Engineering Director

We are hiring an Engineering Director, who will take ownership of the development and operations of internal software products serving Canonical’s business and a popular security solution Livepatch. A successful candidate has a track record of delivering full‑stack software services, adheres to high engineering quality standards, and continuously develops their skills as well as the skills of their direct reports. The opportunity involves working with highly enthusiastic people and innovative engineering solutions supporting Canonical’s growth and learning about engineering for the business.

Commercial Systems unit

The Engineering Director will lead the Commercial Systems unit, which consists of three engineering teams closely collaborating with other engineering and business teams at Canonical. Services designed, developed, and operated by the Commercial Systems unit are at the heart of Canonical business. We look for a software engineering director to oversee the three software teams led by software engineering managers.

Billing team

The Billing team designs, develops, and operates a Golang service that provides a standardized and scalable capability to turn metrics into billable amounts, enable customers to see their current spend with Canonical at any time, and ensure accurate, reliable, and timely billing. The service further integrates with other engineering, business, and payment systems.

Contracts team

The Contracts team designs, develops, and operates a Golang service that will become the single source of truth for all contracts with all customers. The service provides a standardized CPQ capability and stores signed contracts in a structured format. The service further integrates with other engineering and business systems including a CRM system and an accounting system.

Livepatch team

The Livepatch team designs and develops a service for the delivery of Linux kernel patches to shrink the exploit window for critical and high severity Linux kernel vulnerabilities, by patching the Linux kernel between security maintenance windows, while the system runs. The engineering team behind this product develops Golang based client and backend components, while another Canonical team, the Kernel team, develops the security patches.

Location

This role will be based remotely in the EMEA region.

Role responsibilities

• Lead multiple teams of engineers, ranging from graduates to seniors
• Develop engineering managers to maintain Canonical culture in their teams
• Develop and evangelise great engineering practices and processes in the teams
• Set and implement solid performance management with performance goals and objectives with your direct reports and teams
• Identify and measure indicators of team health, and take action where needed
• Be accountable for the product development roadmaps in the teams
• Be an active part of the Commercial Systems leadership team, collaborating with other leaders
• Expand your teams by hiring great talent
• Collaborate with stakeholders and product users

Qualifications

• Exceptional academic track record from both high school and university
• Undergraduate degree in a technical subject or a compelling narrative about your alternative chosen path
• Proven ability to drive multiple teams or large teams of software engineers to deliver outstanding results
• Engineering experience in at least one of the following areas: Golang, Python, Java, or distributed integrations
• Track record of going above-and-beyond expectations to achieve outstanding results
• Professional written and spoken English with excellent presentation skills
• Result‑oriented, with a personal drive to meet commitmentsAbility to travel internationally twice a year, for company events up to two weeks long

Nice‑to‑have skills

• Performance engineering and DevOps/SRE experience
• Experience with accounting, sales, sales operations, or other business roles

Benefits

• Distributed work environment with twice‑yearly team sprints in person
• Personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year
• Annual compensation review
• Recognition rewards
• Annual holiday leave
• Maternity and paternity leave
• Employee Assistance Program
• Opportunity to travel to new locations to meet colleagues
• Priority Pass, and travel upgrades for long haul company events

Canonical is an equal‑opportunity employer

We are proud to foster a workplace free from discrimination. Diversity of experience, perspectives, and background create a better work environment and better products. Whatever your identity, we will give your application fair consideration.