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Chicago, Illinois, United States
Onsite
Company Summary
Zoro.com is a leading eCommerce platform offering nearly 12 million tools, parts and supplies for our business customers. Launched in 2011, we brought a B2C-like experience to the B2B industry, and continue to be at the forefront of digital innovation at the intersection of technology and distribution. We have rapidly grown to over $1 billion in annual revenue and we’re just getting started!
Join a data engineering group that is evolving into a data focused software-engineering organization and is deliberately reinventing how engineering work is performed with AI.
This is an engineering management role in the data domain. You will lead the data and software engineers who build and interact with streams, services, shared libraries, analytical & operational data stores, and vendor integrations; it is a hands-on role. We expect our engineering managers to stay in the codebase every week and you will have the time and the support to do that.
Your engineers work inside data product teams, each of which are co-lead by a tech lead and a product manager who set direction and priority. Your focus is the engineers themselves: helping them make sound technical decisions, raising the quality of what they ship, supporting how they run it in production, and investing in how they grow. At this level you would support one to two data product teams' of engineers.
Because the work happens in teams you do not manage, much of your influence comes through partnership rather than reporting lines. You will not own the backlog, and you will not need to. The role is going well when a tech lead brings you into a design conversation early, when a product manager trusts your read on what is realistic, and when your engineers are making good calls without you in the room.
AI-assisted engineering is a core part of how we work, and we look for managers who practice it themselves rather than only encourage it. That means using AI to pressure-test designs, surface underspecified requirements, explore unfamiliar code, and to help your engineers build those habits into how they work, review, and learn.
We value leaders who take ownership, prefer simple systems, treat operations as part of engineering, ask questions when designs are unclear, give thoughtful feedback, and balance speed with reliability.
We expect managers to build teams that use AI aggressively but not uncritically, and to share what they learn so the whole organization improves.
We also expect managers to be honest about capacity. Protecting a team's ability to do sound work is part of the job, not an obstacle to it.
Table Stakes:
Soft Skills:
Total Rewards
Zoro’s total compensation plan includes our Zoro Incentive Plan (ZIP) that is designed to foster and reward our team members for strong performance. Total compensation will be highly competitive.
In addition to competitive compensation, Zoro offers comprehensive benefits and perks including:
For additional information and details regarding our benefits and our parent company, W. W. Grainger, please click on the link here.
The pay range provided is not a guarantee of compensation. The range listed reflects the expected base pay for this position at the time of posting, based on the role's job grade. Actual compensation may vary depending on factors such as location, relevant experience and individual qualifications.
Our Culture
Zoro was founded in 2011 with a simple idea: make it easy for businesses to get the tools, parts, and supplies they need to keep things running. We've grown by staying curious, moving quickly, and solving everyday challenges in smart, practical ways. Backed by W.W. Grainger and inspired by our endless assortment business model, we’re on a clear path toward our next big milestone: $2 billion in revenue—and beyond.
At Zoro, we don’t just follow a playbook—we help build it. You’ll get to work on real problems with a supportive team that shares ideas freely, learns from each other, and celebrates wins together. Our culture is grounded in values that guide how we show up every day: Winning & Learning Together, Being Customer Obsessed, Being Transparent, and Taking Ownership. We don’t have all the answers, but we’re always asking good questions.
Zoro’s culture has been recognized by Fortune, Best Places to Work, and Built In Chicago—but the recognition we care about most comes from our team members, who make this place what it is.
We also know that flexibility matters. Our hybrid work model gives you space to focus and the flexibility to live your life — asking team members to be onsite at least two days a week. Our Chicago HQ (right above Ogilvie Transportation Center in the Accenture Tower) is always open and ready for connection, collaboration, or just a good cup of coffee.
At Zoro, we’re growing fast toward big aspirations — and we’re continuously excited about the new challenges we get to solve together.
We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or expression, protected veteran status, or any other protected characteristic under federal, state, or local law. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace. We are also committed to fostering an inclusive, accessible work environment that includes both providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities during the application and hiring process as well as throughout the course of one’s employment. Should you need a reasonable accommodation during the application and selection process, including, but not limited to use of our website, any part of the application, interview, or hiring process, please advise us so that we can provide appropriate assistance.
