Manager, Software Engineering - Resilience Engineering

Company Overview

Affirm is transforming credit to be transparent and user-friendly, offering customers the ability to purchase items with the option to pay later without hidden fees or compounding interest.

Role Summary

We are looking for an experienced Engineering Manager to lead our Resilience Engineering team. This role focuses on maintaining the security and reliability of our production systems by employing proactive testing techniques such as production load testing and chaos engineering.

Responsibilities

• Set and advance the vision for resilience engineering at Affirm, emphasizing the integration of production load testing and chaos engineering as essential practices.
• Manage and mentor engineers dedicated to developing platforms and tools for safe experimentation in production environments.
• Collaborate with infrastructure, product, and security leaders to integrate resilience verification into the software development process.
• Develop and enforce best practices for safe validation of system limits and failure scenarios in live production.
• Oversee the architecture and continuous improvement of platforms that enable controlled load testing and fault injection safely in production.
• Implement protective measures including isolation boundaries, approval workflows, and automated rollback to safeguard user experience.
• Create systems offering comprehensive observability, traceability, and audit capabilities for all resilience experiments.
• Drive system reliability enhancements through systematic identification of vulnerabilities via load testing and chaos experiments.
• Establish alerts, monitoring, and incident response protocols tailored to proactive resilience assessments.
• Partner with engineering teams to design and execute safe production load tests and chaos experiments.
• Work alongside infrastructure teams to build guardrails around testing and experimentation activities.
• Enable the adoption of resilience methodologies by providing reusable tools, frameworks, and standardized procedures.
• Lead cross-functional initiatives to address and remediate systemic vulnerabilities to improve overall reliability and fault tolerance.
• Promote a culture of preemptive failure testing throughout the organization.

Qualifications

• Demonstrated leadership experience managing engineering teams focused on reliability, infrastructure, or distributed systems.
• Practical experience in production load testing, chaos engineering, or validating large-scale systems.
• Familiarity with chaos engineering platforms such as Gremlin, Harness, or equivalent tools.
• Deep understanding of distributed systems failure modes including latency issues, partial failures, and cascading outages.
• Experience designing or operating systems with robust safety features like isolation, rate limiting, guardrails, and auditability.
• Knowledge of cloud-native technologies including AWS and Kubernetes, along with observability tools.
• Strong programming skills in languages such as Python, Kotlin, or Java.
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving capabilities, balancing long-term investment in resilience with immediate business priorities.
• Proven communication and leadership skills demonstrated by influencing engineering standards across teams.

Compensation and Benefits

This is an existing position classified as Pay Grade - P and Equity Grade - 7. Base salary ranges from 181000 to 241000 CAD annually, with new hires typically starting at the lower end of the scale. The total compensation package may include monthly stipends for health, wellness, and technology, plus comprehensive benefits such as fully subsidized medical, dental, and vision insurance for employees and their dependents. Eligibility for equity shares through the parent company is also available.

Work Environment

Affirm operates as a remote-first company allowing employees to work anywhere within their country of employment. While most roles are fully remote, those in proximate roles may occasionally visit assigned offices. Some functions remain office-based depending on job responsibilities.

Additional Benefits

• Comprehensive healthcare coverage with full premium payment for employees and their dependents.
• Generous stipends for various lifestyle expenses including technology and food.
• Flexible vacation and holiday allowances to promote rest and recovery.
• Employee Stock Purchase Plan available for discounted acquisition of company shares.

Inclusivity Statement

Affirm is committed to providing an inclusive interview experience and will accommodate candidates with disabilities as needed. This role abides by employment ordinances that support consideration of applicants with prior arrest and conviction records in specified locations.