Engineering Manager, Backend

About Prose Prose is truly custom hair and skin care made‑to‑order—just for you. Our line of custom products are made by an in‑house, Paris‑based R&D team of gifted chemists who combine natural ingredients in innovative ways alongside dermatologists, giving consumers clean skin care, hair care and impeccable results. At the heart of Prose’s success is Singular, its proprietary AI‑powered beauty‑tech platform, which has revolutionised personalised beauty at scale. Marrying a technology‑driven approach with an apothecary‑style concept, all Prose hair and skin care products are personalised to your one‑of‑a‑kind hair, skin, goals and environment. We’re a company that wants to change beauty practices, so we’re changing the way beauty companies practice. As a certified B Corporation, a Public Benefit Corporation and Climate Neutral, we’re proving that good business is always sustainable. With Prose, there’s nothing sacrificed to bring you great products—not trees, materials, wages, or performance. Prose & Singular in Numbers Founded in 2017, with hubs in Paris, New York, and Los Angeles 2M customers and 350K active subscribers 21M custom products made, with 1M+ unique formulas 350+ team members across disciplines $600M+ in lifetime sales, with $165M+ revenue in 2024 Profitable since 2024 📍 Located in Paris, min 3 days in‑office Engineering Manager Prose is seeking a hands‑on Engineering Manager to lead and grow our engineering teams while contributing directly to our technical initiatives. You’ll be part of our Tech organisation that designs, builds, and delivers both platform capabilities and product features that power Prose’s personalised beauty experience. This is a dual role that blends technical execution with people leadership. You’ll be responsible for maintaining delivery excellence, reducing technical debt, and fostering a culture of collaboration, learning, and accountability. As a key member of the Tech leadership team, you will act as the technical point of contact in interactions with Product and Design, ensuring alignment between technical vision and user experience goals. You’ll also play a cross‑functional coordination role, collaborating closely with other teams and Engineering Managers to ensure consistency, scalability, and shared best practices across the organisation. You will ensure the stability, scalability, and quality of our systems — while coaching and mentoring engineers to help them thrive. If you’re passionate about human‑centred leadership, technical excellence, and helping teams deliver with confidence and purpose, we’d love to hear from you. Responsibilities Management and Leadership Manage and mentor a group of engineers across one squad (backend and/or frontend), fostering their growth and aligning the team’s efforts with business objectives. Collaborate with Product on team priorities, workload distribution, balance between tech and product initiatives and contribute to a clear communication across teams. Advocate for best practices across the organisation, influencing cross‑functional collaboration. Technical Contribution Write, review, and ship production code alongside your team. Lead by example with engineering best practices in testing, documentation, and code quality. Participate in architecture discussions and system design decisions. Unblock your team with hands‑on support and pragmatic solutions. Identify and address areas of technical debt, implementing improvements to enhance system performance and maintainability. Process & Collaboration Improve engineering workflows and team efficiency across squads. Collaborate closely with product, design, and other stakeholders to ensure delivery of high‑quality features. Bring visibility to ongoing work, risks, and dependencies. Support the rollout and evolution of engineering processes and rituals. Culture & Impact Build and maintain an inclusive, psychologically safe environment where engineers can thrive. Help define and uphold the values of our engineering organisation at Prose. Advocate for engineering needs within the broader organisation. Provide technical documentation and training to team members to promote knowledge sharing. Key Candidate Management and Technical Requirements Have previously managed Engineers and understand the challenges and how to achieve maximum productivity. Comfortable in being responsible for People, Technical Quality and Delivery. Pragmatic mindset, knowing when to invest in perfection, and when to build a PoC. Presentation and communication skills, capable of presenting technical ideas in a way that suits the audience. Mentoring and coaching experience. Previous backend experience with Python, along with common libraries such as Django, Rest Framework, FastAPI. Deep understanding of fundamental design principles behind a scalable application. Understanding of front‑end web technologies. A knack for writing clean, readable, and maintainable code. Prior experience in B2C, e‑commerce, manufacturing is a plus. Fluency in English is required. 🕓 Timeline: From first contact to final decision: ~3 weeks Interview Process 1. HR Interview — 45 minutes (Video Call or On‑site) A first conversation with our People Team to get to know you. 2. Technical & Team Interview — 1 hour (On‑site) Meet Arthur (VP Engineering) in person. He will introduce you to the Tech team, our projects, and how we work day to day. 3. Live Technical Assessment — 1 hour 30 (On‑site) Led by Ivica (VP Technology) and a backend engineer. We’ll walk through a live practical exercise simulating a real‑world scenario from our environment. We’ll look at your reasoning, problem‑solving process, and ability to communicate clearly under realistic conditions. 4. Final Interview — 45 minutes (Zoom or On‑site) Meet Nicolas (CTO) and Sabrina (VP People & Culture) for the final conversation. Compensation Competitive base salary - 70-75K€ based on xp Variable bonus up to 10% based on company and individual performance BSPCE program 100% coverage of health insurance and life/disability plan (including dependents) Access to sports and cultural activities with an €80/month allowance Standard French benefits: Swile meal vouchers, transport allowance, and Syntec vacation bonus €150 worth of personalised Prose products each year €80 “Friends & Family” credit to share Prose with your loved ones Understand & Embody our Prose Values Intentional Inclusivity We know the best ideas come from open minds and willingness to listen. While our products cater to the individual, an invitation into our process is always open to our community. We value our differences and diverse backgrounds by communicating openly, managing with transparency and striving to understand one another’s perspective. It's a key ingredient to our innovation. Our strength as a group will outlast our efforts as individual contributors. With offices across countries (and across boroughs) staying inventive and agile deepens our clear vision and consistent communication. We stay in a spirit of entrepreneurial collaboration: We do not have consensus at all times, but we trust one another to work toward our common goals. Our success is an expression and result of our progressive and gratifying teamwork. We value ownership and coaching that encourages employees to think constructively and creatively about the business. We view employees as leaders and individuals who are accountable, resourceful and responsible. Anyone and everyone is encouraged to lead. We recognise that in order to continue thinking one step ahead, we will need to try new things. We strive to provide an open environment that accepts this truth making space for new ideas to emerge. Humanity Always We assume good intentions in every interaction keeping ourselves accountable for the climate we create. We seek to understand our co‑workers through this lens of authenticity and fellowship. We operate with the intention of preserving resources, creating an environment we can all live in— for our business and the world. Sustainable care is essential to our ethos as an organisation. We take a mindful approach to how we think about our people (employees) and our planet. #J-18808-Ljbffr