AI-First – Engineering Manager

About the Role

Engineering Manager – Marketing Platform (Dispatch & Subscriptions)

Groupon's Marketing Engineering team owns the systems that connect millions of users with the right offer at the right time. This includes our Dispatch platform (real-time communications infrastructure) and Subscription systems that drive engagement and conversion at scale.

As Engineering Manager, you'll lead distributed engineering teams responsible for the reliability, scalability, and evolution of these platforms. You'll be accountable for both keeping the lights on and driving meaningful modernization — reducing operational costs, shipping AI-enabled features, and building a team that executes with ownership and speed.

This role sits at the intersection of platform engineering and business impact. If you're energized by large-scale distributed systems, cross-functional delivery, and growing engineers — this is for you.

Key Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end delivery across Dispatch and Subscription platform services, ensuring 99.99% uptime and sub-1s latency for real-time communications

• Lead and grow a distributed engineering team; manage performance, run regular 1:1s, and build a strong culture of ownership and accountability

• Drive platform modernization: reduce technical debt, optimize cloud resource usage, and target a 30% reduction in operational costs over 12 months

• Partner with product, data, and marketing stakeholders to align engineering delivery with business priorities

• Set and enforce engineering standards — code quality, CI/CD pipelines, microservices patterns, and incident response

• Participate actively in architectural decisions, design reviews, and technical direction within your team's scope

• Champion AI/ML integration where it delivers measurable outcomes — intelligent routing, automation, personalization; target at least 2 AI-driven features shipped per year

• Own hiring across your team: sourcing, interviewing, onboarding, and ongoing development

Key Requirements

• Hands-on software engineering and leadership experience

• Hands-on background in Java and distributed systems; comfortable reviewing architecture and code when needed

• Proven experience managing platform or communications infrastructure at scale in a microservices, cloud-native environment

• Strong AI-First approach and working knowledge of AWS or GCP; familiarity with Kubernetes, Terraform, and messaging systems (Kafka, RabbitMQ)

• Experience leading geographically distributed teams across time zones

• Demonstrated ability to manage ambiguity, balance competing priorities, and deliver in fast-moving environments

• Track record of performance management, career development, and team building

Nice to Have

• Familiarity with Ruby, Node.js, or React in addition to Java

• Experience with email/push/SMS communication platforms or subscription management systems

• Exposure to AI/ML integration in production systems

• Background in marketing technology or customer engagement platforms

What Success Looks Like

• 30 days: You understand the platforms, team dynamics, key stakeholders, and top 3 risks. You've had 1:1s with every direct report and flagged immediate delivery blockers.

• 60 days: You've taken ownership of sprint planning, are running team rituals effectively, and have a clear view of the technical debt backlog with a prioritization proposal.

• 90 days: You've shipped at least one meaningful improvement, established clear performance baselines, and have a 12-month roadmap draft aligned with business goals.

We Are Interested In

• Leaders who make decisions anchored in customer and business outcomes 

• Managers who build autonomy in their teams rather than creating dependency on themselves

• Engineers who treat AI as a tool, not a trend 

• People who can hold quality standards in a messy, fast-moving environment without slowing everything down

• Communicators who can translate complexity for non-technical stakeholders without dumbing it down

#LI-KH1 #LI-Hybrid.

##LI-KH1 and #LI-Hybrid.