Senior Engagement Manager - Professional Services (d/f/m)

Personio; Dublin; Hybrid; EUR 90,000 - 140,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Salary + equity (pre-IPO)

28 days paid vacation

Impact Day

Family leave and well-being support

Office-led, remote friendly culture

Job summary

Personio in Ireland is looking for a Senior Engagement Manager for Professional Services to lead the DACH pre-sales services motion, scope requirements, and shape Statements of Work that are commercially sound and deliverable. You will translate customer needs into concrete implementation plans and guide the engagement from discovery through to post-signature handover.

This hands-on role involves leading discovery calls, coordinating input from delivery experts, and scaling the model with PS

Qualifications

• 8+ years in Professional Services or related customer-facing SaaS role.
• Business proficiency in German and English, both written and verbal.
• Proven ability to lead discovery and scoping conversations and translate requirements into concrete implementation plans.
• Strong commercial judgement across effort estimation, services packaging, pricing, and Statements of Work.
• Credible with senior Sales stakeholders, customers, and delivery teams.
• Strong written communication and cross-functional coordination.

Responsibilities

• Own complex Professional Services requests from DACH Sales end-to-end - leading discovery and scoping workshops, translating customer requirements into a clear implementation approach, and recommending the right services package, delivery model and level of support.
• Define scope, assumptions, exclusions, timelines, effort and delivery roles; draft, review and approve Statements of Work for complex and non-standard engagements, ensuring recommendations are commercially credible and operationally deliverable.
• Walk customers through what implementation will actually look like once they sign - phases, timelines, roles on both sides, and what's expected of them - giving Sales a credible, detailed narrative to de-risk the buying decision rather than a generic sales-brochure description.
• Proactively surface and address the questions that create hesitation or stall deals (go-live timing, data migration, integration complexity, resourcing asks), and support Sales directly in explaining the approach and customer responsibilities.
• Ensure what's explained pre-sale matches what delivery actually does post-sale, with a clear, documented handover into the delivery team, and review post-sale scope issues to identify weaknesses in the pre-sale process.
• Identify implementation risks, dependencies and capability gaps before signature, coordinating input from Team Leads and implementation specialists and consolidating it into a single recommendation for Sales and the customer.
• Estimate effort, duration and role mix for complex engagements, applying pricing, packaging and margin guardrails, and supporting discount or commercial exception discussions within agreed authority.
• Balance customer requirements against standardisation, delivery capacity and long-term customer success, escalating material delivery, margin or capability risks, and partnering with Finance, Operations and PS leadership on approvals or exceptions as needed.
• Identify recurring questions and scoping patterns that should become standard guidance, defining content for playbooks, decision trees, templates and effort calculators.
• Partner with PS Operations to turn repeated answers into reusable Sales enablement, and coach Sales teams on services packaging, qualification, discovery and scoping.
• Help define where Sales can self-serve versus where Engagement Manager support is required, using request and deal data to prioritise the highest-impact improvements to service packages, commercial guardrails and the pre-sales operating model.

Skills

Stakeholder management

Discovery & scoping

German language proficiency

English language proficiency

Presentation & communication

SaaS/Professional Services experience

Job description

Personio's intelligent HR platform helps small and medium-sized organizations unlock the power of people by making complicated, time-consuming tasks simple and efficient. Our team of 1,500 Personios is building user-friendly products that delight our 15,000+ customers and their 1.5 million employees. Ready to make an impact from day one?

The Role: How you'll make an impact at Personio

As Senior Engagement Manager for Professional Services, you'll lead the DACH pre-sales services motion—helping Sales and customers land on the right implementation approach before contract signature. You'll scope requirements, recommend the right services package, estimate effort, and shape Statements of Work that are both commercially sound and deliverable. Just as critically, you'll make implementation feel concrete and credible to customers who haven't lived it yet, walking them through what happens after signature, stage by stage, so deals close on real understanding rather than sales-brochure assurance.

This is hands-on work: leading complex scoping conversations, joining customer calls, and coordinating specialist input from Team Leads and delivery experts. You'll also help scale the model—turning repeat questions into standard guidance—by partnering with PS Operations on intake, reporting, and self-service infrastructure.

Success means Sales gets fast, credible, commercially sound support on complex deals; customers get an accurate picture of what implementation involves; and PS spends less time on requests that shouldn't need an Engagement Manager at all.

Role Responsibilities: What you'll do

• Own complex Professional Services requests from DACH Sales end-to-end - leading discovery and scoping workshops, translating customer requirements into a clear implementation approach, and recommending the right services package, delivery model and level of support.
• Define scope, assumptions, exclusions, timelines, effort and delivery roles; draft, review and approve Statements of Work for complex and non-standard engagements, ensuring recommendations are commercially credible and operationally deliverable.
• Walk customers through what implementation will actually look like once they sign - phases, timelines, roles on both sides, and what's expected of them - giving Sales a credible, detailed narrative to de-risk the buying decision rather than a generic sales-brochure description.
• Proactively surface and address the questions that create hesitation or stall deals (go-live timing, data migration, integration complexity, resourcing asks), and support Sales directly in explaining the approach and customer responsibilities.
• Ensure what's explained pre-sale matches what delivery actually does post-sale, with a clear, documented handover into the delivery team, and review post-sale scope issues to identify weaknesses in the pre-sale process.
• Identify implementation risks, dependencies and capability gaps before signature, coordinating input from Team Leads and implementation specialists and consolidating it into a single recommendation for Sales and the customer.
• Estimate effort, duration and role mix for complex engagements, applying pricing, packaging and margin guardrails, and supporting discount or commercial exception discussions within agreed authority.
• Balance customer requirements against standardisation, delivery capacity and long-term customer success, escalating material delivery, margin or capability risks, and partnering with Finance, Operations and PS leadership on approvals or exceptions as needed.
• Identify recurring questions and scoping patterns that should become standard guidance, defining content for playbooks, decision trees, templates and effort calculators.
• Partner with PS Operations to turn repeated answers into reusable Sales enablement, and coach Sales teams on services packaging, qualification, discovery and scoping.
• Help define where Sales can self-serve versus where Engagement Manager support is required, using request and deal data to prioritise the highest-impact improvements to service packages, commercial guardrails and the pre-sales operating model.

Role Requirements: What you need to succeed

• 8+ years in Professional Services, Solutions Consulting, Implementation, Customer Success, or a related customer-facing SaaS role.
• Business proficiency in German and English, both written and verbal.
• Strong track record supporting Sales on complex opportunities, or equivalent depth explaining implementation delivery directly to customers pre- or post-sale.
• Proven ability to lead discovery and scoping conversations, translating business and technical requirements into concrete implementation plans.
• Skilled at explaining delivery processes—stages, timelines, roles, customer expectations—in specific, credible detail that builds trust rather than reciting a template.
• Strong commercial judgement across effort estimation, services packaging, pricing, and Statements of Work, balancing customer needs with delivery feasibility, standardisation, and margin discipline.
• Credible with senior Sales stakeholders, customers, and delivery teams; comfortable making clear recommendations and challenging unrealistic expectations.
• Strong written communication skills, with the ability to coordinate multiple specialists without adding unnecessary complexity for Sales.
• Experience turning recurring customer and deal patterns into repeatable playbooks or processes.

Why Personio?

Personio is an equal opportunities employer, committed to building an integrative culture where everyone feels welcomed and supported. We embrace uniqueness and understand that our diverse, values-driven culture makes us stronger. We are proud to have an inclusive workplace environment that will foster your development no matter your gender, civil status, family status, sexual orientation, religion, age, disability, education level, or race.

Aside from our people, culture, and mission, check out some of the other benefits that make Personio a great place to work:

• Receive a competitive reward package – reevaluated each year – that includes salary, benefits, and pre-IPO equity
• Enjoy 28 days of paid vacation, plus an additional day after 2 and 4 years
• Make an impact on the environment and society with 1 (fully paid) Impact Day
• Receive generous family leave, child support, mental health support, and sabbatical opportunities.
• We follow an office-led, remote friendly approach, including opportunities to work from home and international locations. Many of our teams have designated days for gathering in the office to enhance collaboration and foster a sense of community.
• We enjoy gathering for meals, cultural initiatives, and events like local Summer Sessions and year-end celebrations. There's also healthy snacks, drinks, and a weekly catered lunch.