiatives, with the ability to navigate complex data ecosystems and influence enterprise-wide adoption.

What You'll Do:

Engineering Leadership & Delivery

• Lead, coach, and develop a high-performing team of engineers, fostering accountability, technical excellence, and continuous improvement.

• Own end-to-end delivery of DDI solutions, ensuring timely execution against roadmap commitments such as Data masking, Data truncation, Synthetic data generation, Data scanning and discovery and Data remediation workflows

• Drive a strong execution culture, ensuring work is prioritized, tracked, and delivered with quality and predictability.

• Actively remove blockers and ensure teams are focused on delivering outcomes.

• Define and create new technical solutions to address complex business and engineering challenges within the DDI domain.

• Pull together key technical SMEs (data, platform, security, application teams) to evaluate solution options, align on architecture, and drive execution.

• Drive alignment and progress despite constraints (technical, organizational, or operational) to ensure successful delivery of results.

Technical Leadership & Decision Making

• Serve as a hands-on technical leader, capable of diving deep into architecture, design, and implementation.

• Make and drive key technical decisions aligned with enterprise architecture and long-term scalability goals.

• Review and guide system design, data flows, and integration patterns across applications.

• Ensure adherence to engineering best practices, design patterns, and data protection standards.

Roadmap Ownership & Product Alignment

• Partner closely with Product, Program, and Business stakeholders to define and execute the DDI roadmap.

• Translate business strategy into clear technical plans, priorities, and deliverables.

• Ensure DDI solutions to integrate seamlessly into the broader developer workflow, test environments, and automation ecosystem.

• Continuously evaluate and refine roadmap based on business needs, technical insights, and outcomes.

Vendor & Execution Management

• Lead delivery through a mix of internal teams and vendor partners.

• Demonstrate a proven ability to get work done through vendor resources, ensuring accountability, quality, and delivery outcomes.

• Establish clear expectations, operating models, and performance metrics for vendors.

• Actively manage vendor relationships to optimize cost, productivity, and results.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Collaborate across engineering, platform, security, and business teams to align solutions with enterprise needs.

• Drive enterprise adoption of de-identified and synthetic data patterns, influencing teams to shift toward secure and compliant data practices.

• Work closely with Testing Transformation teams to drive alignment across test data, environments, tooling, and automation.

• Influence decisions and drive alignment across multiple stakeholders and teams.

Operational Excellence

• Implement and improve engineering processes, SDLC practices, and delivery frameworks.

• Ensure high standards for product quality, reliability, and performance.

• Drive continuous improvement in development, deployment, and operational practices.

Talent Development

• Hire, develop, and retain top engineering talent.

• Provide direct feedback, mentorship, and performance evaluations.

• Build strong technical capabilities within the team and develop future engineering leaders.

Domain Expertise

• Proven experience working on data de-identification, data privacy, or sensitive data management initiatives

• Strong understanding of:

• Data masking and obfuscation techniques

• Synthetic data generation approaches

• Data discovery, classification, and scanning tools

• Data remediation and compliance workflows

Technical & Leadership Skills

• Strong understanding of SDLC and modern engineering practices

• Solid data engineering knowledge, including how data flows across systems and environments

• Proven ability to make sound technical decisions and guide architecture/design

• Experience working with public cloud and on-prem application architectures

Technology Experience

• Familiarity with databases and platforms such as:

• Aurora/RDS, Postgres, DB2, DynamoDB

• Databricks, MySQL, Sybase

• Strong understanding of design patterns, distributed systems, and data security practices

Execution & Vendor Management

• Demonstrated success in delivering outcomes through vendor partners and hybrid teams

• Ability to manage multiple priorities, teams, and dependencies effectively

Communication & Influence

• Strong communication skills with the ability to engage both technical and non-technical stakeholders

• Ability to influence teams and leaders on important technical and business decisions

• Comfortable operating with visibility across leadership levels

What You'll Bring to the Role:

• Bachelor's Degree or equivalent experience.

• 8-12 years of professional experience in software engineering, data engineering, or related fields

• 3-5+ years of experience working with modern engineering tools, languages and practices.

• 4-8+ years leading engineering teams, including Software Engineering, DevOps, or Data Engineering including:

• Growing engineering skill sets in others.

• Developing future engineering leaders.

• Providing direct feedback and performance reviews.

• Proven track record of successfully designing and delivering significant and impactful technology solutions.

• Experience developing and leading solution delivery using agile methods.

• Solid understanding of the organizations primary domains and business functions.

• Capable of communicating between product, engineering, and the business.

• Ability to successfully communicate to both technical and non-technical audiences in varying forms and levels of detail.

• Leads the team to collaboration.

Skills You Have:

• Accountability (NM)- Accountability: Holds self and their direct reports accountable for measurable, high-quality, timely, and cost-effective results, delivery, and execution. Determines objectives, sets priorities, delegates work to direct reports, and accepts responsibility for mistakes.

• Adaptive Communication (NM) - Adaptive Communication: Formulates strategies to be used to convey complex information about services, products, systems, or processes to targeted audiences; communicates and liaises between technical and non-technical audiences.

• Analytical Thinking (NM) - Analytical Thinking: Organizes and compares various aspects of a situation to comprehend and identify key or underlying complex issues through the use of quantitative data and analysis; leverages strong business acumen, problem solving, and interpersonal skills to think critically about situations from multiple perspectives and consistently seeks ways to improve processes.

• Application Security (NM) - Application Security: Introduces security standards during application development and implements security procedures to protect applications in production. Utilizes knowledge to implement authentication for applications that contain sensitive data. Ensures that no PII/PCI information is logged. Conducts PenTest for external facing apps.

• Business Influence (NM) - Business Influence: Collaborates, communicates and influences direct reports, stakeholders, and other business functions based on understanding of the marketplace, organizational needs, and the client as a people manager.

• Cloud Technology (NM) - Cloud Technology: Applies knowledge of cloud service platforms and delivery models to support, develop, adopt, secure, implement and evaluate end-to-end cloud solutions delivery and data storage instead of through traditional physical servers in a back office.

• Coaching & Mentoring (NM) - Coaching & Mentoring: Develops others by providing actionable, constructive feedback through the lens of technical expertise and offers guidance to others on how to leverage, prioritize, and develop skills to achieve one's goals and objectives.

• Cross Functional Partnering & Planning (NM) - Cross Functional Partnering & Planning: Facilitates collaboration, communication, coordination, and planning with individuals and teams from different functions within the organization, and who have different areas of expertise, to achieve common goals.

• Data Literacy (NM) - Data Literacy: Utilizes appropriate data for a particular purpose by thinking critically about information yielded by data analysis; applies data analytics tools/methods and their appropriate purposes and recognizes when data is being misrepresented to resolve issues or escalate to the appropriate party.

#LI-Hybrid

Compensation Range:

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Geographic Specific Pay Structure:

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We believe in fairness and transparency. It's why we share the salary range for most of our roles. However, final salaries are based on a number of factors, including the skills and experience of the candidate; the current market; location of the candidate; and other factors uncovered in the hiring process. The standard pay structure is listed but if you're living in California, New York City or other eligible location, geographic specific pay structures, compensation and benefits could be applicable, click here to learn more.

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Northwestern Mutual is an equal opportunity employer that welcomes talented individuals of all backgrounds. We are committed to creating and maintaining an environment in which each employee can contribute creative ideas, seek challenges, assume leadership and continue to focus on meeting and exceeding business and personal objectives.

Strategic Thinking (NM) - Advanced, Cross Functional Partnering & Planning (NM) - Advanced, Root Cause Analysis & Decision Quality (NM) - Advanced, Application Security (NM) - Advanced, DevOps (NM) - Intermediate, Release Management (NM) - Advanced, Software Problem Solving (NM) - Advanced, Customer Centricity (NM) - Expert, Strategic Vision & Planning (NM) - Advanced, Data Literacy (NM) - Intermediate, Talent Development & Planning (NM) - Advanced, Coaching & Mentoring (NM) - Advanced, Accountability (NM) - Advanced, Technical Problem Solving (NM) - Advanced, Cloud Technology (NM) - Advanced, Business Application (NM) - Advanced, Analytical Thinking (NM) - Expert, Business Influence (NM) - Advanced, Software Development (NM) - Advanced, Adaptive Communication (NM) - Expert, Learning Agility & Critical Thinking (NM) - Advanced, IT Strategy (NM) - Advanced, Application Performance Management (NM) - Advanced

We're excited about the potential people bring to Northwestern Mutual. You can grow your career here while enjoying first-class perks, benefits, and our commitment to a culture of belonging.

• Flexible work schedules
• Concierge service
• Comprehensive benefits
• Employee resource groups