Director of Engineering

At Insomnia Cookies, we believe warm cookies and tech go hand in hand. As we continue to expand our late-night empire, our digital platforms are key to delivering exceptional guest experiences-from craveable online ordering to smooth in-store systems. We're seeking a Director of Engineering to lead the talented team behind our web and mobile applications and scale our architecture for the next chapter of growth.

The Director of Engineering is a hands-on leader who will shape the future of Insomnia's digital experience. You'll lead the engineering teams behind our ecommerce, loyalty, and store technologies, setting a high bar for both team performance and technical quality. You'll operate as a force multiplier-removing roadblocks, coaching talent, guiding architectural decisions, and pushing the boundaries of modern engineering practices, including AI-augmented development.

Reporting to the VP of Digital Product & Development, the Director will manage a team of three Full Stack Engineering Leads, and indirectly oversee engineers across multiple scrum teams. This is a hands-on leadership role where technical excellence, people development, and executional clarity are key. You'll help set and uphold best practices, modern development standards, and ensure delivery of high-quality, scalable, and secure software.

Sweet Position Perks:
4 day work week!! (yupp, we get every Friday off)
A competitive base salary plus annual bonus compensation package
A relocation package to assist in moving to the Greater Philadelphia area
Eligibility for our Long-Term Incentive Program
Excellent comprehensive benefits coverage that includes medical, dental, vision & pet insurance plans
401K with contribution match
3 weeks paid vacation plus 2 paid Insomnia personal wellness days
Relaxed, fun, come as you are office culture
Free cookies, branded swag and so much more!

Job Responsibilities:

• Leadership & Team Management

Lead, coach, and grow a team of engineering leads and their direct reports, creating an environment of accountability, collaboration, and continuous learning
Cultivate an engineering culture focused on innovation, speed, and quality-balancing long-term architecture with near-term delivery
Own the technical rhythm of the team: rituals, code quality, reviews, standups, and release cadence
Encourage experimentation and exploration of emerging technologies, including AI tooling, to improve developer velocity and product performance
Establish and maintain engineering best practices, code quality standards, and architectural consistency across teams
Partner with the VP of Digital Product & Development to ensure seamless execution of the product roadmap and sprint planning
Champion agile methodologies, promote cross-functional collaboration, and streamline development operations

Engineering Oversight
Lead development across the full stack (ReactJS, PHP/Laravel, MySQL) with deep involvement in architecture, performance optimization, and scaling
Evaluate and implement modern tooling, patterns, and frameworks to keep our platform cutting-edge, including cloud infrastructure improvements, system integrations, and CI/CD enhancements
Drive adoption of developer productivity tools and testing automation to reduce friction and improve release confidence
Oversee code reviews, release cycles, testing coverage, and post-release monitoring to uphold high quality and reliability

Strategic Planning & Execution
Contribute to the technology strategy and participate in long-term planning with product, design, and data teams
Identify areas for innovation and optimization across frontend, backend, APIs, and infrastructure
Actively collaborate on platform modernization and refactoring initiatives that improve performance and reduce technical debt
Stay ahead of trends in software engineering and propose new methods to boost reliability, speed, and team effectiveness

Mentorship & Culture
Build a healthy engineering culture grounded in transparency, innovation, and ownership
Provide career development support and mentorship to engineers and leads
Champion inclusivity and diversity within the engineering team
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Tech Stack You'll Be Working With:

• Frontend: ReactJS, HTML5, CSS, JavaScript
• Backend: PHP/Laravel, RESTful APIs, GraphQL (plus!)
• Database: MySQL (bonus if experience with Postgres)
• Tooling: Git, CI/CD pipelines, Agile project management tools (JIRA, Azure Boards, etc.)
• Testing: Unit and integration testing frameworks
• Other: ORM frameworks (Eloquent, Django, Active Record), experience with cloud infrastructure and DevOps pipelines preferred
• Open to exploring new stacks and tools where they provide meaningful business or developer productivity gains

Desired Skills & Qualifications:

• 7+ years in full-stack development with increasing levels of responsibility; 2+ years in people leadership, ideally in fast-paced or high-growth environments
• Comfortable rolling up your sleeves while mentoring others and setting standards for technical excellence
• Strong proficiency in full-stack web development, especially with ReactJS and PHP/Laravel
• Proven experience managing, mentoring, and scaling engineering teams
• Deep understanding of modern engineering principles, including object-oriented programming, testing strategies, and agile development
• Familiarity with tools or approaches that enhance developer efficiency-whether through AI copilots, DevOps automation, or architectural simplification
• Excellent communication skills and ability to translate technical concepts for non-technical stakeholders
• Track record of launching and scaling digital products, especially in ecommerce or omnichannel consumer brands
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related technical field (or equivalent work experience)
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