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, profitable and growing, 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 a Head of Product to lead Tandem’s product organization and help us scale an outcome-driven product culture across different teams.
This is a player-coach role: You will lead and grow the product organization in collaboration with company leadership, while also staying deeply involved in product discovery, experimentation and decision-making within the teams, to deliver measurable impact across growth, retention and monetization.
This role is ideal for someone who loves shaping product strategy and evolving a product organization, with high ownership and real responsibility for outcomes in an empowered product model.
Develop a thorough understanding of what drives growth, retention, and monetization at Tandem.
Develop Tandem’s product strategy and translate company goals into clear product bets and measurable outcomes.
Define product success metrics and ensure that decision-making at all levels is data-informed and evidence-based.
Lead, coach, and grow a team of product managers.
Set the standards for discovery, experimentation and delivery quality, as well as communication and documentation.
Foster strong product operations practices, including planning cadences, decision logs, high-quality PRDs, metric reviews, and learning loops across teams.
Partner closely with Engineering and Design leadership to run product teams that ship iteratively and learn quickly.
Actively participate in product discovery and experimentation together with teams, including shaping problem statements, writing PRDs, reviewing experiments, analyzing results, and occasionally leading initiatives end-to-end.
Champion the adoption of AI tools and workflows across the product organization to accelerate discovery, analysis, documentation, and decision-making.
Work hand-in-hand with Marketing on product-led growth loops and lifecycle experiences.
Work hand-in-hand with Trust & Safety to ensure that safety, integrity, and community health are built into product decisions from day one.
Sponsor and prioritize technical refactoring and modernization initiatives that increase product velocity and reliability, or unlock new capabilities, and clearly connect these to user and business outcomes.
Ensure a steady cadence of experimentation, both quantitative and qualitative.
Foster a culture where we share learnings widely, celebrate wins, and continuously improve.
What success looks like:
The top company priorities are mapped to a coherent product roadmap.
All stakeholders feel clarity about what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, and how we’re measuring success.
Teams operate autonomously and effectively aligned, in a consistent and focused discovery and delivery rhythm, with fast learning cycles.
Teams ship faster and with greater confidence because the foundations have improved.
Collaboration with Engineering, Design, Marketing, and Trust & Safety runs smoothly.
The organization learns faster because experiments are well-designed, instrumentation is solid, and insights are shared.
PMs are growing, and the product culture is visibly stronger.
You are contributing directly to key product initiatives, helping teams solve hard problems and raising the bar for product thinking and decision-making through hands-on involvement.
As a result, we see sustained improvements in member and revenue growth while maintaining or improving community health.
Have 8+ years of product experience, with 3+ years leading PMs.
Have a strong track record of delivering measurable product outcomes.
Are energized by Tandem’s mission and care deeply about helping people connect across cultures.
Have experience scaling product practices across multiple teams, such as strategy, discovery, experimentation, delivery, and stakeholder alignment.
Are highly analytical and user-centric, combining data, research, and product intuition to make good trade-off decisions.
Are a communicative team player with an excellent command of written and spoken English.
Thrive in ambiguity and love solving complex problems with real constraints.
Have demonstrated the ability to be resourceful and innovative.
Enjoy both leading people and getting your hands dirty in product work, from shaping experiments to reviewing data or drafting PRDs.
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 an advanced degree in computer science, business, design, psychology, linguistics, or a related field.
Your application will stand out if you:
Have experience with high-scale B2C mobile apps.
Have built products with strong community, marketplace, or social dynamics, and understand Trust & Safety as core to product success.
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 worked in language learning or EdTech environments.
Have successfully led teams through major refactors or migrations that improved velocity and reliability.
Have coded prototypes yourself, to quickly explore solutions and communicate intent.
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.
Tandem is the leading global language learning app, where 30 million members in over 200 countries practice languages together. The concept of learning from each other is not only an integral part of the Tandem community but is also at the heart of our everyday lives at Tandem. This shared connection through learning helps us to grow and enhances the language journeys of our members.
We are based in Berlin and are 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 build a product that not only teaches a new skill but also encourages meaningful cross-cultural conversations.
