Job description
Engineering Manager (Hands on)
Company Overview
A fast-growing European SaaS company is looking for an Engineering Manager who codes first and manages second.
Job Summary
You'll be joining a high-performing team of 5 engineers building an AI-powered compliance platform that's disrupting a massive, broken market across Europe. You will work in partnership with the CTO, taking over the EM responsibilities - not as an executive, but as the strongest IC on the team who also happens to lead it.
Key Responsibilities
- Month 1: ship a meaningful feature (70–80% coding).
- Month 2: own engineering hiring.
- Month 3: lead performance conversations and 1:1s.
- Shape engineering culture, hiring, and technical standards from near-scratch.
- Own system design on the company's biggest projects end-to-end, including a new agentic AI product (CISO AI) with real traction.
Requirements / Qualifications
- 8+ years backend engineering, principal level or equivalent — you earned management, you didn't escape into it.
- 1–3 years EM experience: 1:1s, performance conversations, hiring, ideally at a similar stage startup.
- Hands-on with AI-assisted dev tools (Cursor, Claude Code) in real production work, with opinions on what actually moves the needle.
- Strong Backend/ OOP background; comfortable across backend and infra.
- You think people-first, not process-first — you reach for the right engineer, not the right runbook.
- Based in EMEA, working CET/CEST timezone.
- Authorized to work in Germany.
Location
Remote in Europe - Ideally Germany. Based in EMEA, working CET/CEST timezone.
Employment Type
Full Time
Salary & Benefits
- Competitive salary benchmarked to European market rates + generous equity.
- €1,000/year development budget.
- Full remote setup support + co-working access.
- 26 days holiday + public holidays + comprehensive health insurance.
- Latest MacBook + peripherals.
- Medical insurance.
- Annual team retreats — Costa Brava, Austrian Alps, Portugal, Italy.
