Software Engineering Manager

Spellbook is the most comprehensive AI copilot for transactional lawyers. It works directly inside Microsoft Word to help legal teams draft, review, and negotiate contracts up to 10x faster and with greater precision. Today, more than 4,000 law firms, in-house teams, and solo practitioners rely on Spellbook to simplify their workflows and eliminate the drudgery of everyday contract work.

We are backed by leading investors including Khosla Ventures, Thomson Reuters Ventures, Inovia Capital, The LegalTech Fund, Bling Capital, and Moxxie Ventures. The company recently raised $50 million in Series B funding, led by Keith Rabois at Khosla Ventures, bringing its total funding to more than $80 million.

*This is an existing vacancy

We are looking for a people-first, technical Engineering Manager to join our engineering team. As part of your role, you’ll lead technical projects from inception to launch, working with cross-functional stakeholders to proactively prioritize and solve common pain points for our customers. You will help to support the strategic technical direction of Spellbook’s product and key features by defining the technical vision for the teams you manage and stepping in to build alignment within your teams on complex issues that align to Engineering’s OKRs. You are comfortable scoping complex tasks, coordinating a team towards solving them, and unblocking others along the way, often being the glue that just gets things done. In addition, you will manage a team of up to 8 software engineers across various projects tied to Spellbook’s key pillars, providing coaching and mentorship and effective performance management to uphold technical quality and best practices.

We’re a small team of developers with a sophisticated and modern tech stack. An ideal candidate would have experience in some of the following: OpenAI and other large language models (LLMs), ReactJS, Node, Typescript, Mongo, Docker, AWS, or CDK.

• Working as part of a distributed team in a fast-paced environment, identifying opportunities to make impactful enhancements to lawyer workflows.

• Coach and mentor other software engineers to support career growth and product development, including providing timely and direct feedback and praise.

• Complete annual performance reviews for direct reports and arrange 1:1s to check in on progress towards current projects or department goals

• Designing, architecting, and implementing new features in the Spellbook application.

• Contribute to the technical direction of the Engineering team by defining technical vision for your teams, building team alignment and setting Engineering’s OKRs.

• Oversee technical projects from start to finish, engaging with key stakeholders across the organization to address common customer pain points and encouraging feature adoption.

• Scope complex tasks, coordinate a team towards solving these problems and unblock challenges or issues along the way.

• Using the latest large language models (LLMs) from OpenAI, Anthropic, and other LLM providers to add and improve application functionality, such as providing our customers with review suggestions they can use to improve their documents.

• Collaborate with our product management team on changes to our React application to improve customer experience.

• Add and improve application functionality by improving our Express and tRPC-based API.

• Improving the performance and reliability of existing functionality and addressing user feedback through bug fixes.

• Support with hiring against current headcount plan and effectively onboard new team members

• Act as a multiplier on the team, with a willingness to operate at all levels and do the ‘glue work’ that keeps things running smoothly

• Contribute to the creation and maintenance of engineering documentation, resources, and training materials as a single source of truth in Github and Notion

• Support in establishing and implementing Engineering best practices and workflows to prioritize efficiency and productivity, especially in a distributed environment

• Building and maintaining application infrastructure in Amazon Web Services (AWS) with AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK).

• Conducting code reviews and providing constructive feedback to team members.

• Support with other responsibilities and projects as required.

• You have 5+ years of experience in Software Development

• You have exceptional communication skills. You can explain and advocate your ideas to a diverse audience.

• You can take a product feature from a vague abstract idea to a demo beta implementation to a production-ready feature deployed to customers.

• You have demonstrated effective project management skills by seamlessly managing multiple projects and priorities, including proactive communication and engagement of stakeholders

• You are a self-starter and problem-solver motivated by curiosity and a desire to help others succeed, encouraged by continuous improvement.

• You are a team player who is motivated to help Spellbook succeed. You think of and implement ways to help and improve the work of the team as a whole.

• You take an “it’s not my fault, but it is my problem” approach to your work. When things break, you are eager and able to help fix them by taking a solutions-focused approach.

• You care about helping others learn and grow by regularly providing mentorship and coaching and don’t shy away from giving constructive feedback

• You have experience setting technical direction and sharing expertise from an engineering perspective to scale up and mature an engineering organization

• You have a firm grasp of the fundamentals of software development and computer engineering.

• You have the ability to break down complex and vague customer requirements into clear, achievable plans to get product features shipped in record time.

• Experience with TypeScript.

• Experience with Javascript build tooling such as Vite, esbuild, and swc.

• Experience in small startup environments.

• Experience designing and building infrastructure on AWS in CDK.

• Proven experience driving new and innovative product features from concept to production.

• Demonstrated ability working with LLMs, improving prompts, and orchestrating agents.

We will only be considering candidates in Ontario for this role. This role is not subject to Ontario's salary range disclosure requirement, as total compensation exceeds the threshold set out in the exemption. We're happy to discuss compensation details directly with candidates as the process progresses.

• Embrace autonomy and accountability in a flexible work environment; we focus on outcomes and empower you to determine how to get the job done

• Access our company-paid group benefits for you and your family, with $1,000 towards mental health support

• Disconnect during our holiday closure and take advantage of our generous time off policies throughout the year

• Enjoy monthly paid meals, an annual wellness allowance to support your well-being and parental leave top-ups as your family grows

• Secure your stake in our success; you’ll receive competitive stock option grants as a pivotal early employee

We are committed to creating an inclusive and supportive candidate experience. Should you require any accommodation whatsoever during the interview process, please inform us without any hesitation. Spellbook is dedicated to ensuring equal treatment and opportunity in all phases of recruitment, selection, and employment, in compliance with employment law. We do not discriminate based on gender, race, religion, national origin, ethnicity, disability, gender identity/expression, sexual orientation, veteran or military status, or any other protected category. Spellbook is proud to be an equal opportunity employer, fostering a culture of inclusivity and maintaining a work environment that is free from discrimination, harassment, and retaliation.

Spellbook uses artificial intelligence (AI) responsibly to support administrative and efficiency-focused aspects of our recruitment process. This includes activities such as drafting job descriptions, generating interview questions, note-taking and recordings, and supporting sourcing and scheduling workflows. All candidate evaluations, interviews, and hiring decisions are made by members of the Spellbook team. While AI tools may assist with screening and assessment, they do not replace human judgment in selection decisions. Our use of AI is intended to streamline routine tasks, improve consistency, and enhance the overall candidate experience. We are committed to upholding principles of fairness, transparency, and accountability in all hiring activities. Spellbook regularly reviews its recruitment practices to mitigate bias and to ensure alignment with applicable laws and evolving best practices.

Spellbook uses industry benchmark data to establish compensation bands for all roles. The salary range listed for a position reflects the expected total wage range for the role—including base salary and on-target commissions, where applicable—and may span multiple career levels. Final compensation is determined during the interview process based on factors such as experience, skills, scope, and role level. In addition to base salary and applicable commissions, total rewards may include equity, health and wellness benefits, and other company programs. Full details will be shared during the interview process.