Jakov Friedman is Wallester’s Head of Product Engineering, which means he’s responsible for delivery, people, and process across five teams and around 30 engineers. He joined Wallester in 2025 as an Engineering Team Lead and was promoted to his current role in early 2026.
He brings more than twenty years of experience in IT, including close to a decade leading agile transformations across telecom, security software, and fintech, at companies such as Onoff Telecom, Riverty, and Symantec.
In this interview, Jakov talks about what it takes to lead a large engineering organisation, how he turns engineers into managers, and what shipping reliably looks like at a fast-growing fintech.
Interviewer: You’re Head of Product Engineering at Wallester. For someone outside the tech world, what does that role cover day to day?
Jakov: I work with five engineering teams, around 30 people. My job is to help them understand what we need to achieve and make sure they have what they need to get there.
A typical day might involve discussing priorities with product colleagues, helping a team lead work through a difficult situation, or figuring out why something is stuck. There’s quite a lot of connecting people and making decisions together.
I want the teams to feel confident about what they’re doing, and I want the rest of the business to have a realistic picture of what we can deliver.
Interviewer: “Product engineering” is one of those terms that can mean different things. How is it different from just “engineering,” and what does your part of Wallester build?
Jakov: The word “product” puts extra emphasis on understanding who we’re building something for and what they need from it. You can build something technically impressive, but you still need to ask whether it makes someone’s life easier.
Our teams work on backend functionality, integrations, and mobile applications. So, when a business issues a card, manages its spending, or checks a transaction, several teams may have contributed to that experience.
My part is helping those teams work together and understand how their individual pieces fit into the product people actually use.
Interviewer: You went from Engineering Team Lead to Head of Product Engineering in under a year. What changed in the job when you stepped up?
Jakov: The biggest change was how much I needed to step back. As a team lead, you’re close to the everyday work. You know the people, the details, and usually where the problems are.
When you’re responsible for several teams, you can’t stay involved in everything to the same degree. You have to trust your team leads and give them space to make decisions, while still being available when they need support.
I also started thinking much more about what happens between teams. Each team might be doing good work, but you still need to make sure everyone is moving in the same direction.
Interviewer: Much of your background is as a Scrum Master and Agile coach, roles people hear about without always knowing what they involve. In plain terms, what does that work do for a team?
Jakov: You help people work better together. You pay attention to where things get stuck, listen to what the team is struggling with, and help them find a practical way to improve it.
Sometimes it’s something quite small. In our mobile teams, for example, people raised concerns about how we handled messages and requests. We agreed on a simple way to show what was urgent and what could wait.
That’s a good example of how I approach it. Start with something people are actually finding difficult, agree on a change, and see whether it helps. Common sense matters a lot.
Interviewer: A theme that runs through your career is turning engineers into managers. Why is that transition so hard, and how do you help people through it?
Jakov: You’ve become good at one job, and then suddenly you’re doing a very different one. As an engineer, you can finish something and see the result. In management, you might spend a day having conversations and wonder what you actually achieved.
But those conversations can be exactly what someone needed to move forward. It takes time to recognise that as a contribution.
I try to help people through real situations: a difficult conversation, a decision they’re unsure about, or something they’re struggling to delegate. We talk it through, they try an approach, and we come back to what happened. Nobody becomes comfortable with all of that overnight.
Interviewer: You talk a lot about predictable delivery. Why does predictability matter so much in engineering, and how do you build it?
Jakov: When we give a date, someone else usually makes a plan around it. That might be a product launch, a customer conversation, or work another team needs to do. So our commitments affect quite a few people.
For me, it starts with being honest about the work and the capacity we have. Do we understand the scope? Are we waiting on another team? Have we included the time needed to check everything properly?
Then you keep talking as things change. If a date is at risk, raise it early. It gives people a chance to adjust, and over time it builds trust.
Interviewer: You’ve worked in telecom, security software, and now a card-issuing fintech. What’s different about building engineering for a company that issues payment cards?
Jakov: You’re very aware that people rely on the product to run their businesses. If a card doesn’t work or a transaction behaves unexpectedly, there’s someone on the other end who needs to get something done.
That keeps reliability and quality very close to every conversation. You have to think about how a change behaves in real situations, including when something goes wrong.
It also brings you into close contact with operations, product, and compliance colleagues. They see things from different angles, and you need that understanding to build something customers can depend on.
Interviewer: You’ve led teams across countries and remotely, between Germany and Estonia, for example. What did that teach you about running a team well?
Jakov: You have to be deliberate about sharing context. It’s easy to assume everyone knows why a decision was made, especially if you’ve just discussed it with the people sitting next to you. Someone in another office may have missed that conversation completely.
So clear updates and written decisions matter. But you also need to get to know people.
When we were setting up the team in Riga, I went there to meet everyone and help establish how we would work together. Spending time with people makes everyday conversations afterwards much easier. You know the person behind the message.
Interviewer: What’s the hardest part of being accountable for thirty engineers?
Jakov: Making sure you stay connected to people as the organisation grows. Everyone has different strengths, ambitions, and things they find difficult. It’s easy for those differences to disappear when you’re only looking at plans and status updates.
I rely on the team leads, and I also want people to have opportunities to give honest feedback about how we’re doing as leaders.
That’s one reason I’ve put effort into feedback rounds and technical meetups. You learn a lot when people have the chance to speak openly or share something they care about. It helps you understand what’s happening beyond the immediate delivery work.
Interviewer: You’ve been in IT for twenty plus years. How has the job of engineering leadership changed over that time, especially now with AI moving so fast?
Jakov: There’s always something new to learn, but AI has made that especially noticeable. Teams are trying different tools and approaches, and part of my job is helping them make sense of what’s useful.
We already use AI for things like coding, tests, documentation, and understanding unfamiliar parts of the code. We’re also working on shared guidance so people can learn from each other’s experience.
I’m interested in what happens after the first result appears. Does it work? Has it been checked? How much needs to be redone? Those questions matter when you’re deciding whether an approach is helping. The tools can do more, but we still have to take responsibility for what we deliver.
Interviewer: What’s your advice for an engineer about to step into their first leadership role?
Jakov: Spend time listening. Get to know the people in your team and ask what makes their work difficult. You’ll probably find something useful to improve quite quickly.
You don’t need to arrive with an answer to everything. It’s perfectly fine to say, “I’m still learning how this works.” People can usually tell anyway, and being open about it makes the conversation easier.
Also, give yourself a bit of time. The role can feel strange at first, especially when you’re used to measuring your day by what you’ve personally finished. You’re learning a new job.
Interviewer: Outside of work, what do you spend your time on?
Jakov: I have three kids, so they keep me pretty busy! They’re a big source of inspiration too. You think you’re the one teaching them, but you end up learning so much from them yourself.
I also love travelling. I enjoy seeing new places, exploring a bit, and having a break from the usual routine.
