Ask HN: What's expected from an engineering manager or director now?

A new Director of Engineering at a 30-person AI startup in the Bay Area with 20 senior/staff engineers using AI tools like Claude Code is tasked by the CTO to improve velocity and productivity while balancing quality, and is seeking peer groups for engineering leaders in similar setups.

| |||||||||||| 3 points by | I just joined a 30-person AI startup in the Bay Area as Director of Engineering. Two non-coding founders CEO and CTO and a flat team. We have 2 PMs, 20 engineers. Every engineer is senior or staff level. They use Claude Code and AI agents etc quite well. What is my job in an environment like this? According to the CTO, I'm to improve the velocity and productivity while also balancing quality. Also, are there any Bay Area meetups or peer groups where engineering leaders are actually talking about this specific setup? | ||||||||||| Applications are open till July 27. |