Director, Technical Marketing

MKTQ427R50 As the Director of Technical Marketing at Databricks, you will lead and scale the team responsible for explaining Databricks products, and what you can do with them, at scale to technical buyers and practitioners (from data engineers, data scientists, and ML engineers to solutions architects, platform teams, security engineers, and application developers). You will own the strategy and execution of technical content in written and video form, demos, workshops, launch storytelling, and outbound evangelism that drives technical mindshare, consideration, product adoption, and ultimately pipeline. In the era of agentic marketing and AEO/GEO, your team will increasingly produce content designed to educate both humans and agents alike. You will also play an outsized role in programming the technical content for key Databricks events, such as the Data + AI Summit and Data + AI World Tour, among others. Reporting to the SVP of Product & Solutions Marketing, you will manage a team of 6+ Technical Marketing Managers (growing) and serve as the connective tissue between Product, Product Marketing, Field Engineering, and the broader technical community. This role expands the traditional TMM charter to include a stronger outbound evangelism dimension, becoming a visible, trusted technical voice externally through social media, YouTube, conferences, and the data practitioner ecosystem while continuing to own the core technical content engine that powers Summit, World Tour, workshops, and field enablement. The impact you will have: First 6 months: • Assess the current TMM team's strengths, gaps, and capacity; establish a clear operating model with defined ownership areas (product coverage, content types, GEO) and a quarterly planning cadence. • Own and deliver the technical content agenda for Data + AI World Tour and/or the next major Tier 1 event, achieving ≥4.5/5.0 average session ratings and measurable pipeline contribution. • Launch or significantly expand at least 2 new outbound evangelism motions (e.g., a YouTube series architecture, a technical social media cadence, or a creator/influencer engagement program) that grow Databricks' external technical reach by ≥25%. • Build an AI-powered publishing engine that enables the TMM team to scale content faster, leveraging AI assistance for content creation and publishing. • Establish yourself as a credible external technical voice, publishing 3+ original technical pieces (blogs, videos, or talks) and representing Databricks at 2+ external events or podcasts. First 12 months: • Scale the TMM team to meet growing demand across an expanding set of technical personas (solutions architects, platform engineers, security teams, data scientists, analysts, app developers) driven by the 2026+ product surface (Lakebase, Genie, Lakewatch, Agent Bricks, Omnigent). • Work with Databricks Field Engineering and FDE (Forward-Deployed Engineering) to capture repeatable product use cases into a Solutions Library, building a motion to scale capture and marketing of these use cases for learning across the entire community. • Build and operationalize a "1 launch → many assets" content engine that converts every major product launch into persona-specific learning journeys (demos, workshops, blogs, videos, social). • Grow Databricks' YouTube and social technical content reach by 2x, with a series-based content architecture targeting key personas at multiple depth levels. • Drive measurable contribution to AEO/GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) ensuring Databricks is cited by default in AI answer engines for key buyer questions. First 18–24 months: • Establish Databricks as the default place every technical practitioner learns data + AI, measured by YouTube subscriber growth (target: 300K+), technical content engagement, and Free Edition activation rates tied to content. • Build a formal Databricks Creators program that turns independent creator reach into co-owned, accurate, early-access content across new product areas. • Develop the TMM team into a recognized center of excellence — with clear career paths, a strong hiring bar, and a reputation as one of the best technical marketing teams in enterprise software. What we look for: • 10+ years of experience in technical marketing, developer relations, solutions engineering, field engineering, or a related technical field in enterprise software / SaaS / cloud. • 3+ years of people management experience, with a track record of hiring, developing, and retaining high-performing technical teams. • Deep technical fluency in data, AI/ML, and cloud platforms, comfortable building demos and engaging credibly with data engineers, data scientists, solutions architects, and other technical practitioners across the data + AI ecosystem. • Demonstrated outbound evangelism skills, including a visible external presence through conference speaking, technical blogging, YouTube/video content, or social media thought leadership. • Experience owning technical content strategy for major product launches and flagship events (e.g., user conferences, world tours). • Strong cross-functional influence with a proven ability to partner with Product Management, Product Marketing, Field Engineering, and Sales to align on priorities and deliver integrated GTM. • Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to translate complex technical concepts into compelling narratives for multiple audiences. Preferred: • Experience with data platforms, lakehouse architectures, Apache Spark, or related open-source data technologies. • Experience building or scaling a YouTube channel, podcast, or technical content program for practitioner audiences. • Familiarity with GEO / AI answer engine optimization strategies. • Experience with technical community building, creator programs, or influencer engagement across practitioner audiences. • Track record of building technical content that drives measurable pipeli