Engineering Manager, Data Platform at TRM Labs

Job description

BUILD A SAFER WORLD. TRM Labs provides AI-powered intelligence solutions that help public and private sector agencies investigate and disrupt crime. TRM's platforms enable investigators to trace illicit activity, build cases, and construct operating pictures of threat networks. Leading agencies and businesses worldwide rely on TRM to make the world safer and more secure. The Data Platform team collaborates with an experienced group of data scientists, engineers, and product managers to build highly available and scalable data infrastructure for TRM's products and services. As an Engineering Manager, you will guide your team toward executing mission-critical systems and data services that analyze blockchain transaction activity at petabyte scale. Your contributions will play a pivotal role in building a safer financial system for billions of people. The impact you'll have here: • Lead and nurture a team of high-impact engineers, offering guidance in both technical and cultural aspects. • Provide regular coaching and technical mentorship to your immediate team, while contributing to the broader engineering organization's growth. • Assume direct responsibility for ensuring the quality and timely delivery of the team's work, while overseeing the availability and performance of critical services. • Drive projects aligned with well-defined goals and measurable outcomes, accountable to key performance indicators (KPIs). • Foster best practices in design and usability, creating scalable solutions while emphasizing documentation and knowledge sharing. • Resolve operational escalations and collaborate with cross-functional teams to address production incidents through resolution. • Collaborate closely with management and product teams to plan, estimate, and prioritize roadmap objectives, while identifying opportunities and mitigating risks. • Contribute to the creation of highly reliable data services that seamlessly integrate with numerous blockchains. • Engineer and optimize ETL pipelines that handle real-time transformation and processing of petabytes of structured and unstructured data. • Architect data models to ensure efficient storage and retrieval, maintaining sub-second latency for querying blockchain data. • Oversee the deployment and monitoring of large-scale database clusters, focusing on performance and high availability. • Collaborate cross-functionally with data scientists, backend engineers, and product managers to design, implement, and refine new data models supporting TRM's products. What we're looking for: • 5+ years managing engineers, including a team of roughly 8–15, with scope that has grown over time (more surface area, more people, or more complex systems than when you started). • Technical depth you still use. You read design docs closely, ask the question that changes the approach, and can unblock an engineer on the hard part. You don't need to be writing production code daily to stay credible. • A point of view on leadership. You've thought about how you build teams and how you want engineers to work, and you can articulate it. If you've shared it publicly (writing, talks, open source, community), even better. • You disagree well. You've made the case against a roadmap, a design, or your own leadership, brought evidence, and come out of it still in partnership. • Influence beyond your own team. You've delivered work that depended on teams you don't manage (a migration, a shared SLA, a platform dependency) by bringing people along rather than escalating. • Team building as core work. You've hired engineers you're proud of, grown people into senior and lead roles, and treated the quality of the team as part of the product. • Communication that creates momentum. You can frame where a team is heading in a way that makes strong engineers want to build it with you. • A Bachelor's degree (or equivalent) in Computer Science or a related field. • A proven track record with 5+ years of experience conceiving and implementing distributed systems from ideation through production. • Proficiency in Python, along with strong SQL or SparkSQL experience. • Versatility across the full data engineering stack, including: • Data stores such as ClickHouse, Elasticsearch, Postgres, Redis, and Neo4j. • Data pipeline and workflow orchestration tools such as Airflow, DBT, Luigi, Azkaban, and Storm. • Data processing technologies and streaming workflows, including Spark, Kafka, and Flink. • Infrastructure deployment and monitoring in public cloud environments using Docker, Terraform, Kubernetes, and Datadog. • Demonstrated ability to load, query, and transform large-scale, complex datasets. The following represents the estimated range of compensation for this role: - Individual pay is determined by skills, qualifications, experience, and location. The compensation details listed in this posting reflect the US base salary only - The estimated base salary range for this role is $230,000 - $260,000. - Additionally, this role may be eligible to participate in TRM’s equity plan. - Please note – we factor in the different costs for geographies outside the United States. Work Week Travel: This role requires participation in in-person R&D work weeks, typically 1–2 times per quarter, at a TRM hub or other designated location. Work weeks may be scheduled with as little as 14 days’ notice, and some roles may require additional travel based on team and cross-functional needs. TRM coordinates and covers approved travel, lodging, and workspace. Accommodations are available for legitimate caregiving, health, immigration, and similar constraints. APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS If you’re interested in joining TRM, we encourage you to apply directly. Every application is reviewed by our Talent team. Before applying, review the job description carefully and highlight the experience and impact that best demonstrate the required qualifications. Please also provide thoughtful and accurate answers to the application questions, as these will be used to evaluate your skills and qualifications for the role. If you send your resume directly to someone at TRM, we can’t guarantee it will reach the appropriate hiring team. Applying directly is the best way to ensure your application will be considered. INTERVIEWING WITH TRM Our process is designed to understand how you think, solve problems, and deliver impact, while allowing you to evaluate TRM. Most interview processes include a case study, an AI skills assessment, and a Leadership Principles interview. - Recruiter Intro: Qualifications, motivations, and alignment with the role. - Hiring Manager: Deep dive into your relevant experience, skills, and impact. - First Round: 1–2 interviews focused on the skills most critical to the role. - Final Round: Hands-on case study. This is usually a panel-style session where we go deeper into your craft, problem-solving, and alignment with TRM. - References: Former colleagues who can provide insight into your work and impact. - Offer: Congrats! Your recruiter will present the offer and compensation details. - Welcome to TRM: We're excited to build a safer world with you! Your recruiter will share your specific interview plan and preparation guidance along the way. AI FLUENCY AT TRM AI fluency is a baseline expectation at TRM. We believe AI meaningfully changes how top performers operate. We expect every team member to use AI to accelerate and reimagine their craft, not just automate surface tasks. At TRM, AI fluency means you are among the top 10 percent of operators in your function in how you apply AI to: - Accelerate repeatable workflows - Structure and solve problems - Improve output quality - Increase speed and leverage You will be evaluated on applied AI fluency during the interview process. LIFE AT TRM We are building a safer world. That promise shows up in how we work every day. TRM moves FAST. We are a high-velocity, high-ownership team that expects clarity, follow-through, and impact. People who thrive here are energized by hard problems, experimentation, and continuous feedback. If something takes months elsewhere, it will ship here in days. Our work sits at the intersection of AI, national security, and fighting crime. The problems are complex, the stakes are real, and the environment evolves quickly. The pace and intensity of the work reflect the importance of the mission. As a result, the way we operate requires a high level of ownership, adaptability, collaboration, and creative problem-solving. At TRM, you should expect: - Priorities and targets to change quickly - Operating with a high degree of ambiguity - A high level of personal ownership and accountability - Close collaboration across teams and functions - Frequent, high-touch communication - Creative problem-solving and out-of-the-box thinking - A pace that rewards urgency, adaptability, and outcomes This environment is energizing for people who enjoy building, solving hard problems, and making progress in situations that are not always fully defined. It also requires thriving in ambiguity, adjusting course as new information emerges, and maintaining focus and positivity in a fast-moving and intense environment. We also recognize that this style of operating is not for everyone. If you are primarily optimizing for predictability or a consistently balanced workload, we encourage you to use the interview process to pressure-test whether this environment is truly the right fit. We want teammates who thrive here, not just survive here. If you are excited by meaningful problems, motivated by ambitious goals, and energized by working alongside mission-driven colleagues, there is a good chance you will find TRM to be an exceptional place to grow and contribute. LEADERSHIP PRINCIPLES We hire and grow against three leadership principles. They’re the standards for how we operate, treat each other, and make decisions. - Impact-Oriented Trailblazer: We put customers first and move with speed, focus, and adaptability. We treat every plan like an experiment – test, ship, measure, and iterate quickly. - Master Craftsperson: We care deeply about our craft. We balance speed with high standards, own outcomes end‑to‑end, and invest in getting better everyday. - Inspiring Colleague: We add clarity and energy, not noise. We bring humility, candor, and a one‑team mindset — giving and receiving feedback to make the team stronger. JOIN OUR MISSION At TRM, we care deeply about our craft. We are looking for individuals who want their work to matter, who experiment with speed and rigor, and who take pride in building a safer world for billions of people. If you’re excited by TRM’s mission but don’t check every box, we encourage you to apply — we hire for slope, judgment, and the will to learn fast. TRM is a Series C company with $220M in total funding, backed by Goldman Sachs, Bessemer, Y Combinator, Thoma Bravo, and others. Headquartered in San Francisco, TRM operates as a distributed-first company with hubs in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Washington D.C., London, and Singapore. PRIVACY POLICY AND ADDITIONAL INFORMATION By submitting your application, you agree to allow TRM Labs to process your personal information in accordance with our Privacy Policy trmlabs.com. We collect the information you provide (such as your resume, work history, and contact details) solely for the purpose of evaluating your candidacy for current and future roles at TRM. Because our hiring cycles for certain positions may span 24 to 36 months, we retain your personal information for up to 36 months from the date of your application. After that period, your data is deleted unless a different retention period is required or permitted by law. If you are located in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom, or another jurisdiction with applicable data protection laws, you have the right to access, correct, or request deletion of your personal data at any time before that period ends. To exercise any of these rights, contact us at privacy@trmlabs.com. To notify TRM Labs that you believe this job posting is non-compliant, please submit a report through this form docs.google.com. No response will be provided to inquiries unrelated to job posting compliance. The use of AI tools of any kind (including but not limited to notetakers, interview assistants, and real-time coaching tools such as Otter.ai, Fireflies, Fathom, Cluey, or similar) during TRM interviews is not permitted without prior approval from TRM. TRM uses its own internal tools for note-taking to ensure a consistent and confidential experience for all candidates. We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities, and requests can be made via this form docs.google.com. RECRUITMENT AGENCIES TRM Labs does not accept unsolicited agency resumes. Please do not forward resumes to TRM employees. TRM Labs is not responsible for any fees related to unsolicited resumes and will not pay fees to any third-party agency or company without a signed agreement.

Requirements

Must-haves

BUILD A SAFER WORLD.
Lead and nurture a team of high-impact engineers, offering guidance in both technical and cultural aspects.
Provide regular coaching and technical mentorship to your immediate team, while contributing to the broader engineering organization's growth.
Assume direct responsibility for ensuring the quality and timely delivery of the team's work, while overseeing the availability and performance of critical services.
Drive projects aligned with well-defined goals and measurable outcomes, accountable to key performance indicators (KPIs).
Foster best practices in design and usability, creating scalable solutions while emphasizing documentation and knowledge sharing.
Resolve operational escalations and collaborate with cross-functional teams to address production incidents through resolution.
Collaborate closely with management and product teams to plan, estimate, and prioritize roadmap objectives, while identifying opportunities and mitigating risks.
Contribute to the creation of highly reliable data services that seamlessly integrate with numerous blockchains.
Engineer and optimize ETL pipelines that handle real-time transformation and processing of petabytes of structured and unstructured data.
Architect data models to ensure efficient storage and retrieval, maintaining sub-second latency for querying blockchain data.
Oversee the deployment and monitoring of large-scale database clusters, focusing on performance and high availability.
Collaborate cross-functionally with data scientists, backend engineers, and product managers to design, implement, and refine new data models supporting TRM's products.
5+ years managing engineers, including a team of roughly 8–15, with scope that has grown over time (more surface area, more people, or more complex systems than when you started).
Technical depth you still use. You read design docs closely, ask the question that changes the approach, and can unblock an engineer on the hard part. You don't need to be writing production code daily to stay credible.
A point of view on leadership. You've thought about how you build teams and how you want engineers to work, and you can articulate it. If you've shared it publicly (writing, talks, open source, community), even better.
You disagree well. You've made the case against a roadmap, a design, or your own leadership, brought evidence, and come out of it still in partnership.
Influence beyond your own team. You've delivered work that depended on teams you don't manage (a migration, a shared SLA, a platform dependency) by bringing people along rather than escalating.
Team building as core work. You've hired engineers you're proud of, grown people into senior and lead roles, and treated the quality of the team as part of the product.
Communication that creates momentum. You can frame where a team is heading in a way that makes strong engineers want to build it with you.
A Bachelor's degree (or equivalent) in Computer Science or a related field.
A proven track record with 5+ years of experience conceiving and implementing distributed systems from ideation through production.
Proficiency in Python, along with strong SQL or SparkSQL experience.
Versatility across the full data engineering stack, including:

Nice-to-haves

None flagged.

Application prep

Use the role’s language and application details while tailoring your materials.

Keywords to mirror

aipythonsqlpostgresdockerkubernetesgo

Platform: ashby
Effort: quick