Senior Manager, Application Security

This position is listed on behalf of a partner company, who manages all applications and next steps. Our partner is looking for a Senior Manager, Application Security based in Bulgaria. Lead the development of a dedicated application security function within a fast-growing, fully remote technology environment. In this senior leadership role, you will combine hands-on application security expertise with people management, strategic planning, and cross-functional collaboration. You will establish security standards, strengthen vulnerability management, and embed secure development practices across engineering teams. Alongside application security, you will guide experienced IT and compliance professionals, aligning their work with broader business priorities and enterprise security expectations. You will also represent security and compliance to senior leadership, customers, and external stakeholders. This opportunity offers significant autonomy to shape an AI-first security program while helping the organization scale securely and maintain customer trust.

As Senior Manager, Application Security, you will establish and lead the application security strategy while providing direction across IT operations and compliance. You will remain technically engaged in security initiatives while building a scalable program that supports engineering excellence, customer confidence, and business growth. Define and own the application security roadmap, including vulnerability management, threat modeling, security reviews, and remediation processes for new features and architectural changes. Conduct hands-on security reviews, triage vulnerabilities, collaborate with engineers on remediation, and progressively develop processes that allow the application security program to scale. Embed security-by-default practices throughout the software development lifecycle, including secure development standards, dependency management, secrets hygiene, and automated security scanning integrated into CI/CD pipelines. Design and implement an AI-first application security strategy, evaluating AI-assisted code analysis, vulnerability triage, remediation agents, and automated testing while establishing appropriate validation and oversight. Partner with engineering teams to ensure security practices strengthen development capabilities rather than create unnecessary delivery bottlenecks. Oversee third-party and vendor security assessments, ensuring external providers meet appropriate security standards when handling sensitive customer information. Establish zero-trust security principles and collaborate with cloud platform leadership on network security, identity and access management, security logging, and alerting. Lead application-layer security incident response and coordinate with infrastructure teams on incidents involving cloud platforms or underlying systems. Manage and support the Compliance Lead and IT team, providing strategic direction, prioritization, organizational context, and professional development while respecting their operational expertise. Align application security, IT operations, and compliance under a unified strategy with shared standards, risk frameworks, and coordinated roadmaps. Oversee cross-functional priorities involving access reviews, identity governance, endpoint security, employee onboarding and offboarding, and the connection between application security controls and compliance evidence. Partner with compliance leadership to assess future frameworks and enterprise requirements, prioritize IT investments, and support continued compliance maturity beyond existing SOC 2 Type II certification. Represent security posture, compliance status, and IT health to engineering leadership, enterprise customers, prospects, and auditors. Own the security questionnaire and due diligence process, communicating technical controls, risk assessments, and remediation plans clearly to external stakeholders. Provide leadership with actionable recommendations on security risks, compliance priorities, and operational improvements rather than routine status updates. Requirements: The ideal candidate is an experienced application security practitioner who has successfully built or matured security programs and developed the leadership skills needed to guide experienced specialists. You should be comfortable working directly with engineers, making strategic decisions, and translating complex security topics into clear business priorities. At least 7 years of security experience, including substantial hands-on application security experience. Demonstrated success building or significantly maturing an application security program, including security reviews, threat modeling, vulnerability management, and penetration testing follow-up. Strong knowledge of secure software design, OWASP principles, common application vulnerabilities, and practical exploitation scenarios. Ability to read and understand application code, evaluate modern web and API architectures, and collaborate directly with engineers on remediation. At least 2 years of people management experience, including providing direction, coaching, and prioritization to practitioners with specialized expertise. Experience leading security initiatives while remaining technically hands-on rather than moving entirely into administrative management. Regular use of AI agents and AI-assisted development or security tools, with an understanding of how AI-generated code and automated security workflows affect application security practices. Ability to evaluate AI-assisted code analysis, vulnerability triage, automated remediation, and security testing, including determining which activities can be safely automated and how results should be validated. Strong strategic communication skills, with the ability to explain security posture, risk, and technical tradeoffs to senior leaders, engineers, customers, and other nontechnical stakeholders. Ability to learn unfamiliar domains quickly, ask effective questions, and make informed prioritization decisions across application security, IT, and compliance. A collaborative leadership style that empowers experienced team members, avoids unnecessary micromanagement, and builds alignment across engineering and business functions. Nice-to-have qualifications: Experience with IT operations, identity and access management platforms such as Okta, endpoint management, or technology operations for a distributed workforce. Familiarity with compliance and governance frameworks, including SOC 2, ISO 27001, and GDPR. Experience with security tools such as Snyk, Wiz, Cloudflare, or Okta. Practical experience implementing or evaluating AI-assisted security analysis, vulnerability triage, automated remediation, or autonomous security testing in production environments. Experience responding to detailed enterprise security questionnaires, particularly those used by financial institutions and other security-conscious customers. Background in a high-growth SaaS organization where security practices must evolve rapidly without slowing product development. Benefits: Annual base salary ranging from $177,000 to $240,000, depending on location, experience, and expertise. Location-based salary examples include $209,000–$240,000 for New York City and $177,000–$204,000 for Chicago. Fully remote work environment, with location eligibility subject to the organization's geographic and regulatory restrictions. Significant autonomy and direct access to engineering leadership to shape the application security function and its long-term strategy. Opportunity to build a dedicated application security program with executive support and a clear organizational mandate. Collaboration with an established team of experienced IT and compliance professionals. High visibility through engagement with enterprise customers, prospects, leadership, and auditors. Opportunity to influence AI-first security practices and the evolution of security, IT, and compliance across a growing technology organization. Inclusive and collaborative working environment that values diverse experiences, perspectives, and professional backgrounds.