The Technical Director, Data Engineering will own the vision, architecture, and delivery of our data platform and the engineering organization behind it. You will set the technical direction for how Code and Theory collects, models, and activates data, powering analytics, predictive models, and generative AI across the agency and its clients. You will work closely with agency leadership, client stakeholders, Engineering, Strategy, and the Machine Learning team to translate business strategy into data and platform development.
You will have broad authority over technical strategy, standards, and staffing, and input into budget and roadmap decisions. You will anchor the architecture of major platform initiatives, define how we prioritize and fund competing investments, and build the team as deliberately as the systems. You will collaborate with some of the best talent globally and define the culture and craft of a world-class data organization.
Our engineers are AI native and advance the state of the art in the practice of software development with AI.
WHAT YOU’LL DO
- Own the vision, architecture, and delivery of the Code and Theory data platform and the engineering organization behind it
- Set technical strategy and tie it to measurable business outcomes, prioritizing and funding competing initiatives
- Design and scale data platforms from the ground up, covering how data is collected, modeled, and activated
- Activate latent company and client data lakes into data-driven product backends
- Evaluate and select cloud data platforms, making and defending architectural trade-offs
- Write and review Python and SQL, staying hands-on in architecture, design reviews, and critical builds
- Partner with the Machine Learning team to power analytics, predictive models, and generative AI across the agency and its clients
- Use AI tools like Claude Code and Cursor in daily engineering, and build agentic tools and AI-enabled workflows that automate and optimize quality, processes, and delivery
- Lead adoption of AI-powered coding and agentic engineering across the team, establishing best practices for AI-enhanced processes
- Hire, mentor, and develop engineers and leads, and establish engineering standards, best practices, and team culture
- Have input into budget and roadmap decisions and represent the data organization to senior leadership and clients
- Recommend data governance, privacy, and security policies that fit client and regulatory constraints
- Communicate effectively across the full range of technical levels in an organization that is 50/50 Tech/Creative
- Create internal and external knowledge sharing in the form of blog posts, whitepapers, best practices, and methodologies
WHAT YOU’LL NEED
- 10+ years in data engineering or adjacent disciplines
- 3+ years leading teams or technical organizations
- Record of designing and scaling data platforms from the ground up
- Demonstrated ability to set technical strategy and tie it to measurable business outcomes, including prioritizing and funding competing initiatives
- Substantial work experience activating latent company data lakes into data-driven product backends
- Deep expertise in cloud data platforms and the judgment to choose among them. Bring your opinions on which you love and which you hate!
- Strong technical fluency in Python and SQL
- Substantial experience with AI-powered coding, agentic engineering, and AI-enabled workflows, ideally having led their adoption across a team
- Proven track record of hiring, mentoring, and growing engineers and leads, and of establishing standards and best practices
- Exceptional communication and influence across the full range of technical levels
- Ability to represent the data organization to senior leadership and clients
NICE TO HAVE
- Experience owning data governance, privacy compliance, and security programs
- Working knowledge of marketing data ecosystems (GA4, advertising platforms, CRMs, CDPs)
- Experience integrating AI/ML capabilities into data pipelines and shipping GenAI applications to production
- Experience in an agency or consultancy environment, balancing client-facing delivery with internal platform investment
ABOUT US
Born in 2001, Code and Theory is a digital-first creative agency that sits at the center of creativity and technology. We pride ourselves on not only solving consumer and business problems, but also helping to establish new capabilities for our clients. With a global client roster of Fortune 100s and start-ups alike, we crave the hardest problems to solve. We have teams distributed across North America, South America, Europe, and Asia. The Code and Theory global network of agencies is growing and includes Kettle, Instrument, Left Field Labs, Create Group, Current, and TrueLogic.
Striving never to be pigeonholed, we work across every major category: from tech to CPG, financial services to travel & hospitality, government and education to media and publishing. We value the collaboration with our client partners, including but not limited to Adidas, Amazon, Con Edison, Diageo, EY, J.P. Morgan Chase, Lenovo, Marriott, Mars, Microsoft, Thomson Reuters, and TikTok.
The Code and Theory network is comprised of nearly 2,000 people with 50% engineers and 50% creative talent. We’re always on the lookout for smart, driven, and forward-thinking people to join our team.
Skills Required
- 10+ years in data engineering or adjacent disciplines
- 3+ years leading teams or technical organizations
- Experience designing and scaling data platforms from the ground up
- Ability to set technical strategy and connect it to measurable business outcomes
- Experience prioritizing and funding competing initiatives
- Experience activating company data lakes into data-driven product backends
- Deep expertise in cloud data platforms and architectural decision-making
- Strong technical fluency in Python and SQL
- Experience with AI-powered coding, agentic engineering, and AI-enabled workflows
- Track record of hiring, mentoring, and developing engineers and leads
- Experience establishing engineering standards and best practices
- Exceptional communication and influence across technical levels
- Ability to represent the data organization to senior leadership and clients
- Experience owning data governance, privacy compliance, and security programs
- Working knowledge of marketing data ecosystems, including GA4, advertising platforms, CRMs, and CDPs
- Experience integrating AI/ML capabilities into data pipelines and shipping generative AI applications to production
- Experience in an agency or consultancy environment
Code and Theory Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Code and Theory and has not been reviewed or approved by Code and Theory.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — Time-off policies include an “unlimited”/flexible PTO approach with paid holidays/sick time and seasonal early-close Fridays, offering notable flexibility. These options provide additional downtime beyond standard accrual models.
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Healthcare Strength — Core medical, dental, and vision coverage is part of the standard package, with employer-verified health plan information cited as current. Life and disability insurance further reinforce foundational coverage.
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Retirement Support — A 401(k) with employer match is included in the package, supporting long-term savings. Candidates are encouraged to confirm the match formula during the offer stage.
Code and Theory Insights
What We Do
Code and Theory is a strategically driven, digital-first creative agency that lives at the intersection of creativity and technology. We solve consumer and business problems across the entire customer journey that flex to meet the ever-changing needs of consumer expectations. We put the user, their behaviors and needs, at the center of everything we do — from our proprietary research methodologies, to product development processes, to how we create brand, channel and messaging strategies. Our goal is simple: to solve our clients business problems. We bring big ideas to life by looking holistically at brand ecosystems where digital plays a prominent role in driving the consumer from first-touch through to conversion to relationship deepening over time. We identify gaps in the consumer journey and opportunities in culture that require products, services or communications to fill. We work across categories, ranging as far and wide as health care (Pfizer, Sanofi, Reach MD, Bioreference Laboratories) to financial services (JP Morgan Chase, Prudential, Morgan Stanley, First Data) to cpg (Mars, Unilever, Johnson & Johnson) to technology companies (Facebook, Xerox, Samsung, Comcast) to culture brands (adidas, H&M). And because our DNA is in publishing — we’ve embedded in over 135 newsrooms in the past decade — we bring unique expertise in understanding how content is created, distributed and optimized, including our work with CNN, NBC News, NBC Sports, and Bustle Digital Group. At Code and Theory, we strive to only be limited by our own ambition and creativity. We believe in pushing our creativity beyond the easy and obvious answers in order to deliver the solutions that are right for our clients, their businesses, and their consumers.
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