Manager, Developer Relations - Open Source

RDQ427R541

At Databricks, we are passionate about enabling data teams to solve the world's most challenging problems — from making the next mode of transportation a reality to accelerating medical breakthroughs. We do this by building and running the world's best data and AI platform, enabling our customers to use deep data insights to improve their businesses. Our ability to execute this mission depends on building trust and recognition within an ever-growing community of data engineers, analysts, scientists, machine learning practitioners, and AI practitioners.

Databricks’ Developer Relations team is looking for a leader to manage our open source Developer Advocates, deepen our engagement across the Apache Software Foundation and Linux Foundation communities, and lead technical storytelling and experiences that strengthen trust and adoption. This role is ideal for someone who thrives in the spotlight, is known and respected in open source communities, and gets even more satisfaction from growing other advocates than from giving the keynote themselves.

As the Developer Advocate Manager for Open Source, you'll lead the team that advocates for the projects Databricks builds in the open, and serve as a crucial link between our engineering teams and the global community of practitioners building their careers on them. Your team's remit spans the Open Lakehouse — Apache Spark™ (including Spark Declarative Pipelines), Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, Apache Iceberg™, and MLflow — as well as Omnigent, our open source meta-harness for composing, governing, and sharing AI agents. As the original creators of Apache Spark™, Delta Lake, and MLflow, we hold ourselves to a high standard here: our credibility in these communities is earned continuously, not inherited.

This role will leverage your expertise in building and scaling a developer relations team, and it will build on your standing within the open source world and your working relationships with the Apache Software Foundation, the Linux Foundation, and the maintainers and committers who keep these projects healthy. You'll coach your team on building a content flywheel — where a single demo, video, or talk becomes the source of truth for a dozen derivative assets — and on applying AI as a force multiplier without ever lowering the technical bar.

Your responsibilities will encompass both team leadership and a wide range of knowledge-sharing activities. You'll lead by example: delivering engaging talks, hosting panels and meetups, creating blogs and video content, developing courseware, answering questions in community forums, and meeting one-on-one with influential contributors and maintainers.

Community engagement will be at the heart of your role. You'll work closely with the open source communities and with product and engineering teams, ensuring that community needs and product development align seamlessly. Reporting directly to the Head of Developer Relations, you'll collaborate with fellow DevRel managers across our Databricks, App Dev, and DevRel Programs teams to create a cohesive and impactful open source strategy.

The ideal candidate embodies the values of our Developer Relations team: a deep passion for data and AI, genuine empathy for developers' needs, and a real, demonstrated commitment to open source — including the parts that don't directly benefit Databricks.

More about the DevRel team

The Developer Relations (DevRel) team at Databricks is dedicated to building and fostering relationships with communities of data practitioners. Our goal is to drive awareness and adoption of the Databricks Data + AI Platform — including Lakeflow, Lakebase, Genie Agents, and AI/BI — alongside the open source projects that underpin it, such as Apache Spark™, Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, MLflow, Apache Iceberg™, and Omnigent. Our team also owns programs like the Databricks MVP program, the user group program, and DevConnect roadshows.

The impact you will have

• Own developer relations for our open source portfolio end-to-end — set the strategy, define what success looks like, and be accountable for the outcomes.
• Hire, level, and grow a team of Developer Advocates, and take real ownership of their careers: clear expectations, honest feedback, and a visible path forward.
• Strengthen Databricks' standing as a trusted, vendor-neutral participant in the Apache and Linux Foundation ecosystems — measured by what the projects gain, not only by what we gain.
• Establish repeatable advocacy approaches — content flywheels, contribution guides, event playbooks — that the rest of DevRel can adopt and replicate.
• Grow external, non-Databricks adoption and contribution across our open source projects, and help develop the next generation of maintainers.
• Drive awareness and adoption of the Open Lakehouse and Omnigent through your own speaking at industry events and conferences, and by getting your team on the right stages.
• Guide the creation of high-quality educational content — videos, sample notebooks, datasets, tutorials, courseware, and blog posts — that meets a high technical bar.
• Expand and nurture these communities by growing meetups and user groups and supporting practitioners in online communities, mailing lists, and issue trackers.
• Represent the community inside R&D, turning contributor friction into a documented, prioritized roadmap change.
• Apply AI-assisted workflows to increase your team's leverage while maintaining technical depth and originality.
• Define and defend meaningful success metrics for an open source DevRel team, and be able to explain them to executives.

What we look for

• 8+ years of combined experience in developer relations or developer advocacy and in a hands-on technical role — software engineer, data engineer, solutions architect, or similar.
• 2+ years managing and growing a developer relations team, including hiring, leveling, and promoting advocates.
• You have done the work yourself. You've written the posts, built the demos, given the talks, filed the issues, and sat in the forums — and you can still do all of it.
• A substantial, verifiable open source track record: sustained contribution, and experience with project governance, release processes, and community norms.
• Established relationships within the Apache Software Foundation and Linux Foundation ecosystems, and a clear understanding of how to engage them well.
• Deep knowledge of the Open Lakehouse stack — Apache Spark™, Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, Apache Iceberg™, and MLflow — and a working understanding of the agentic open source landscape, including Omnigent.
• Subject matter knowledge of solving data engineering, data science, or data analytics problems at scale.
• A genuine passion for growing people and building strong teams.
• Active participation and recognized leadership in open source community forums, chats, and meetups.
• Proven track record in nurturing developer communities, organizing user groups, and facilitating global meetups.
• Exceptional communication skills, with a talent for articulating complex concepts through writing, teaching, video, and public speaking.
• Experience using AI to scale a team's output without lowering the technical bar.
• Adept at collaborating with cross-functional stakeholders to align community initiatives with product objectives.