Senior Manager of Software Engineering

About the role

The Retirement group at Morningstar builds products and solutions that help employers maximize the value of their workplace retirement plans and put individuals on the path to better retirement outcomes. This is a high-growth area offering a diverse suite of technology and investment-based solutions for plan providers, sponsors, advisors, consultants, and participants.

Responsibilities

• Team Leadership: Lead the North America engineering teams supporting Morningstar Plan Advantage and Fiduciary Services. Hire, coach, and develop technical leads and engineers while fostering a culture of ownership, accountability, and continuous learning.
• Technical Leadership: Establish clear ownership, decision-making practices, architecture and design review standards, and consistent engineering expectations. Enable technical leads and teams to operate independently and deliver predictably. Continuously improve software development and operations through modern practices, automation, and operational excellence.
• AI-Native Engineering:
  • Lead teams through the shift from AI-assisted to agentic engineering, where engineers set direction, build context and guardrails for agents, and verify outcomes rather than producing implementation themselves.
  • Own the engineering environment that ensures agent-authored work is trustworthy: context, standards enforced through automated checks, and feedback that catches defects before human review.
  • Accountability for what ships remains with engineers; AI-generated work does not reduce or transfer responsibility.
  • Measure effectiveness through cycle time across the full delivery lifecycle, rework rate on agent-authored work, and no compromise in quality, security, compliance, or accessibility.
• Delivery & Cross-functional Execution:
  • Own successful execution of initiatives spanning multiple applications and engineering teams by driving alignment, managing dependencies, removing blockers, and maintaining delivery momentum.
  • Partner closely with Product Management to shape roadmaps, clarify priorities, and balance near-term needs with platform modernization.
  • Build strong working relationships across engineering and product organizations, encouraging direct communication, shared ownership, and collaborative problem solving.

Requirements

• 8+ years of software engineering experience, including 5+ years leading engineering teams with direct people management responsibility.
• Strong technical depth in distributed systems, including service architecture, API design, data consistency, resiliency, and performance, with the ability to review designs and identify scalability and operational risks.
• Hands-on proficiency with Java, Spring Boot, REST APIs, and cloud-native development on AWS. Sufficient front-end depth in modern component-based JavaScript/TypeScript frameworks to review full-stack designs end-to-end.
• Demonstrated experience delivering complex initiatives spanning multiple engineering teams and applications, driving execution, managing dependencies, and resolving cross-team technical challenges.
• Experience adopting AI-assisted engineering practices including coding agents, AI-assisted code reviews, testing, and documentation. Ability to establish appropriate guardrails, verification practices, and engineering standards while maintaining high standards for quality, security, and engineering judgment.
• Working knowledge of modern software engineering practices, including CI/CD, automated testing, observability, SLOs, secure SDLC, and cloud-native operational practices.
• Experience developing engineers and technical leads with a track record of growing individuals into broader technical and leadership responsibilities.
• Demonstrated ability to build collaborative engineering teams and foster a culture of ownership, accountability, continuous improvement, and direct cross-functional communication.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to influence technical decisions, navigate ambiguity, and build trusted partnerships across groups.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.

Benefits

• Financial Health:
  • 100% 401k match up to 6% of salary
  • Stock ownership potential
  • Company-provided life insurance (1x salary + commission)
• Physical Health:
  • Comprehensive health benefits (medical/dental/vision) with potential premium discounts and company-provided HSA contributions (up to $500–$2,000 annually) for specific plans and coverages
  • Additional medical wellness incentives (up to $300–$600 annually)
  • Company-provided long- and short-term disability insurance
• Emotional Health:
  • Trust-Based Time Off
  • 6-week Paid Sabbatical Program
  • 6-Week Paid Family Caregiving Leave
  • Competitive 8–24 Week Paid Parental Leave
  • Adoption Assistance
  • Leadership Coaching & Formal Mentorship Opportunities
  • Annual Flex Stipend ($1,000 annually to cover personal education & well-being expenses)
  • Tuition Reimbursement
• Social Health:
  • Charitable Matching Gifts program
  • Dollars for Doers volunteer program
  • Paid volunteering days
  • 15+ Employee Resource & Affinity Groups

Pay

Total Cash Compensation Range: $147,550.00–$226,233.33 (inclusive of annual base salary and target incentive).

Schedule

Morningstar's hybrid work environment requires in-office collaboration four days per week in most locations, with tools and resources to engage meaningfully with global colleagues. A range of other benefits are available to enhance flexibility as needs change.

If you receive and accept an offer, personal and related investments must be disclosed to the Compliance team for review to ensure they meet Code of Ethics requirements. Conflicts of interest will require liquidation of holdings. Certain employee accounts may need to be held with an approved broker, depending on department and location.