Staff Technical Program Manager, Developer Amplification

Duolingo · Seattle, WA

  • Senior
  • Full-time
  • $181,600 – $272,400
  • Posted 2026-07-17
  • Confirmed live on 25 September 2026

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Job description

Our mission at Duolingo is to develop the best education in the world and make it universally available. It’s a big mission, and that’s where you come in!

At Duolingo, you’ll join a team that cares about finding innovative solutions to complex technical problems, running countless experiments (300+ at a time!) with our massive user base to make data-driven decisions, and educating our users and employees alike. You’ll have limitless learning opportunities, mentorship and collaboration with world-class minds, and a variety of projects with large scopes — while doing work that’s both fun and meaningful.

Join our life-changing mission to develop education for our half a billion (and growing!) learners around the world.

About the role...

This is a high-impact, high-visibility Staff TPM role at the center of one of Duolingo's most strategic engineering initiatives: dramatically reducing the effort required to get results and doubling developer productivity across the organization. You'll lead this initiative in close partnership with the Developer Amplification (DevAmp) Area, a team dedicated to accelerating how engineers work through better tooling, streamlined processes, and modern engineering practices. AI is one important lever — but the goal is the outcome: step-change improvements in how fast and effectively Duolingo engineers can build. This role is for a builder and a change agent: someone who can define what "doubling productivity" means in practice, align leadership and engineering teams around it, and drive the transformation to completion. If you thrive in ambiguity, have a bias for outcomes, and can bring people along through significant organizational change, this role is for you.

🧠 You will...

• Define and drive the roadmap for doubling developer productivity across Duolingo — aligning engineering, product, and data science around a shared vision, sequencing the work, and holding teams accountable to measurable outcomes.

• Lead organizational change management as engineering teams adopt new ways of working — building alignment, communicating progress to executives and ICs alike, and helping teams internalize new processes and tooling.

• Partner closely with Developer Amplification (DevAmp) Area leads to accelerate developer productivity through AI-powered tooling, ensuring programs have clear goals, measurable impact, and sustained momentum across engineering squads.

• Lead the delivery of strategic, high-impact cross-functional initiatives from conceptualization to launch, operating with significant autonomy across multiple workstreams.

• Partner with engineering, product, data science, QA, and executive leadership to ensure communication and alignment; serve as the connective tissue between Duolingo strategy and day-to-day execution.

• Leverage deep technical expertise to develop detailed plans with key milestones and goals, identify and mitigate risks, resolve dependencies, remove blockers, and ensure timely and smooth launches.

• Establish and evangelize engineering practices that drive step-change improvements in developer productivity — coaching engineering leads and TPMs on new ways of working and how to measure their impact.

• Drive decisions when difficult tradeoffs must be made, including those with cross-organizational or company-level impact; model how to navigate hard problems with analytical rigor and a calm, decisive presence.

• Identify systemic issues impacting delivery efficiency company-wide and take swift, collaborative action to resolve them.

• Guide and develop other TPMs and engineering leads, scaling best practices across teams and continuously improving how the organization operates.

✅ You have...

• Proven experience as a TPM, Engineering Lead, or Engineering Manager.

• B.S. or M.S. in Computer Science or equivalent degree or experience.

• Demonstrated experience leading large-scale technical transformation programs with measurable organizational impact — you've shifted how engineering organizations think and work, not just shipped projects.

• Strong executive presence and influence in a matrix environment — able to build conviction among skeptics, align competing priorities across senior leadership, and drive decisions without direct authority.

• Deep technical credibility — enough to challenge architectural assumptions, spot delivery risks early, and earn the trust of strong engineers.

• Proven ability to build and implement detailed plans that account for ambiguity, dependencies, and technical complexity — and to re-plan quickly when things change, without losing team confidence or momentum.

• A track record of standing up new programs or practices from scratch in ambiguous, high-visibility environments.

• Ability to relocate to Seattle, WA.

⭐ Exceptional candidates will have...

• Strong knowledge of software engineering, systems engineering, or similar hands-on technical experience, in addition to program management experience.

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