Staff Software Engineer (Cloud, Kubernetes)

About the role

Software Development: Write clean, maintainable, and efficient code for various software applications and systems.
Technical Strategy: Drive the technical strategy and vision for major projects and initiatives, ensuring alignment with business goals and industry best practices.
Leadership: Lead cross-functional teams to design, develop, and deliver high-impact software projects on time and within budget. Coordinate activities and tasks of other team members, working independently and needing guidance only in the most complex situations.
Architectural Excellence: Architect, design, and develop complex software systems and applications, ensuring high standards of performance, scalability, and reliability. Collaborate with architects on mid-level and high-level design.

Responsibilities

• Develop, enhance, and maintain tools, frameworks, and service infrastructure that support DevOps pipeline automation for various UKG products.
• Collaborate with Product Management, Architects and internal engineering teams to understand requirements, implement solutions, identify issues, and propose improvements.
• Work as a Leader, Developer, and Developer Advocate, working closely with product development teams to enable mature and evolve our Kubernetes and container platforms.
• Oversee CI/CD pipelines, ensuring efficient build, test, and deployment phases.
• Build testable software, define tests, participate in the testing process, automate tests using tools (e.g., JUnit, Selenium) and design patterns leveraging the test automation pyramid as the guide.
• Conduct comprehensive code reviews, providing constructive feedback and ensuring adherence to best practices.
• Mentor junior engineers on taking ownership of the full lifecycle of services and features.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related technical field.
• 7+ years of DevOps and software engineering experience.
• Deep expertise in one or more programming languages such as Python, Java, C#, .NET, or JavaScript.
• Extensive experience with GitHub Actions, leveraging Terraform and Ansible to create CI/CD pipeline automation frameworks and container-based deployments.
• Deep experience working with Kubernetes, Docker, and public cloud deployment platforms.
• Extensive experience with software architecture and design patterns, including the ability to design and implement scalable, reliable systems in a DevOps model.
• Proven track record of leading and delivering large-scale, complex software projects.
• Proficiency with cloud technologies like Azure, AWS, GCP, and version control systems like GitHub.
• Strong problem-solving skills and attention to detail, with a commitment to delivering high-quality software solutions.
• Proficiency in building telemetry or observability as part of the development process.
• Strong leadership, communication, and interpersonal skills, with the ability to influence and drive technical decisions across the organization.
• Deep understanding of Kubernetes operators, networking primitives, including Services, Ingress, Gateway API, and service mesh architectures (e.g., Istio, Linkerd), with hands-on experience operating them at scale.
• Strong expertise in DNS architecture and operations, including traffic management, split-horizon DNS, failover strategies, and performance optimization in large-scale distributed systems.
• Experience with API gateway and edge routing technologies (e.g., NGINX, Envoy, Kong, or cloud-native equivalents), including authentication, rate limiting, and policy enforcement.
• Hands-on experience with TLS/mTLS, certificate lifecycle management, and secure service-to-service communication in a Kubernetes or microservices environment.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree or PhD in Computer Science or a related technical field.
• Experience with GitHub Actions, Terraform, Ansible and Kubernetes.
• Familiarity with developing accessible technologies.
• Dedicated to diversity and inclusion initiatives.
• Recognized as an expert in their technical area.
• Understanding of internal and external business challenges and regulatory factors.

Skills

• Expertise in cloud technologies like Azure, AWS, GCP.
• Experience with Kubernetes, Docker, and public cloud deployment platforms.
• Hands-on experience with TLS/mTLS, certificate lifecycle management, and secure service-to-service communication in a Kubernetes or microservices environment.
• Experience with API gateway and edge routing technologies (e.g., NGINX, Envoy, Kong).
• Experience with GitHub Actions, Terraform, Ansible.
• Experience with Git and version control systems.
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines, including build, test, and deployment phases.
• Experience with testing frameworks like JUnit, Selenium.
• Experience with software architecture and design patterns.
• Experience with DevOps practices and methodologies.
• Experience with cloud-native technologies and microservices.

Benefits

UKG is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, disability, religion, sex, age, national origin, veteran status, genetic information, and other legally protected categories. View The EEO Know Your Rights poster UKG participates in E-Verify. View the E-Verify posters here. It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability. Disability Accommodation in the Application and Interview Process For individuals with disabilities that need additional assistance at any point in the application and interview process, please email UKGCareers@ukg.com. The pay range for this position is $129,500 to $186,100. The actual base pay offered may vary depending on skills, experience, job-related knowledge and work location. In addition to base pay, employees may be eligible to participate in a performance-based bonus plan and to receive restricted stock unit awards as part of total compensation. Learn more about UKG’s benefits and rewards at https://www.ukg.com/about-us/careers/benefits