Welcome to Warner Bros. Discovery… the stuff dreams are made of.
Who We Are…
When we say, “the stuff dreams are made of,” we’re not just referring to the world of wizards, dragons and superheroes, or even to the wonders of Planet Earth. Behind WBD’s vast portfolio of iconic content and beloved brands, are the storytellers bringing our characters to life, the creators bringing them to your living rooms and the dreamers creating what’s next…
From brilliant creatives, to technology trailblazers, across the globe, WBD offers career defining opportunities, thoughtfully curated benefits, and the tools to explore and grow into your best selves. Here you are supported, here you are celebrated, here you can thrive.
CNN is seeking a Sr. Software Engineer to serve as the technical authority for CNN’s Data Platform — the foundation that powers analytics, data science, machine learning, and AI across CNN’s digital products. You will define and execute the platform’s data strategy, architect the systems that transform raw event data into business-ready intelligence and enable teams across CNN to build on a shared, reliable data ecosystem.
Your work powers audience analytics, personalization, and content recommendations for millions of users daily across CNN.com, the CNN mobile app, and connected TV experiences. You will drive architecture decisions, set engineering standards, and mentor other engineers on the team. If you thrive on owning complex systems end-to-end and care deeply about building reliable, secure infrastructure at scale — this is the role.
Set the architectural direction for CNN’s Data Platform — own data modeling, schema design, and platform capabilities that serve Analytics, Data Science, ML, and AI teams
Lead architecture, design, and implementation of CNN’s Data Platform for real-time data use cases
Mentor junior engineers through code reviews, design sessions, and technical guidance
Deliver scalable data pipelines for both real-time streaming and batch processing, from event collection through transformation to business-ready datasets
Drive best practices around security, performance, and reliability for data services
Contribute to technical roadmap planning and advocate for improvements to the data platform
Deliver high-quality, well-tested code - improve code, documentation, and operational runbooks with each iteration
Communicate designs, architectural decisions, and technical tradeoffs clearly to engineers and leaders at all levels — represent the data platform domain with autonomy
Evangelize and oversee implementation of data engineering best practices — your code, documentation, and operational standards are the model others follow
Required
5+ years of software engineering experience with deep expertise in data engineering, data platform architecture, and large-scale data systems
3+ years of experience with cloud technology (AWS, GCP, or Azure), including data-specific services (e.g., EMR, Glue, S3, Athena, Redshift)
Strong expertise in data processing frameworks (Spark, Flink, or equivalent) and orchestration tools (Airflow, Dagster, or equivalent)
Experience with data modeling, ETL architecture, and designing schemas that serve diverse analytical and ML use cases
Strong programming experience across at least two of Java, Go, Python, and SQL
Previous experience working with Snowflake, Databricks, or other modern enterprise data warehouses
Demonstrated experience leading technical direction and setting engineering standards across multiple teams — not just executing, but defining how teams build
Preferred
Experience working on end-to-end analytics pipelines from event collection to producing business-ready semantics
Deep familiarity with dbt or similar transformation frameworks
Experience with streaming and event-driven architectures (Kafka, Kinesis, Flink) at scale
Experience building or supporting AI/ML pipelines, feature stores, or model training infrastructure
Familiarity with data governance, data quality frameworks, and data cataloging tools
Experience in media, streaming, digital advertising, or consumer-facing products at scale
How We Get Things Done…
This last bit is probably the most important! Here at WBD, our guiding principles are the core values by which we operate and are central to how we get things done. You can find them at www.wbd.com/guiding-principles/ along with some insights from the team on what they mean and how they show up in their day to day. We hope they resonate with you and look forward to discussing them during your interview.
Championing Inclusion at WBD
Warner Bros. Discovery embraces the opportunity to build a workforce that reflects a wide array of perspectives, backgrounds and experiences. Being an equal opportunity employer means that we take seriously our responsibility to consider qualified candidates on the basis of merit, without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, mental or physical disability, and genetic information, marital status, citizenship status, military status, protected veteran status or any other category protected by law.If you’re a qualified candidate with a disability and you require adjustments or accommodations during the job application and/or recruitment process, please visit our accessibility page for instructions to submit your request.