Engineering Manager, Developer Productivity & AI — CTO Office

Background

Money Forward Cloud is a suite of business SaaS products that automate and simplify back-office work. Money Forward continues to invest in this business in a competitive market.

Our engineering organization has more than 1,000 engineers across 100+ products in Japan and Vietnam, with English as our working language. Tools and development practices vary widely across products. At this scale, improving tooling and reducing manual work requires coordination across teams.

We're looking for an Engineering Manager to join the MF CTO Office and improve developer productivity, with a particular focus on AI in software development. We welcome Principal Engineers and Engineering Managers who have helped engineering teams work more effectively and have practical experience with AI tools.

Scope of the role

• Reports to the Director of the CTO Office.
• Leads selected developer productivity and AI initiatives across Money Forward Cloud and the wider group. Priorities will be agreed with the Director based on your expertise and the needs of our engineering teams.
• Works with the CTO, engineering leaders, Product, platform teams, and PMOs to deliver those initiatives.
• Has no direct reports initially. The intention is for this role to develop into a Deputy Director position in the CTO Office, with the possibility of direct reports in the future. You'll start by leading projects across teams and working closely with the Director.

Mission

• Help engineers build and deliver software more effectively by reducing avoidable delays and repetitive work.
• Find where AI tools can improve everyday development, test them with engineers, and help teams adopt the approaches that work.

Main Responsibilities

• Help the Director run the CTO Office, including setting priorities, coordinating work across initiatives, and following up on progress and decisions.
• Work with engineering teams and Product to understand day-to-day problems and decide which improvements are worth pursuing.
• Lead agreed projects from initial investigation through implementation and rollout, coordinating with the teams involved.
• Evaluate AI tools and agents in real development workflows. Run pilots, assess their effect on speed and quality, and support wider adoption where the results justify it.
• Contribute through prototyping, tool evaluation, technical reviews, or implementation, depending on the project and your strengths.
• Use delivery data and developer feedback to assess results and adjust the approach.
• Help teams adopt new tools and practices through coaching, documentation, and support from engineering managers and technical leaders.
• Work with platform, architecture and governance, CISO, PRE/SRE, and FinOps teams when projects involve their areas of responsibility.
• Communicate proposals, decisions, progress, and results to engineers and executives in English and Japanese.

Examples of focus areas

We expect you to bring expertise in a few of these areas. You won't be responsible for all of them.

• AI in the developer workflow: Coding assistants, agents, AI-assisted testing and review, or workflow automation.
• Developer experience and internal platforms: Self-service tooling, developer portals, templates, documentation, and clear paths for common engineering tasks.
• Development and delivery workflows: CI/CD, build and test feedback, local development, and reducing repetitive manual work.
• Productivity measurement: Using delivery data and developer feedback to identify bottlenecks and assess improvements.
• Team adoption and support: Coaching engineers and managers, improving working practices, and introducing tools across teams.

Required Skills and Experience

• Experience improving developer productivity, with examples of better delivery, less manual work, or a better development experience.
• Practical experience evaluating, implementing, or leading the adoption of AI tools for software development. You should be able to explain what worked, what didn't, and how you assessed the results.
• Experience as an Engineering Manager, Principal Engineer, or in a comparable role, with responsibility for teams or significant technical projects.
• A background in hands-on software engineering and the technical judgment to assess solutions, discuss tradeoffs, and work closely with senior engineers.
• Experience delivering technical projects across teams, including influencing people outside your reporting line.
• Experience working with remote teams in different countries.
• The ability to set priorities and explain technical decisions clearly to engineers, Product, and senior management.

Preferred Skills and Experience

• Experience in any of the following would be useful:
  • Working in a developer productivity, developer experience, platform engineering, or engineering effectiveness team.
  • Extending AI tools, building agent workflows, or developing or operating an internal AI platform.
  • Building internal developer platforms or improving CI/CD, build systems, or test workflows.
  • Using frameworks such as DORA or SPACE alongside developer feedback to guide improvements.
  • Working with Backstage, Apache DevLake, BigQuery, or Looker Studio.
  • Coaching engineering managers or technical leaders and supporting changes across multiple teams.
  • Combining technical delivery and engineering management in a growing company or international engineering organization.
• Experience in AI development and/or experience in using AI tools to improve development processes.
  • Money Forward is at a major turning point, shifting "from Cloud to AI." We are currently driving "AX (AI Transformation)"—the next step beyond DX—with the goal of providing "Digital Workers," where AI agents autonomously execute tasks. As we enter a phase of evolving into Japan's No. 1 back-office AI company by integrating AI agents into all of our products in the future, we are looking for individuals who can contribute to AI-driven development and value creation.

Language Requirements

• Business-level English (equivalent to TOEIC 800 or above). Other qualifications or experience that demonstrate English ability are welcome — for example EIKEN Pre-1st, TOEFL iBT 88+, IELTS 6.0+, or Cambridge FCE.
• Japanese proficiency sufficient to lead online meetings and handle complex discussions.
• Candidates without a qualification equivalent to TOEIC 800+ will take a company-designated test during selection (generally after the first interview).

How You Work

• You take time to understand engineers' day-to-day work before proposing changes.
• You notice repetitive or unnecessary work and look for practical ways to reduce it.
• You enjoy helping other people become more effective and are willing to change your approach when feedback or results call for it.
• You take initiative when the next step is unclear and follow through on your commitments.
• You build trust with colleagues, explain your reasoning, and treat people with respect.

Technology Stack

Our teams use the technologies and tools below. Experience with all of them is not required.

Languages: Go, Kotlin, TypeScript

Infrastructure & Cloud: AWS, GCP, Azure

Containers & Orchestration: Docker, Kubernetes, Terraform, ArgoCD

CI/CD: GitHub Actions, CircleCI, Dependabot

Tools Used

Developer Platform & Productivity Data: DFP (Backstage with custom plugins/dashboards), Apache DevLake, BigQuery, Looker Studio, internal AI Platform

Repository: GitHub

Design: Figma

Communication: Slack, Miro

Documentation Hub: Notion

Tickets: Jira

Work Environment

At Money Forward, we provide an environment where we can create world-class services together, and we are looking forward to welcoming you.

• Provided PC Specs: We provide PCs equipped with the latest CPUs (MacOS or Windows). Custom-made PCs tailored to business requirements and replacements with the latest OS are also possible.
• Systems to Enhance the Development Environment: Peripheral devices necessary for work (such as displays, mice, keyboards) can be purchased as office supplies. Generally, you can choose from standard products (catalog), and if conditions are met, you can apply for non-standard products as well. (*Excluding certain group companies)
• Money Forward Library: We have a library system where you can freely borrow books, ranging from technical books to management books. Desired books can be purchased at the company's expense.
• Referral Driven: We cover the cost of recruitment meals. There is a referral reward system.
• Conference Participation Support: The company partially covers participation in domestic and international conferences, such as RubyKaigi and Google I/O.