Technical Product Manager

About Tandem

Tandem is the leading global language learning community, with over 35 million members from all around the world practicing languages together. The concept of learning from each other is not only core to the Tandem community, it is also at the heart of how we work every day at Tandem.

We are based in Berlin and backed by top European investors. We are highly international and driven by a shared passion for languages, technology, and culture. Together, we are on a mission to connect the world through languages, by building a product that helps people not just learn, but truly understand each other across cultures.

We are looking for an outcome-driven, technically fluent, data-savvy, and highly collaborative Technical Product Manager to join our team. You will be part of a cross-functional product team that works primarily on technical initiatives, such as code and platform modernization, to enable various product initiatives and improve reliability, scalability, observability and team velocity.

This role is ideal for someone who loves product and enjoys going deep on system design trade-offs, code modernization, APIs, and platform constraints, without losing sight of the user and business outcomes.

Your role will be to:

• Develop a thorough understanding of what drives growth, retention, and monetization at Tandem.

• Own technical product work that spans multiple systems, e.g. client/server, APIs, data pipelines, experimentation, payments/subscriptions, trust & safety tooling, etc.

• Define and maintain a code and platform modernization roadmap with clear prioritization.

• Align backend, Kotlin Multiplatform (KMP), and client teams on architecture and design principles that keep modernization consistent and future-proof.

• Partner closely with engineers to evaluate architecture options, manage technical trade-offs, conduct architecture spikes, and ensure that solutions are scalable, secure, and maintainable.

• Act as the product counterpart for technical initiatives by clarifying goals, defining success metrics, shaping scopes, creating artifacts like PRDs and migration plans, and coordinating sequencing across teams.

• Make the business case visible by translating modernization into concrete outcomes.

• Ensure that decision-making at all levels is data-informed and evidence-based.

• Champion the adoption of AI tools and workflows across the product organization to accelerate discovery, analysis, documentation, and decision-making.

• Contribute to the overall product strategy and vision at Tandem.

What success looks like:

• You ship improvements that move core metrics by advancing the technical foundations of our platform and codebase.

• Product teams ship faster because unknowns are surfaced early, groundwork is sequenced, and modernization is tied to concrete capability unlocks.

• Engineers trust you because you have a clear vision of your goals, you are pragmatic about trade-offs, and rigorous about measurement.

• Platform work predictability improves as key dependencies stay current, releases become safer, incidents decrease, and operational costs trend downward.

• The organization learns faster because experiments are well-designed, instrumentation is solid, and insights are shared.

You are the right fit for the role if you:

• Have 3+ years of PM experience as a Technical PM, Platform PM, Data/ML PM, or generally as a PM with substantial technical depth and ownership.

• Have a proven track record of delivering measurable product outcomes.

• Are a communicative team player with an excellent command of written and spoken English.

• Are comfortable going deep technically on topics such as architecture trade-offs, APIs, client-server boundaries, event schemas, migrations, and performance and reliability considerations.

• Thrive in ambiguity and love solving complex problems with real constraints.

• Have demonstrated the ability to be resourceful and innovative.

• Are AI-forward in how you work, actively using AI tools to augment your own productivity and bring best practices for integrating them into product operations.

• Have at least a bachelor’s degree in computer science or engineering, or equivalent practical experience.

• Are energized by Tandem’s mission and care deeply about helping people connect across cultures.

Your application will stand out if you:

• Have an advanced degree in computer science or engineering, or equivalent practical experience.

• Have experience with high-scale B2C mobile apps.

• Have shipped significant refactors or migrations in brownfield systems and can clearly articulate their impact.

• Have worked on trust & safety products, such as abuse prevention or moderation systems.

• Have worked on ML- and GenAI-driven product features, such as recommender systems, ranking, search, fraud detection, or personalization, and understand how to partner with data and engineering teams to ship and iterate on these systems

• Have coded prototypes yourself, to quickly explore solutions and communicate intent.

The benefits

Passion for languages: 

We’re a team of 30 people speaking 20 languages fluently between us. For those wanting to improve their German (or Denglisch!), you can join one of our German classes on us.

Take a deep dive: 

As a Tandem team member, we’ll give you a budget for up to 6 “Deep Dive Days” per year. Pick a topic you’ve always wanted to explore for your professional development that has never made it out of your backlog. Then book a cabin in the woods or whatever matches your individual learning style.

Teams who train together, stay together: 

We offer Urban Sports Club gym memberships to boost our team’s physical and mental health. If you prefer, we can contribute to your monthly public transport ticket instead.

It takes a team to Tandem: 

Bonding with our teammates outside of our normal work routine is important to us. We organize regular team events: from day trips to monthly lunches, summer BBQs, and movie nights.

Balance matters: 

Life isn’t just about work. We know when to snooze Slack notifications, recharge our batteries, and take time out for our personal hobbies. As home office has become the new normal for some of us, it’s even more important to be able to switch off from work and relax.

Modern family: 

As part of our family-friendly company philosophy, we embrace flexible working hours, welcome families to our events, and love for our kids to visit the office and get a taste of life at Tandem.

Relocation without the stress: 

If you’re looking to relocate to Berlin, we’re ready to assist you with the infamous German bureaucracy. Many of us have been through it before, so we have plenty of tips to share. You’ll feel settled in no time.

Hybrid by design: 

We’re all about embracing a flexible, modern way of working. That’s why we focus on a hybrid approach—balancing time between our vibrant Berlin-Mitte office and the comfort of your home. It’s the best of both worlds, and we’ll support you in creating the perfect setup for this dynamic way of working.