Application Development Team Lead

Application Development Team Lead Adobe Commerce / Magento

Department: Information Technology

Reports To: Director of Software Development

Employment Type: Full-Time

Location: Oakland, NJ (Hybrid)

About Us:

We foster a dynamic, collaborative culture that values innovation and service, where our development team plays a vital role.

Job Description:

We are seeking an experienced Application Development Team Lead to manage and grow our Adobe Commerce (Magento) joint India development team. This is a hands-on leadership role responsible for the technical direction, day-to-day delivery, and overall health of our eCommerce platform that powers our digital storefront and supports millions in annual revenue.

The ideal candidate is a seasoned PHP engineer who has evolved into a strong people leader - comfortable architecting complex eCommerce solutions, mentoring developers spread globally, and partnering with business stakeholders to translate commercial goals into technical roadmaps. You will be the bridge between our offshore India and onshore US engineering team, ensuring consistent quality, velocity, and accountability across both.

Responsibilities: Team Leadership & Management

• Lead, mentor, and develop a hybrid team of Business Analysts, Adobe Commerce engineers, QA analysts, and technical contributors split across multiple teams in India.
• Conduct one-on-ones, performance reviews, capacity planning, and career development for direct reports.
• Foster a culture of code quality, accountability, and continuous improvement across geographies and time zones.
• Manage daily handoffs, on-call rotations, and coverage models that take full advantage of the follow-the-sun model between multiple teams.
• Partner with HR and recruiting to interview, hire, and onboard new engineers in both regions.

Technical Leadership

• Own the architecture, scalability, and reliability of the Adobe Commerce platform, including custom modules, third-party integrations, and storefront customizations.
• Conduct code reviews, set coding standards, and enforce best practices for PHP, MySQL, and Magento-specific patterns.
• Lead technical design discussions, write technical specifications, and make build-vs-buy decisions on integrations and extensions.
• Drive platform upgrades, security patches, and performance optimization initiatives.
• Troubleshoot complex production issues, including database performance, caching, indexing, and integration failures.

Delivery & Agile Process

• Work with the Scrum Master to conduct the agile ceremonies (sprint planning, stand-ups, retrospectives, backlog grooming) using Jira, ensuring the team delivers predictably sprint over sprint.
• Partner with product managers and business stakeholders to translate requirements into well-scoped user stories and estimates.
• Manage sprint commitments, track velocity, surface risks early, and remove blockers for the team.
• Maintain release management processes, CI/CD pipelines, and deployment hygiene.

Business Partnership

• Act as the primary technical point of contact for merchandising, marketing, customer experience, fulfillment, and finance teams.
• Understand and contribute to eCommerce business processes including catalog management, pricing and promotions, checkout, payments, order management, returns, tax, and shipping integrations.
• Translate business KPIs (conversion rate, AOV, page speed, uptime) into engineering priorities and measurable outcomes.

Required Qualifications:

• 7+ years of professional software development experience, with at least 3+ years in a technical lead or engineering management role.
• Strong hands-on experience with Adobe Commerce (Magento 2). Magento 1 experience is a plus but not a substitute.
• Deep expertise in PHP (modern PHP 7.x / 8.x), object-oriented design, and SOLID principles.
• Strong proficiency in MySQL - schema design, query optimization, indexing strategies, and performance tuning at scale.
• Demonstrated working knowledge of Jira for sprint management, reporting, and workflow customization.
• Solid understanding and practical application of Agile / Scrum methodology in a delivery-focused environment.
• Strong understanding of eCommerce business processes - order lifecycle, payments, tax, shipping, inventory, promotions, and customer data.
• A solid grasp of front-end fundamentals (HTML/CSS/JavaScript) and modern dev tooling (Git, Composer, Docker).
• Excellent communication skills in English, both written and verbal - required for daily collaboration with stakeholders and the India team.

Preferred Qualification:

• Adobe Commerce Certified Developer or Solution Specialist certification.
• Experience with Adobe Commerce Cloud or GraphQL APIs.
• Experience integrating with ERP, OMS, PIM, tax engines (e.g., Vertex), payment gateways, and CRM platforms.
• Background working in a B2C or B2B eCommerce company with significant transaction volume.
• Exposure to AWS or other cloud infrastructure, Fastly, Elasticsearch / OpenSearch.
• Experience managing or coordinating with offshore development teams.
• Experience working across time zones with structured async communication practices.

What we offer:

• Competitive salary.
• Medical / Dental / Vision Plans
• Retirement: 401(k) with company match after eligibility period.
• Opportunities for professional growth and development
• Collaborative work environment that encourages innovation
• Exposure to cutting-edge e-commerce technology and tools

If you are a passionate software engineering manager looking to lead teams to achieve professional growth, we'd love to hear from you!