Senior Engineering Manager, Product Engineering (m/f/d)

What you'll actually do in the first 3 months

This isn't a role where you show up and start running standups. There are no standups. Here's how the first quarter goes:

• Month 1: Ship. Get into the codebase and ship a meaningful feature with AI alongside the team. You don't need to be the fastest engineer in the room, but the team needs to see that you can build at the level you'll ask of them and can ask the right questions.
• Month 2: Make the team faster. Find where features take three weeks that should take one, and fix it — in tooling, in how we review and test, or in who's working on what. Start regular 1:1s with each engineer, focused on weekly output, quality, and how well they use AI.
• Month 3: Own hiring. Take over engineering interviews and build a process that runs without my oversight. Design the technical challenges, run the screens, make the calls. The next people we bring in should raise the pace again. I will be there but switch my focus to final interviews.
• What will the role look like beyond the first 3 months?

After the first quarter, the job is management and the technical decisions. You own how the team builds: how engineers test, how they review each other's code and security, how the team is organised, and who we hire next. We're 8 engineers and 2 product designers today and plan to be around 16 within 12 months — most of that hiring is yours to run. You won't ship weekly, but you'll build something with the team now and then, because that's how you know the playbook still gets things out the door. Our CS and Sales leaders work the same way — they still own a small slice of the IC work, so they have skin in the game. Here's what you'll be close to in the next months:

• Speed. You’ll refine our software development processes to keep the team operating at high velocity. Cycle time from spec to production is your number and accountability. Tooling, review flow, how work is split, who's on what — whatever moves it.
• Quality. Improve how engineers test and automate, how they review each other's code and security changes, and how the zero-bug policy survives a team of 20.
• Team and hiring. Team structure, growth conversations, the hiring process, and eventually the next manager.
• AI in the craft — and in the management.

This role is for you if:

• You've managed a real team and made it ship faster. You've hired for it, run the hard conversations, and know what breaks as it grows — and you can point to where cycle time dropped because of you.
• You know what great engineers look like. You've thought deeply about what makes them productive, what holds them back, and how to move them forward — and you can spot one in a single interview.
• You have an exceptional IC track record before becoming a manager. You were a senior/principal engineer before you started managing — you didn't skip into management early because coding wasn't working out.
• You have product taste. You notice when a feature ships on time but isn't good enough, and you say so.
• You hold people to a high standard. You're comfortable giving direct feedback and having hard conversations about performance.
• You're hands-on with AI-assisted development. You've used Cursor and Claude Code in real production work, not just toy projects. You have opinions about how AI changes the engineering workflow from ideation to release, and you want to push a team to keep getting faster.
• You've worked in startups. You know what it feels like when there's low process, and the answer is "figure it out and ship it."
• You think engineering culture can stay startup-like at scale. You're optimistic that a small, high-performing team can stay that way as it grows, with little process.
• You communicate proactively in writing. In a remote team, written communication is how decisions get made and context gets shared. But you're not scared of jumping into a pair programming session either.

What we're looking for

• 8+ years as a software engineer, including 4+ years managing a team of 8+ and hiring for it yourself
• You've shipped AI features to production — retrieval, RAG, agentic workflows — and you know the difference between a demo that works and one that holds up on real customer data
• Product taste: a keen sense for what makes a product feel great, and the habit of saying so when it doesn't
• You've built and shipped with Claude Code and Cursor in real production work, and you have opinions about where AI helps and where it quietly creates debt
• You're an engineer at heart. You were senior or principal before you managed, and you can still hold your own in a design review, a debugging session, or building a feature
• You've built something zero to one at a startup, or scaled a team through the messy middle. You know what it feels like when there's no playbook
• Able to work in European timezone (CET/CEST). EMEA-based, ideally Germany or UK Nice to have
• You've grown a team to 15+ at a VC-funded startup
• Managed tech leads or a second manager
• Previous experience at a fully remote company

What Secfix gives you

• Location: Remote (EMEA) · Germany/Munich preferred - CET/CEST time zone
• We want to see how you think, build, and lead — not test you on algorithms. Here's the process:
• 30 min — Intro call with our talent team
• 45 min — Interview with Grigory
• 60 min — Technical interview
• 1.5 hr — AI-assisted build session: system design for a real feature, then building part of it with AI
• 2 hr — Leadership session with the founders
• Then you’ll get the offer! If we don't make an offer, we'll tell you why.
• Remote: 100% remote with a real virtual office in Gather
• Salary: Competitive, benchmarked to European market rates (we'll share specifics once we talk)
• Equity: Generous package — we're all owners here
• Development budget: €1,000/year — yours to spend on whatever makes you better
• Workspace: Remote workspace support + co-working access
• Holidays: 26 days + local public holidays
• Health insurance: Comprehensive coverage
• Annual retreat: Last time we went to Alicante — before that, the Austrian Alps, Portugal, Italy, and the Spanish Islands
• Tech: MacBook, monitors, headphones — the latest