Senior Engineering Manager - Thorn

At Thorn, our cause is our code. We are a nonprofit whose mission of defending children from sexual exploitation and abuse is deeply embedded within our core—a shared code that drives us to do challenging work with resilience and determination.

Here, you’ll work and grow among the best hearts and the best minds in tech, data, and business alongside our network of independent partners, NGOs, and law enforcement agencies. Together, we’re focused on building technology that protects children’s futures. We are looking for dynamic problem solvers with the desire to help address some of today’s toughest issues. You'll collaborate with a diverse group of peers in a remote environment centered on wellness, care, and compassion.

In 2019, we took the stage at TED and shared our audacious goal of eliminating child sexual abuse material from the internet. Come join us to help make this goal a reality and build a world where every child can be safe, curious, and happy.

About the Role

Our Build Team develops and supports the products and tools that empower our industry and law enforcement partners to combat child sexual abuse online. As a Senior Engineering Manager, you’ll lead a team of engineers who bring different technical strengths to this work, connecting user experiences, backend services, data systems, and cloud infrastructure into products that deliver meaningful impact.

You’ll partner closely with Product, UX, and technical leaders to shape what we build and how we build it. You’ll help your team turn complex problems into clear plans, make thoughtful technical decisions, and deliver useful, reliable products. Along the way, you’ll earn trust, develop people, and create an environment where engineers can bring their expertise, learn from one another, and take ownership of outcomes.

What You’ll Do

• Lead a high-performing, collaborative, and inclusive team of engineers with varied technical specialties across the stack. Build a culture of curiosity, healthy disagreement, learning, and accountability.
• Partner closely with Product, UX, and technical leaders to understand user needs, shape product direction, and guide work from discovery and experimentation through release and iteration.
• Work with technical leads and engineers to evaluate solutions across frontend applications, backend services, APIs, data systems, and infrastructure. Connect decisions across specialties and empower the people closest to the work to lead.
• Create clarity around priorities, ownership, capacity, and expectations. Coordinate dependencies, surface risks early, clear roadblocks, and continually improve practices across the software development lifecycle to support effective planning, coordination, and delivery.
• Balance product delivery with technical investments that improve reliability, security, privacy, maintainability, and developer experience. Help the team make deliberate choices about technical debt and long-term system health.
• Collaborate with engineers, technical leaders, and cross-functional partners to navigate shared challenges, build alignment, and strengthen engineering practices across Build.
• Manage and develop your direct reports through consistent 1-1s, quarterly check-ins, coaching, and timely, candid feedback. Set clear expectations, recognize strong performance, address concerns thoughtfully and directly, and proactively protect their wellness.
• Support engineers with different skills, experience levels, and career goals by creating meaningful growth opportunities, developing technical leadership skills, and delegating ownership.
• Define and lead the hiring process for your team in partnership with People & Culture, bringing diverse perspectives into the process and hiring for technical strength, collaboration, and mission alignment.

What We’re Looking For

• You have a commitment to putting the children we serve at the center of everything you do.
• You have a demonstrated track record of managing and developing software engineers, building strong teams, and delivering products that meet real user needs.
• You bring a strong software engineering foundation and experience leading engineers across frontend, backend, data systems, and cloud infrastructure. You can guide technical decisions, connect work across specialties, and draw on the deeper expertise of others.
• You have a passion for product engineering and experience partnering with Product and Design to turn ambiguous problems into practical solutions, learn from results, and improve what comes next.
• You demonstrate strong judgment in balancing user needs, technical constraints, delivery commitments, engineering quality, and team capacity. You adapt thoughtfully to emerging needs and shifting priorities, helping others understand tradeoffs and move forward with clarity.
• You care for people and have experience setting clear expectations, providing candid feedback, and supporting engineers with varied skills and career goals. You lead with empathy, humility, and accountability.
• You collaborate across disciplines and team boundaries, earning trust through curiosity and follow-through, working through disagreements constructively, and helping others find shared direction.
• You communicate clearly, efficiently, and thoughtfully with technical and non-technical audiences. We’re a highly-distributed team, so strong written communication and accessible documentation of decisions and context are crucial.

Technologies We Use

Our work spans the technologies below. We value the ability to lead across specialties and learn new systems; experience with every technology listed is not expected.

• Python 3 / TypeScript
• React / Node / Express
• GraphQL / Prisma / Apollo
• PostgreSQL / Elasticsearch
• Docker / Kubernetes / Terraform
• AWS / Google Cloud
• Amazon SQS / Google PubSub / RabbitMQ / Kafka

Compensation and Benefits

• Salary Range: $150,000 - $207,000 per year
• Work Model: Remote-first with occasional travel for company gatherings, team-building events, and industry conferences.
• Benefits: Comprehensive benefits package supporting employee health, wellness, and growth.