Head of Backend Engineering (Berlin, Germany)

Head of Backend Engineering

Company Overview

Annapurna 236,781 followers Staffing and Recruiting 51-200 employees 58 on LinkedIn At Annapurna, we are focused on becoming a trusted responsible search partner for our clients.We provide a multi-award winning, values-led recruitment service delivered by experienced search consultants, utilising a methodology derived from a passion for innovation, thought leadership and outstanding corporate social responsibility.We partner with the most innovative organisations in the world to help them engage the best talent on the market within the HR, Technology, and Go-To-Market sectors, and scale through growth services.Working across the Permanent, Interim & Exec Search markets, with a particular focus on Europe and North America, we support organisations from early-stage funded organisations to those that are stock listed.We also provide semi-embedded or subscription models to work alongside your teams, complemented by additional growth services such as benchmarking, EVP, research and much more.Our thought leadership-led approach has been empowering communities since 2008. Whether driving DEI, empowering women in leadership or embracing digital, we strive to be the instigators of the conversations that need to be had.Curious to learn more and partner with us?www.annapurnarecruitment.com

Job Summary

We are partnering with a fast-growing, Berlin-based digital entertainment business operating at scale across Europe. The company is building a high-traffic, consumer-facing platform where performance, reliability, and speed of innovation are critical.They are now hiring a Head of Backend Engineering to lead the backend function while remaining deeply hands-on. This role blends technical leadership, system architecture, and active coding, and is ideal for someone who enjoys setting technical direction while still shipping production code.As Head of Backend Engineering, you will own the backend platform end-to-end, leading a small but growing team of engineers while acting as the technical authority for backend systems. You will work closely with Product, Frontend, Mobile, and Data teams to deliver scalable, resilient services that power a high-usage entertainment platform.This is not a purely managerial role, you are expected to remain close to the codebase and be actively involved in design, implementation, and problem-solving.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the backend architecture for a high-traffic, consumer-facing platform
• Design and evolve scalable, secure, and resilient backend systems
• Make pragmatic technology decisions balancing speed, quality, and long-term maintainability
• Lead system design discussions and technical decision-making across teams
• Contribute directly to the codebase (design, development, reviews)
• Lead by example through high-quality, production-ready code
• Be involved in debugging, performance optimisation, and incident resolution
• Set engineering standards for backend development, testing, and deployment
• Lead, mentor, and develop backend engineers
• Support hiring and team scaling as the platform grows
• Foster a strong engineering culture focused on ownership, quality, and collaboration
• Conduct code reviews and provide regular technical feedback
• Partner closely with Product and Engineering leadership on roadmap planning
• Translate product requirements into robust technical solutions
• Work cross-functionally with frontend, mobile, DevOps, and data teams
• Ensure reliable delivery through well-defined processes and tooling

Requirements / Qualifications

The exact stack is flexible, but experience in several of the following is expected:

• Modern backend languages (e.g. Golang, Python, Node.js)
• API design (REST, GraphQL, event-driven systems)
• Cloud infrastructure (GCP)
• Microservices or modular monolith architectures
• Databases (SQL and NoSQL)
• CI/CD pipelines and infrastructure-as-code
• Observability, monitoring, and production support

Location

Berlin, Germany (Hybrid)

Employment Type

Full Time

Salary & Benefits

Salary Range: Up to €120,000

• True hands-on leadership, technical ownership without stepping away from code
• Opportunity to shape the backend platform
• High-impact role within a modern engineering organisation
• Berlin-based team with a strong engineering culture

Equal Opportunity Statement

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DE&I) Committee Members are responsible for promoting events and awareness in the annual DE&I calendar (includes Eid, Pride month, Black History month, and more). Ellevate Committee Ellevate is a women’s network within Annapurna to support & promote one another in the workplace. This includes regular workshops, coaching & mentoring, webinars and socials as well as an internal chat for day-to-day support.