Engineering Director & Site Lead- Lisbon

Discord; Lisboa; On-site; EUR 150,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

Discord is opening an engineering hub in Lisbon as our first outside San Francisco. You will be the founding Engineering Director & Site Lead, building the hub from the ground up and owning technical direction.

You'll hire the initial team, set architecture across Rust, Python, React/React Native, and C++/Rust stack, and partner with US leadership to align on charters while shaping Lisbon's engineering culture.

Qualifications

• 5+ years as a software engineer with backend and distributed systems background.
• 5+ years in management; bonus for 2+ years managing managers.
• English fluency required; Portuguese strongly preferred.
• Eligibility to work in Portugal.
• Familiar with European hiring norms.

Responsibilities

• Own the Lisbon site end-to-end including hiring plans and technical oversight.
• Lead local hiring, interview loop calibration, and closing for first engineers with central Recruiting.
• Set architecture and technical direction using Rust, Python, React/React Native, and C++/Rust.
• Be hands-on to review design docs and unblock architecture decisions.
• Act as the on-the-ground people leader for Lisbon covering culture, onboarding, and local HR escalations.
• Partner with US engineering leadership to define team charters that travel across time zones.
• Represent Discord externally in Lisbon's tech ecosystem to build employer brand.
• Identify and escalate structural risks with Legal and report site health and hiring velocity.

Skills

Backend & distributed systems

People leadership

Hiring partnerships

Public/brand ambassador

English proficiency

Relocation readiness

Tools

Rust

Python

React/React Native

C++

Job description

Discord has a highly engaged community of millions of daily active users who use the platform for many different reasons, but there's one thing that nearly everyone does: play video games. Discord plays a uniquely important role in the future of gaming, and we are focused on making it easier and more fun for people to hang out before, during, and after playing games.

Discord is opening an engineering hub in Lisbon, our first dedicated one outside of our San Francisco HQ. And we're building it from the ground up. As a member of our founding team, you'll help set the direction for teams across Core Technology, advancing work that keeps Discord reliable for millions of people around the world, helps our engineers move faster, and protects our platform at scale. You'll also help shape the culture of the hub so it feels unmistakably Discord while developing a distinctly Lisbon identity of its own.

We're looking for an Engineering Director & Site Lead to build our engineering hub. This is a founding role: employee #1 on the ground, responsible for standing up the site, hiring the founding engineering team, and establishing Lisbon as a full-fidelity extension of Discord's engineering org- not a satellite office, but a site with real technical ownership and a direct line into how Discord builds technology.

What You'll Do

• Own the Lisbon site end-to-end including hiring plans, technical oversight and operational readiness
• Build and own the local hiring plan- sourcing, interview loop calibration, and closing- for the first cohort of engineers, in partnership with central Recruiting
• Set architecture and technical direction for the workstream(s) based in Lisbon, working in Discord's modern stack: Rust, and Python on the backend; React/React Native and C++/Rust on clients
• Be hands-on enough to review design docs, sit in technical interview debriefs, and unblock architecture decisions- this is a technical leadership role, not a pure people-management one
• Act as the on-the-ground people leader for Lisbon- a Head of Office function, not just a single team's manager- covering culture, onboarding, and local HR escalations
• Partner with US engineering leadership to define team charters that travel well across time zones
• Represent Discord externally in Lisbon's tech ecosystem- universities, meetups, Web Summit- to build employer brand and pipeline
• Identify and escalation structural risks early (notice periods, local employment law) in partnership with Legal
• Report site health, hiring velocity, technical delivery, and risks back to leadership on a regular cadence

What You'll Bring

• A track record of building or scaling an engineering site from zero
• 5+ years as a software engineer with a strong backend and distributed systems background, and 5+ years as a manager, bonus points for 2+ years managing managers.
• Working fluency in a part of Discord's core stack- enough to make credible architecture calls and earn engineers' trust in a technical interview debrief
• Familiarity with European hiring norms
• Comfort operating with high autonomy in the first 6–12 months, before local HR/Recruiting/Finance are fully staffed
• A track record representing a company externally- conferences, universities, local press- as a credible technical and cultural ambassador
• Eligibility to work in Portugal
• Fluency in English required; Portuguese strongly preferred

Candidates must reside in or be willing to relocate to the Lisbon Area and attend the office 3-4 days a week.

Why Discord?

Discord plays a uniquely important role in the future of gaming. We're a multiplatform, multigenerational and multiplayer platform that helps people deepen their friendships around games and shared interests, and helps developers build and grow their businesses. We believe games give us a way to have fun with our favorite people, whether listening to music together or grinding in competitive matches for diamond rank. Join us in our mission! Your future is just a click away!

Discord is committed to inclusion and providing reasonable accommodations during the interview process. We want you to feel set up for success, so if you are in need of reasonable accommodations, please let your recruiter know.