Director of Product & Engineering, LSO Playout

Position summary

The Director of Product & Engineering, LSO Playout leads the development of software for organizations operating scheduled broadcast and streaming channels. Reporting to the Vice President, Software Products, you will manage four specialist engineers and a Technical Support Specialist, and coordinate shared design, quality and cloud support. The planned product direction includes a cloud-only option and a local-plus-cloud option for operators who need output into their own signal chain.

You will translate that direction into a tested product scope, with clear choices about supported systems, output devices and delivery modes. This is a hands-on role requiring architecture judgment, code review and familiarity with time-sensitive media systems. AI tools will support development and selected scheduling workflows; predictable playout, operator control and recovery behavior must be established through conventional software design and testing.

Responsibilities

• Define initial customer workflows, supported deployment modes and product boundaries through discussions with broadcast and streaming operators.
• Own the architecture for scheduling, media preparation, playout execution, local agents and cloud coordination, with explicit failure boundaries.
• Lead and develop the specialist engineering team, review implementation decisions and contribute to difficult technical work.
• Establish measurable targets for timing, continuity, recovery and output quality, together with tests that demonstrate whether they are met.
• Guide validation of supported output devices, drivers and operating systems, including multiple outputs and the mapping of channels to physical devices.
• Require deterministic execution of approved schedules, preserving operator control and separating AI recommendations from timing-critical on-air decisions.
• Plan local behavior during connectivity loss, recovery after restarts and safe reconciliation with the cloud service.
• Review cloud, bandwidth, storage and hardware costs with the VP and shared platform engineer before committing to a delivery architecture.
• Own release-readiness recommendations, operational documentation and technical incident follow-up; pause releases when unresolved defects threaten continuity.
• Coordinate pilot installations, operator training and compatibility documentation with customers, shared specialists and the VP.

Required qualifications

• Substantial software engineering experience, typically seven or more years, including leadership of a technical team and production delivery.
• Practical experience with broadcast automation, media pipelines, real-time applications or comparable systems with strict continuity requirements.
• Ability to reason about scheduling, concurrency, timing, media formats and failure recovery, supported by implementation experience.
• Experience delivering cloud services and working with locally installed software or hardware-dependent integrations.
• Demonstrated use of AI development tools with human review, reproducible testing and clear ownership of generated code.
• Clear communication with technical operators and business leaders; a relevant degree or equivalent professional experience.

Preferred qualifications

• Experience with professional video output SDKs, multi-channel playout or hardware-in-the-loop testing.
• Experience with streaming distribution, contribution workflows or media-processing systems.
• Experience introducing new software into a live broadcast environment while preserving continuity.

Measures of success

• The product has a documented, tested support matrix and a credible first-release scope.
• Scheduling, output continuity and recovery behavior meet agreed acceptance criteria in representative tests.
• Cloud and local responsibilities are clear, including behavior during outages and reconnection.
• Pilot operators can understand system state, intervene when necessary and recover from common failures.

First 90 days

Map operator requirements, inspect existing work and agree the initial deployment and hardware targets. Establish the scheduler and local/cloud architecture, recruit or onboard the engineering team, and demonstrate a reproducible scheduled-playout prototype. Run early timing, disconnection and restart tests, then define pilot entry criteria and the hardware validation plan.

Compensation

Proposed annual base salary of $170,000–$220,000 USD. The final offer will reflect relevant experience, qualifications and the agreed scope of the position, subject to approval. This range covers base pay only; any incentive compensation or benefits would be specified separately in an employment offer.

What to include in your application

Describe a media or reliability-sensitive system you helped deliver, including your direct technical contribution and handling of failures. Include a nonconfidential example of AI-assisted development and the checks you used.