Director of Engineering, Security Operations

Discord is used by over 200 million people every month for many different reasons, but there’s one thing that nearly everyone does on our platform: play video games. Over 90% of our users play games, spending a combined 1.5 billion hours playing thousands of unique titles on Discord each month. Discord plays a uniquely important role in the future of gaming. We are focused on making it easier and more fun for people to talk and hang out before, during, and after playing games.

Discord is looking for an experienced, technical, and mission-driven Director of Security Operations to lead our Detection & Response, Enterprise Security, Identity & Access Management, and Cyber Threat Intelligence teams. You will report directly to the Head of Security and will be instrumental in defining and executing our security operations strategy while building world-class teams that protect Discord and our users.

This role owns four security domains and requires a leader who can operate with minimal direction, drive long-term strategy, and deliver results across complex, high-stakes environments. As a senior member of the Security leadership team, you'll serve as a key succession candidate for greater organizational responsibility.

This is a technical leadership role. Security at Discord is an engineering discipline, and we expect leaders at all levels to stay close to the work. You won't be writing production code daily, but you should be comfortable reading code, writing scripts, and digging into technical details when the situation demands it.

What you'll be doing

Strategy & Vision

• Define and own the unified security operations strategy spanning Detection & Response, IT Security, Identity & Access Management, and Cyber Threat Intelligence—ensuring alignment across domains while respecting their distinct missions
• Formalize and expand Discord's Cyber Threat Intelligence function: mature existing capabilities into a structured program, build the team, establish collection and production processes, and integrate intelligence into security operations and business decision-making
• Own the identity and access management strategy across Discord—covering corporate systems, cloud infrastructure environments, and the policies and controls that govern access to both
• Collaborate with Security, Engineering, IT, Legal, Trust & Safety, and executive leadership to align security operations priorities with company goals
• Own accountability for security operations outcomes across all four domains, ensuring success criteria are effectively measured and achieved

Technical Leadership

• Maintain enough technical depth across your domains to effectively evaluate proposals, challenge assumptions, and hold teams accountable for sound technical decisions
• Get hands-on when needed: review detection logic, dig into incident forensics, audit IAM configurations, or prototype solutions when it accelerates the team
• Drive engineering excellence across security operations—ensuring teams build reliable, automated, and scalable solutions rather than manual processes that don't scale

Organizational Leadership

• Build, lead, and scale a high-performing organization of security professionals across four functions with varying maturity levels, each requiring different leadership approaches
• Design a healthy organization structure that balances operational excellence, innovation, and speed
• Drive the full talent lifecycle: hiring, culture-building, growth, performance management, and retention
• Grow and develop managers who can effectively own their domains with increasing autonomy; maintain a clear succession plan and build bench strength across the organization
• Establish operational rhythms, cross-team rituals, and shared practices that create cohesion while preserving domain expertise

Cross-Functional Partnership

• Partner with Security Engineering leadership to ensure detection, response, IAM, and threat intelligence capabilities are informed by and integrated with product and infrastructure security efforts
• Drive alignment between IT Security, IAM, and enterprise technology decisions—ensuring security is embedded in how Discord operates, not bolted on
• Ensure threat intelligence is actionable: inform detection engineering priorities, support incident investigations, and provide strategic context to Security and company leadership

Executive Communication & Crisis Leadership

• Serve as a trusted advisor to leadership on security operations risks, incidents, threat landscape, and program health
• Provide executive-level visibility into security operations posture, investment needs, and key risks
• Translate threat intelligence into business-relevant context for leadership and cross-functional partners
• Act as an escalation point and decision-maker during significant security incidents; ensure appropriate crisis communication to leadership
• Represent Discord's security operations externally when appropriate, and build the organization's reputation through knowledge sharing

Who you are

• You have 10+ years of experience in security, with 5+ years in leadership roles managing multiple teams or managers across different security disciplines
• You are technical: you can read and write code (Python is ideal), review technical designs, and engage with engineers on implementation details
• You have experience maturing a security function: taking something informal or early-stage and building it into a structured, repeatable program
• You consistently reach the right decision and bring people along with you; you act decisively in critical situations, even when making unpopular calls
• You communicate with clarity and conviction to any audience—from engineers to executives—and you understand the weight your title carries in debates
• You thrive with autonomy, operate with minimal editing from your manager, and proactively drive alignment across the organization
• You have led through significant security incidents and understand how to balance speed, thoroughness, and communication under pressure
• You have aspirations for broader leadership responsibility and see this role as a path toward greater organizational impact
• You have deep experience with identity and access management at scale—particularly in cloud-native environments (GCP, AWS)

Bonus Points

• Hands on experience integrating AI systems and tools into Security workflows
• Background in gaming, social platforms, or consumer technology
• Familiarity with trust & safety operations and their intersection with security
• Experience building organizations across multiple locations or time zones
• Understanding of threat actors relevant to gaming or social platforms (financially motivated fraud, account takeover, community-targeted harassment campaigns, etc.)

Candidates must reside in or be willing to relocate to the San Francisco Bay Area (Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, and Sonoma counties). For this role, the hiring manager would like folks to be in the office 1 day a week. Relocation assistance may be available. 

The US base salary range for this full-time position is $400,000 to $450,000 + equity + benefits. Our salary ranges are determined by role and level. Within the range, individual pay is determined by additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training. Please note that the compensation details listed in US role postings reflect the base salary only, and do not include equity, or benefits.

Why Discord? 

Discord plays a uniquely important role in the future of gaming. We're a multiplatform, multigenerational and multiplayer platform that helps people deepen their friendships around games and shared interests. We believe games give us a way to have fun with our favorite people, whether listening to music together or grinding in competitive matches for diamond rank. Join us in our mission! Your future is just a click away!

Discord is committed to inclusion and providing reasonable accommodations during the interview process. We want you to feel set up for success, so if you are in need of reasonable accommodations, please let your recruiter know.

Please see our Applicant and Candidate Privacy Policy for details regarding Discord’s collection and usage of personal information relating to the application and recruitment process by clicking HERE.