Senior IAM Engineering Leader

Senior Manager, IAM EngineeringIdentify SecurityMiami-Fort Lauderdale Area | South Florida presence requiredContract-to-Direct | Confidential SearchU.S. Citizen or Green Card holder only | No visa sponsorship

For a complete understanding of this opportunity, and what will be required to be a successful applicant, read on.
If you have spent years designing and implementing complex workforce identity systems — and later became the leader IAM engineers call when those systems get complicated — this may be worth a conversation.
I’m supporting a confidential search for a Senior Manager, IAM Engineering to lead a workforce IAM engineering team while remaining close enough to the technology to challenge designs, solve difficult implementation problems, and develop stronger engineers.
+ This is not a governance-only role.+ It is not primarily vendor management.+ It is not a “manage SailPoint and certifications” position.+ The company needs a true player-coach who understands what happens when HR-driven lifecycle, provisioning, directories, federation, applications, APIs, entitlements, PAM, and automation all have to work together in production.
Specific products can be learned. The engineering judgment that comes from building complex workforce identity solutions needs to already be there.
The NeedThe IAM Director needs a senior engineering leader who can:Lead and develop IAM engineersStay technically involved in architecture, design, implementation, and troubleshootingChallenge weak designs before they become production problemsHelp engineers solve difficult provisioning, lifecycle, federation, and integration issuesEstablish repeatable engineering patterns rather than one-off solutionsImprove platform reliability and reduce manual IAM workBuild stronger internal engineering capabilityReduce dependence on vendors for technical thinkingCommunicate complex identity problems clearly across engineering, infrastructure, applications, business teams, and security leadership
Core Engineering BackgroundThe strongest candidates will have personally designed and implemented complex workforce
IAM solutions involving several of these areas:Joiner, mover, leaver lifecycle automationHR-driven identity provisioning and deprovisioningEnterprise directories and identity correlationRole, attribute, and entitlement managementApplication onboarding and downstream provisioningREST APIs, connectors, schemas, mappings, and reconciliationServiceNow-driven access and approval workflowsMicrosoft Entra ID / Azure ADPing IDM / ForgeRock IDM or comparable identity-management platformsPing AM or comparable authentication/access-management platformsSSO, MFA, federation, SAML, OAuth, OIDC, and SCIMProvisioning failures, lifecycle exceptions, and production troubleshootingCustom integrations when native connectors or vendor capabilities are not enoughAutomation, scripting, APIs, or code reviewPAM, privileged access, JIT access, and least privilege
You should be able to explain not only what platform you used, but what you personally designed, implemented, challenged, fixed, or helped your engineers solve.
You Have Probably Solved Problems Like These:+ An employee starts, but downstream access does not arrive on time.+ A role or attribute change produces the wrong entitlement.+ A termination event fails to remove access from one or more applications.+ Identity data becomes inconsistent between HR, directories, IAM platforms, and downstream systems.+ A native connector cannot support the business requirement, forcing a custom API or different engineering pattern.+ A provisioning process works in testing but fails under production complexity.+ A strong engineer proposes a technically clean design that will create operational problems six months later.
These are the kinds of problems this leader needs to understand firsthand.
People Leadership MattersThis is not simply a senior architect role.You need experience directly leading and developing engineers.The right person can point to engineers who became stronger because of their leadership -- better architects, better troubleshooters, better decision-makers, and more capable of solving complex identity problems independently.
You should be comfortable reviewing designs, asking difficult technical questions, coaching engineers through tradeoffs, and stepping into a problem when the team gets stuck.
Additional Identity ExperienceBroader identity-platform experience is valuable, especially in areas such as:Non-human identities and service accountsWorkload identityCloud identityZero TrustAI agents and delegated accessToken-based authorizationIdentity observabilitySecurity automationBut these capabilities do not replace deep workforce IAM engineering experience.
The ideal candidate built their foundation in workforce identity and later expanded into these newer identity domains.
What You Will DoLead and develop IAM engineers in the South Florida organizationPartner closely with the IAM Director on architecture, standards, priorities, and executionReview designs and help solve difficult identity engineering problemsImprove workforce identity lifecycle and provisioningEstablish repeatable patterns for application onboarding and identity integrationImprove integrations across Ping / ForgeRock, Entra, ServiceNow, PAM, directories, and enterprise applicationsCoach engineers and raise technical judgment across the teamReduce operational friction and unnecessary manual workBuild more IAM engineering capability internallyHelp prepare the organization for non-human identities, automation, and AI-agent access patterns
The Right BackgroundYou are likely someone who started as an identity builder and grew into an engineering leader.
You have led engineers, but you never completely left the engineering behind.
You can still understand why a provisioning flow failed, challenge an integration architecture, review an API or automation approach, troubleshoot federation problems, and recognize when a design will become difficult to operate.
You also know how to make engineers better. xzbcwsv
This Is Probably Not the Right Role If Your Background Is MainlyIAM governance, access reviews, or certificationsSailPoint or Saviynt administration without broader engineering depthVendor-led implementations where third parties perform most of the engineeringProgram or delivery management without recent technical ownershipBroad cybersecurity leadership with IAM as only one responsibilityAuthentication or SSO without meaningful workforce lifecycle/provisioning experienceIAM operations without architecture and integration depthPure strategy without implementation experiencePeople management where you are no longer technically close to the workSenior IC work without meaningful experience developing engineers
LogisticsLocation: Miami-Fort Lauderdale / South FloridaWork arrangement: Remote-to-onsite transitionEmployment type: Contract-to-DirectConversion path: Full-time employmentWork authorization: U.S. Citizen or Green Card holder only; no visa sponsorship
Message me directly if you have personally built complex workforce IAM solutions, grew into engineering leadership, and still stay close enough to the technology to help strong engineers solve difficult identity problems.