Senior Staff Data Engineer

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.

We are the now and the next. The power behind the people building the future. We are born from the spirit of innovation. We are created from the idea that people around the world want more, need more, deserve more. We are the home of the global digital revolution. We are CNN.

To see what it’s like to work at CNN, follow @WBDLife on Instagram and X!

About the Team:

With deep domain expertise, advanced technical capabilities, and a proven track record of
successful collaborations, the AI Enablement & Machine Learning team at CNN is
accelerating our digital transformation through strategic applications of machine learning
and AI technologies. Our current products include popular, related and personalized
content recommendations, contextual ad targeting, and site search-serving millions of
CNN users via CNN web and mobile apps. Within the next quarter, we will be launching
summarization and classification features with chat to follow early next year.
We have a variety of specializations and collaborate closely, enhancing our platform and
adding to the suite of machine learning features running on it.
• Machine learning engineers (MLEs) build models and features
• Data engineers fulfill the availability and latency requirements provided by MLEs
• Some software engineers partner with MLEs to operationalize and expose models
and features
• Other software engineers focus on our ML platform and tooling, including A/B
testing
Here are some of the key challenges the team will tackle in next couple of quarters:
• Content Summaries: Support testing and adoption of various types of content
summaries from multiple domains, which can be leveraged in consumer
experiences along with embedding generation and classification.
• Two-Tower Experimentation: Explore options for incorporating additional user
context in our personalized recommendations model such as geolocation, time of
day and time of year
• All Access Search: Partner with teams across CNN to design and build a roadmap
for CNN streaming content search.
• Bandit Foundation: Enhance data access and begin experimenting with bandits for
online ranking of recommendations
• Optimize Site Performance: Dynamically deliver personalized content alongside
cached assets, improving load times and enhancing user experience with features
like page-level deduplication
 About the Job
As a Senior Staff Data Engineer, you will work across teams to design, build and operate
the data foundations that power ML training, feature computation and real-time inference
for our Machine Learning team.
You will partner with ML engineers, platform engineers and product teams to discover data
needs, build reliable data pipelines and deliver high-quality data products that empower
and accelerate the team.
What you’ll do
• Design and own data pipelines and products that support ML training, feature
storage and inference.
• Model datasets and schemas optimized for ML features and real time (low latency)
inference.
• Establish data quality, testing, and observability.
• Collaborate with stakeholders to translate requirements into durable data products
and interfaces.
• Set engineering standards, review designs/code, mentor engineers, and lead cross-
team initiatives.
The Essentials
• 10 years building production data solutions. Strong SQL and data modeling.
• Expertise in modern data tools (Kafka, Airflow, Spark, etc.)
• Expertise with distributed systems and a strong understanding of the way data is
modeled impacts what is possible
• Proficiency in several programming languages
• Passion for data quality and reliability; comfort owning systems end-to-end in a
fast-moving environment.
• Comfortable working cross functionally.
• Experience with streaming and event-driven systems
 The Nice to Haves
• Proficiency in Go and/or Python.
• Experience with Snowflake, DynamoDB and Open Search.
• Cloud infrastructure & IaC experience, especially AWS & Terraform.
• ML platform tooling familiarity (eg. Metaflow, SageMaker)
• Experience with Experimentation and A/B Testing

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.

In compliance with local law, we are disclosing the compensation, or a range thereof, for roles in locations where legally required. Actual salaries will vary based on several factors, including but not limited to external market data, internal equity, location, skill set, experience, and/or performance. Base pay is just one component of Warner Bros. Discovery’s total compensation package for employees. Pay Range: $128,100.00 - $237,900.00 salary per year. Other rewards may include annual bonuses, short- and long-term incentives, and program-specific awards. In addition, Warner Bros. Discovery provides a variety of benefits to employees, including health insurance coverage, an employee wellness program, life and disability insurance, a retirement savings plan, paid holidays and sick time and vacation.