Engineering Manager in Core Product Engineering

About Pleo

Messy spend management is tricky business. And tedious processes are a lose-lose situation for all involved, not just finance. At Pleo, we're changing that. We build spend solutions that make managing money seamless, empowering, and surprisingly effective for finance teams and employees alike—with a vision to help all businesses ‘go beyond’.

The word ‘Pleo’ actually means ‘more than you’d expect’, and living by that mantra has been the secret to our success over the last 10 years.

Now, we’re at a pivotal moment in our journey; every move we make has a direct impact on our 40,000+ customers, our business, and our collective success. We need people who take pride in uncovering customer needs, who turn complex problems into simple solutions, challenge the way things are done (respectfully), and always aim high. With great ambitions driving us forward, we can’t say we’ve got this whole thing figured out. And frankly, that’s half the fun! What we can say is that we’re a driven, progressive, and, importantly, a kind bunch of 850+ people from over 100 nationalities, all committed to delivering the future of business spending, together.

The Role: Engineering Manager in Core Product Engineering

Joining our team as an Engineering Manager in Core Product Engineering places you at the forefront of advancing our technical excellence and innovation. You will be part of a knowledgeable team of leaders representing various technical areas. Your closest collaborator will be the product manager supervising the same teams, and you will report to one of our Senior Engineering Managers.

You’re responsible for delivery and outcomes across multiple engineering teams. You foster the environment in which engineers perform at their best and grow both as individuals and as a team. You do so by making sure each team member is clear on what we expect and how they can grow, by making sure our processes are helping rather than standing in the way, and by working with all engineers ensuring we are building high-quality software.

You'll be supporting two teams of about 5 engineers each. The Backend Core team provides the fundamental backend services, libraries and tooling that power Pleo's platform. The GenAI Core team offers centralized GenAI model routing, tooling and implementation consulting for product teams developing innovative AI-based features in the Pleo product.

Your Leadership Style

We always say that we hire anyone who we would want to be our boss, irrespective of the role they’re in (from Customer Support student workers to co-founders!). That should be the feeling we’re left with when any of us speak to you. We are looking for someone who cares deeply about individuals as human beings - we focus on authentic leadership and are actively trying to develop ourselves in this space. We hope that you will be able to show vulnerability, radical transparency, and a listening ear to those around you. We truly believe that with this type of style you and your team will set an incredible path forward - and that path will get us to incredible places. We want an engineering manager whose team will be standing on the top of the mountain with them - celebrating together and not left behind exhausted on the path below. We want you to help your team(s) through the journey of becoming high-performing, building trust among the members in the team, and helping them fine-tune their processes.

You will thrive in this role if you:

• Have a passion for people management. You work to see your team and individuals growing and shipping great software.
• Like to work with cross-functional teams and other stakeholders to align engineering functions with product & business direction and goals. You think like a technologist in the core and optimize for both customers and the business.
• Enjoy design and optimization of teams and processes to maximize their efficiency. You are comfortable stepping into technical discussions or taking important stakeholder meetings to remove roadblocks allowing the team to move forward.
• Are a strong communicator, with both technical and commercial stakeholders.
• Are a technologist at heart. We work in cross-functional teams in product and engineering: each team is made up of co-founders from product and engineering - and joined by designers, coders, and maybe even some people from commercial.

What this Role entails:

• Work closely with the Product Manager and set a vision and direction for the team or group of product teams.
• Directly manage Engineers (and Tech Leads) and oversee a group of Engineers.
• Drive a customer-centric & solution-oriented mindset.
• Continuously improve the environment and processes for how we build our product.
• Align technology direction within your area, with other areas as well as with the overall technology direction of the company.
• Represent engineering in key initiatives and projects within the department or across the company and ensure they get delivered.
• Design the organization, and objectives and hold a high standard in people, delivery, and technology.

Benefits at Pleo

• Your own Pleo card (no more out-of-pocket spending!)
• Lunch is on us for your work days - enjoy catered meals or receive a lunch allowance based on your local office 🍜
• Comprehensive private healthcare - depending on your location, coverage options include Vitality, Alan or Médis.
• We offer 25 days of holiday + your public holidays.
• For our Team, we offer both hybrid and fully remote working options.
• Option to purchase 5 additional days of holiday through a salary sacrifice.
• We use MyndUp to give our employees access to free mental health and well-being support with great success so far ❤️‍🩹
• Paid parental leave - we want to make sure that we're supportive of families and help you feel that you don't have to compromise your family due to work 👶

Key skills/competency

• Engineering Management
• Team Leadership & Development
• Cross-functional Collaboration
• Software Delivery Excellence
• Process Optimization
• Backend Services
• Generative AI (GenAI)
• Technical Vision & Strategy
• Stakeholder Communication
• Customer-Centric Development