Engineering Manager (Data Platform)

Babbel; Berlin; On-site; EUR 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

30 vacation days

BVG card or Swapfiets bike

Jobbatical and Sabbatical options

Learning opportunities to choose from

Annual Learning & Development budget

Visa and relocation assistance

Full access to Babbel & Babbel Live

Modern office in central Berlin

Diverse internal communities (Femgine?

DEI Ambassadors

Job summary

Babbel is seeking an Engineering Manager to lead the Data Platform team in Berlin. You will own data infrastructure, pipelines and platform capabilities supporting analytics, data science, product and engineering across the company.

This hands-on role combines people leadership with delivery, creating an environment where engineers can excel while delivering reliable, scalable, and well-governed data products.

Qualifications

• Experience working with Product, Analytics, Data Science and Engineering stakeholders in cross-functional teams, balancing delivery, quality, cost and sustainability
• Experience managing and developing data engineers, ideally in a data platform, infrastructure or internal-product context
• A strong track record of delivering and operating reliable production systems, including data pipelines, modelling, schema evolution, testing, CI/CD, monitoring and incident management
• People leadership and team development: Creates a healthy, collaborative and accountable team culture through clear expectations, constructive feedback, coaching and career development
• The role requires both technical depth and strong people leadership, together with the ability to create clarity, resolve ownership gaps and help teams deliver sustainably
• Technical leadership: Strong understanding of modern data platform architecture, including cloud infrastructure, data processing, streaming, orchestration and analytics tools. Experience with technologies such as AWS, Terraform, Databricks, Kinesis or similar, dbt and Airflow is relevant
• Product and delivery leadership: Treats the data platform as a product for internal customers, communicates clearly, manages trade-offs and makes sound build-versus-buy, vendor, cost and reliability decisions
• Data governance and responsible AI use: Practical understanding of access controls, IAM, least-privilege patterns, encryption, lineage, audit logging and governance for AI or agent workloads
• This role requires strong proficiency in English. Please note that our company’s operating language is English, so you will need to be able to work in English
• We are a learning company, inside and out, and we encourage you to apply even if you do not fit all the technical requirements - all candidates are assessed based on skills, qualifications and on our business needs

Responsibilities

• Lead, coach and grow a data engineering team responsible for Babbel’s data platform and infrastructure
• Own reliable delivery and operational excellence across the platform, including quality, observability, SLAs/SLOs, on-call and incident management
• Partner with Analytics, Product, Data Science and Engineering teams to prioritise and deliver platform capabilities that make trustworthy data easy to discover, access and use
• Drive an architecture that supports governed AI and agent workloads at scale, with appropriate access controls, lineage, auditability and cost guardrails built in
• Establish clear ownership, strong engineering practices and a predictable delivery cadence while continuously improving platform performance, cost and sustainability
• You will work across Data, Analytics, Product and Engineering, building trusted relationships with internal customers and technical stakeholders
• Please state your pronouns in your application, and let us know if you’d like to be addressed by a name other than the one appearing on your official documents

Job description

• We are looking for an Engineering Manager to lead Babbel’s Data Platform team. The team owns the data infrastructure, pipelines and platform capabilities that support analytics, data science, product teams and engineering across the company


• This is a hands-on role. You will be responsible for both team health and delivery outcomes, creating an environment where engineers can do their best work while delivering reliable, scalable and well-governed data products


• You will work closely with Data, Analytics, Product and Engineering leaders to turn strategy into sustainable execution


• Lead, coach and grow a data engineering team responsible for Babbel’s data platform and infrastructure


• Own reliable delivery and operational excellence across the platform, including quality, observability, SLAs/SLOs, on-call and incident management


• Partner with Analytics, Product, Data Science and Engineering teams to prioritise and deliver platform capabilities that make trustworthy data easy to discover, access and use


• Drive an architecture that supports governed AI and agent workloads at scale, with appropriate access controls, lineage, auditability and cost guardrails built in


• Establish clear ownership, strong engineering practices and a predictable delivery cadence while continuously improving platform performance, cost and sustainability


• You will work across Data, Analytics, Product and Engineering, building trusted relationships with internal customers and technical stakeholders


• Please state your pronouns in your application, and let us know if you’d like to be addressed by a name other than the one appearing on your official documents

Benefits

• 30 vacation days and flexible working hours


• BVG card or Swapfiets bike


• Jobbatical and Sabbatical options


• Many internal & external learning opportunities to choose from


• A yearly Learning & Development budget


• Visa and relocation assistance


• Full access to Babbel & Babbel Live classes


• Modern office in the heart of buzzing Berlin equipped with a family, music, faith and nap room


• Various internal communities to be part of including the Femgineers, DEI Ambassadors, Accessibility & Disability Group and more

Experience working with Product, Analytics, Data Science and Engineering stakeholders in cross-functional teams, balancing delivery, quality, cost and sustainabilityExperience managing and developing data engineers, ideally in a data platform, infrastructure or internal-product contextA strong track record of delivering and operating reliable production systems, including data pipelines, modelling, schema evolution, testing, CI/CD, monitoring and incident managementPeople leadership and team development: Creates a healthy, collaborative and accountable team culture through clear expectations, constructive feedback, coaching and career developmentThe role requires both technical depth and strong people leadership, together with the ability to create clarity, resolve ownership gaps and help teams deliver sustainablyTechnical leadership: Strong understanding of modern data platform architecture, including cloud infrastructure, data processing, streaming, orchestration and analytics tools. Experience with technologies such as AWS, Terraform, Databricks, Kinesis or similar, dbt and Airflow is relevantProduct and delivery leadership: Treats the data platform as a product for internal customers, communicates clearly, manages trade-offs and makes sound build-versus-buy, vendor, cost and reliability decisionsData governance and responsible AI use: Practical understanding of access controls, IAM, least-privilege patterns, encryption, lineage, audit logging and governance for AI or agent workloadsThis role requires strong proficiency in English. Please note that our company’s operating language is English, so you will need to be able to work in EnglishWe are a learning company, inside and out, and we encourage you to apply even if you do not fit all the technical requirements - all candidates are assessed based on skills, qualifications and on our business needs