Sr. Director, Agentic Engineering

About Dialpad Dialpad is the AI-native business communications platform. We unify calling, messaging, meetings, and contact center on a single platform - powered by AI that understands every conversation in real time. More than 70,000 companies around the globe, including WeWork, Asana, NASDAQ, AAA Insurance, COMPASS Realty, Uber, Randstad, and Tractor Supply, rely on Dialpad to build stronger customer connections using real-time, AI-driven insights. We’re now leading the shift to Agentic AI: intelligent agents that don’t just analyze conversations but take action by automating workflows, resolving customer issues, and accelerating revenue in real time. Our DAART initiative (Dialpad Agentic AI in Real Time) is redefining what a communications platform can do. Visit dialpad.com to learn more. Being a Dialer At Dialpad, AI isn’t just a feature; it’s how our teams do their best work every day. We put powerful AI tools in every employee’s hands so they can move faster, think bigger, and achieve more. We believe every conversation matters. And we’ve built the platform that turns those conversations into insight and action, for our customers and ourselves. We look for people who are intensely curious and hold themselves to a high bar. Our ambition is significant, and achieving it requires a team that operates at the highest level. We seek individuals who embody our core traits: Scrappy, Curious, Optimistic, Persistent, and Empathetic. Your role As the leader of Dialpad's Agentic Engineering organization, you will own the vision, architecture, and execution of our agentic AI platform: systems where AI agents reason, act, coordinate, and safely execute workflows in production. You will lead an established organization of approximately 130 engineers across 4 to 8 teams and sub-teams, working closely with Product, Applied Research, and Design leaders to advance a multi-agent orchestration platform that performs real-time conversational reasoning and tool execution over large-scale data. This is a leadership role first. We are looking for someone who understands what the right agentic architecture looks like, holds a high bar for quality and reliability, and grows the managers and senior architects who carry the work. You will not be writing production features day-to-day, but we expect you to be technical enough to set architectural direction, evaluate hard trade-offs, and get into the code when it sharpens your judgment. This is an onsite position based in our San Francisco office, reporting to the Chief Technology Officer. What you'll do Own The agentic engineering strategy, roadmap, budget, and delivery of Dialpad's agentic platform, including its orchestration layers, memory architectures, tool-use and API-execution frameworks, and evaluation, observability, and safety systems. The health, growth, and succession planning of your organization, managing performance, headcount budgets, and career progression for both managers and senior IC architects. Build Scalable, multi-modal AI agents capable of autonomous reasoning, real-time conversational interaction, and secure tool execution across complex enterprise workflows. Clear multi-team goals, robust QA and regression processes, and operational metrics (KPIs) that hold the platform to enterprise standards of quality and reliability. Clear job descriptions, leveling guides, and onboarding plans to sustain a diverse, high-performing engineering organization. Partner with The executive team and division leaders to set long-term direction, communicate changes, and align the organization with Dialpad's wider business strategy. Peers in Product, Design, Applied Research, Support, and Finance to understand customer needs, maximize resource ROI, and eliminate cross-team friction and duplication. Talent Acquisition and HR to calibrate hiring bars, recruit top-tier talent, and extend competitive, equitable offers. Stay ahead of Emerging agent frameworks, LLM inference optimization, advanced retrieval systems, and evolving safety and policy guardrails, keeping Dialpad's platform at the frontier. Market and industry trends, using deep domain awareness to influence department-wide goals, milestones, and Dialpad's forward business strategy. Skills you'll bring 12+ years of relevant engineering experience, including 5 to 8 years of leadership experience, with a proven track record of growing teams, developing managers, and steering an organization of 100+ engineers. Experience scaling distributed systems and production-grade infrastructure, then evolving into applied AI, LLM platforms, and agentic architectures. A core technical signal: you have shipped production systems where AI agents reason, act, coordinate, and safely execute workflows. You bring depth in several of the following: LLM platforms and inference optimization. Retrieval systems and memory architectures. Agent frameworks (e.g., LangChain/LangGraph, CrewAI, AWS/Google agent ecosystems). Evaluation, observability, and safety frameworks for AI systems. Real-time streaming infrastructure and conversational AI. Tool use, API-execution frameworks, and human-in-the-loop systems. Operational excellence: setting clear multi-team goals, using KPIs to drive decisions, and systematically identifying planning risks and tech-debt gaps. People and career leadership: coaching managers, mentoring senior ICs, holding teams accountable through healthy OKRs, managing performance issues promptly, and championing diversity and inclusion. Strategic planning: managing cross-division dependencies, optimizing multi-million-dollar infrastructure and headcount budgets, and confidently representing the company externally to partners, vendors, and the broader community. Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or a related field, or equivalent practical experience. For exceptional talent based in California the target base salary range for this position is posted below. Our salary ranges are determined by role, level, and location. The range displayed on each job posting reflects the target range for new hire salaries for the position. Within the range, individual pay is determined by work location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for your preferred location during the hiring process. Please note that the compensation details listed in US role postings reflect the base salary only, and do not include bonus, equity, or benefits. California Salary Range $332,000—$387,500 USD Why Join Dialpad Work at the center of the AI transformation in business communications Build and ship agentic AI products that are redefining how companies operate Join a team where AI amplifies every employee’s impact Competitive salary, comprehensive benefits, and real opportunities for growth We believe in investing in our people. Dialpad offers competitive benefits and perks, cutting-edge AI tools, and a robust training program that help you reach your full potential. We have designed our offices to be inclusive, offering a vibrant environment to cultivate collaboration and connection. Our exceptional culture, repeatedly recognized as a Great Place to Work, ensures that every employee feels valued and empowered to contribute to our collective success. Don’t meet every single requirement? If you’re excited about this role and possess the fundamental traits, drive, and strong ambition we seek, but your experience doesn’t meet every qualification, we encourage you to apply. Dialpad is an equal-opportunity employer. We are dedicated to creating a community of inclusion and an environment free from discrimination or harassment.