Senior Backend Engineer, Gitlab Delivery: Runway (Platform Engineering) at GitLab

<div class="content-intro"><p>GitLab is the intelligent orchestration platform for DevSecOps. GitLab enables organizations to increase developer productivity, improve operational efficiency, reduce security and compliance risk, and accelerate digital transformation. More than 50 million registered users and more than 50% of the Fortune 100* trust GitLab to ship better, more secure software faster.</p> <p>The same principles built into our products are reflected in how our team works: we embrace AI as a core productivity multiplier, with all team members expected to incorporate AI into their daily workflows to drive efficiency, innovation, and impact. GitLab is where careers accelerate, innovation flourishes, and every voice is valued. Our high-performance culture is driven by our <a href="https://handbook.gitlab.com/handbook/values/">values</a> and continuous knowledge exchange, enabling our team members to reach their full potential while collaborating with industry leaders to solve complex problems. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuZIb5zszQI">Co-create the future with us</a> as we build technology that transforms how the world develops software.</p> <p>*<em>Fortune 500® is a registered trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, used under license. Claim based on GitLab data. Fortune 100 refers to the top 20% ranked companies in the 2025 Fortune 500 list, published in June 2025. Fortune and Fortune Media IP Limited are not affiliated with, and do not endorse products or services of GitLab.</em></p></div><h2>An overview of this role</h2> <p>As a Senior Engineer on the Runway team, you'll lead the design, evolution, and operation of the Kubernetes-based platform and developer tooling that powers GitLab's engineering organization. You'll drive strategic infrastructure initiatives across platform architecture, automation, and developer experience. That includes operating production Kubernetes clusters across cloud environments, scaling our ArgoCD-based GitOps workflows, and setting infrastructure-as-code practices and standards across teams. You'll mentor engineers, influence architectural decisions, and drive platform improvements that enhance reliability, observability, and security controls like RBAC and secrets management. Your work will establish clear patterns that make it easier for application teams to adopt modern practices and ship with confidence.</p> <p>Some examples of our projects:</p> <ul> <li value="1">Evolve ArgoCD GitOps standards across environments (Application Sets, sync policies, and deployment guardrails)</li> <li value="2">Build reusable Terraform modules and practices for safe, repeatable cloud infrastructure provisioning and drift detection</li> </ul> <h2>What you'll do</h2> <ul> <li value="1">Manage and evolve production-grade Kubernetes clusters across cloud environments, contributing to architectural decisions on upgrades, scaling, disaster recovery, and reliability improvements.</li> <li value="1">Implement and maintain GitOps workflows using ArgoCD, including Application Sets, sync policies, and deployment standards, and share best practices with teams adopting these patterns.</li> <li value="1">Build and maintain reusable Terraform modules that enable safe, repeatable cloud infrastructure provisioning, including state management and drift detection practices.</li> <li value="1">Lead incident response, drive post-mortems to clear conclusions, and implement improvements to availability, performance, and resilience as part of on-call rotation.</li> <li value="1">Partner with application teams to onboard services onto the platform, writing documentation, runbooks, and self-service tooling that improves developer productivity.</li> <li value="1">Implement security controls such as RBAC, network policies, and secrets management that meet compliance requirements.</li> <li value="1">Contribute to CI pipeline integrations as part of end-to-end delivery workflows.</li> </ul> <h2>What you'll bring</h2> <ul> <li class="whitespace-normal break-words pl-2">Proficiency in Go for writing and maintaining production-grade services and automation tooling, with the ability to guide others on best practices and code quality. Python or Bash experience is a plus.</li> <li class="whitespace-normal break-words pl-2">Hands-on experience owning production Kubernetes clusters across one or more cloud environments (for example, Amazon EKS, Google GKE, or Azure AKS), including upgrades, scaling, disaster recovery, and reliability engineering.</li> <li class="whitespace-normal break-words pl-2">Experience designing and operating GitOps-based continuous delivery workflows (for example, ArgoCD or Flux) and infrastructure as code (Terraform or equivalent), including reusable modules and safe infrastructure provisioning practices.</li> <li class="whitespace-normal break-words pl-2">Solid understanding of networking fundamentals (DNS, load balancing, ingress) and the ability to reason through failure modes and design tradeoffs, not just apply familiar patterns.</li> <li class="whitespace-normal break-words pl-2">Ability to deliver well-structured, independently driven work, including clear documentation of decisions, tradeoffs, and future considerations, in support of a team that operates asynchronously across time zones.</li> <li class="whitespace-normal break-words pl-2">Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to write system documentation, establish runbooks, and share knowledge in ways that help the broader team move faster and get unblocked quickly.</li> </ul> <h2>About the team</h2> <p>The Runway team builds and operates the Kubernetes-based platform and developer tooling that GitLab engineers use to ship changes safely and reliably. We own core platform capabilities like production cluster lifecycle management, GitOps-based delivery workflows (ArgoCD), infrastructure as code foundations (Terraform modules and standards), and the reliability and observability practices that keep the platform healthy. We collaborate asynchronously with application and security partners to onboard services, improve self-service workflows, and strengthen controls like RBAC, network policies, and secrets management. The team's focus is reducing friction for developers while improving consistency, security, and operational confidence as the platform scales. For more on how this team works, see the <a class="textLink" href="INSERT_URL_HERE">Team Handbook Page</a>.</p><div class="content-conclusion"><h4><strong>How GitLab Supports Full-Time Employees</strong></h4> <ul> <li><a href="https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/total-rewards/benefits/general-and-entity-benefits/">Benefits to support your health, finances, and well-being</a></li> <li><a href="https://handbook.gitlab.com/handbook/people-group/time-off-and-absence/time-off-types/#flexible-paid-time-off-pto">Flexible Paid Time Off </a></li> <li><a href="https://handbook.gitlab.com/handbook/company/culture/inclusion/tmrg-tmag/">Team Member Resource Groups</a></li> <li><a href="https://handbook.gitlab.com/handbook/total-rewards/stock-options/">Equity Compensation & Employee Stock Purchase Plan</a></li> <li><a href="https://handbook.gitlab.com/handbook/people-group/learning-and-development/growth-and-development/">Growth and Development Fund</a></li> <li><a href="https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/total-rewards/benefits/general-and-entity-benefits/#parental-leave">Parental Leave</a> </li> </ul> <p>Please note that we welcome interest from candidates with varying levels of experience; many successful candidates do not meet every single requirement. Additionally, studies have shown that people from <a href="https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/inclusion/#examples-of-select-underrepresented-groups">underrepresented groups</a> are less likely to apply to a job unless they meet every single qualification. If you're excited about this role, please apply and allow our recruiters t