Director, Distributed Systems

200 W Madison St, Chicago, IL 60606, USA

Posted Monday, February 23, 2026 at 6:00 AM

Our Story

Founded in 2008, Hightower is a wealth management firm that provides investment, financial and retirement planning services to individuals, foundations and family offices, as well as 401(k) consulting and cash management services to corporations. Hightower’s capital solutions, operational support services, size and scale empower its vibrant community of independent-minded wealth advisors to grow their businesses and help their clients achieve their financial vision.

Based in Chicago with advisors across the U.S., we operate as a registered investment advisor (RIA).

Your Future Team

The Director of Distributed Systems reports to the Managing Director, Head of Software Engineering. You will architect the firm’s real-time event-driven backbone and broader AWS cloud ecosystem, encompassing distributed messaging and diverse web-based patterns. Leading an engineering team while remaining a primary hands-on architect, you’ll solve complex challenges in latency, highly scalable architectures, and API design. As the technical authority, you’ll leverage native AWS primitives to build a performant, observable platform, orchestrating seamless workflows across Product, Operations, and Data Engineering teams to scale our technical foundation.

What You’ll Do

• Build and mentor a high-performing software engineering team, fostering technical excellence while maintaining hands‑on involvement in complex development challenges and architectural decisions.
• Partner with business stakeholders and product managers to map end‑to‑end processes, identifying integration points that unlock operational efficiency and enable new product capabilities.
• Implement monitoring and observability frameworks with the Infrastructure Engineering and IT Operations team to proactively identify integration issues, optimize performance, and ensure SLA compliance across all connected systems.
• Lead technical discovery and hands‑on proof‑of‑concept initiatives for new platforms and tools, evaluating build‑vs‑buy decisions and recommending integration strategies that balance speed with sustainability.

What You’ll Bring

• Engineering Depth: 8-10 years of experience in distributed systems engineering and enterprise architecture with deep, hands‑on expertise in API design, event‑driven architectures, and modern cloud‑native patterns on the AWS platform.
• Infrastructure Mastery:
  Deep expertise in modern messaging and integration technologies, including asynchronous event streaming, API‑as‑a‑product strategies, and high‑performance data interoperability.
• Domain Expertise:
  Extensive experience in wealth management, fintech, or financial services, demonstrating a deep understanding of complex financial data flows, regulatory technical constraints, and the interoperability requirements of industry‑standard platforms.
• Lead by Example:
  Proven leadership and exceptional communication skills, with extensive experience managing technical teams while maintaining the ability to lead by example through direct technical contribution.
• Systemic Problem Solving:
  Strong analytical skills to diagnose complex issues across distributed systems, coupled with expertise in fault‑tolerant design, distributed tracing, and observability practices.

What We Offer

• Coverage on the first day of employment for medical, dental, and vision insurance
• Paid parental leave (16 weeks for primary caregiver and 8 weeks for secondary caregiver)
• Mother’s lounge onsite
• Flexible PTO plan
• Hybrid work schedule (minimum of 3 days in office)
• Free brand‑new gym in the Chicago office
• 401k matching plan
• HSA employer contributions
• Student loan assistance
• Base salary of $160,000-$180,000 plus discretionary bonus (exact base salary amount will be dependent on experience)

AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY

EMPLOYER:

Hightower is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate based upon race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, pregnancy, marital status, national origin, citizenship, veteran status, ancestry, age (over 40), physical or mental disability, medical condition (cancer‑related), gender identity or expression, genetic information including sickle cell or hemoglobin C trait, or any other consideration made unlawful by applicable federal, state, or local law.

You are a U.S. citizen, U.S. permanent resident or possess other unrestricted U.S. work authorization and will not require sponsorship for U.S. work authorization now or anytime in the future.

200 W Madison St, Chicago, IL 60606, USA