We are a global team of innovators and pioneers dedicated to shaping the future of observability. At New Relic, we build an intelligent platform that empowers companies to thrive in an AI-first world by giving them unparalleled insight into their complex systems. As we continue to expand our global footprint, we're looking for passionate people to join our mission. If you're ready to help the world's best companies optimize their digital applications, we invite you to explore a career with us!

Engineering Manager, Kubernetes Observability

We are looking for an experienced Engineering Manager with an eagerness for technology, people, project delivery, and process optimization to lead our Kubernetes Observability team.

At New Relic, we love making software that improves the lives of people who make software. The Infrastructure product organization drives New Relic’s customer-facing monitoring experiences, and the Kubernetes ecosystem is at the absolute center of this mission.

In this role, your team develops and maintains the critical Kubernetes integrations that give our customers full, real-time observability into the health and performance of their K8s environments. You will lead a high-performing team of engineers building Go/Python data collectors, highly scalable backend services, intuitive UI dashboards, and AI-driven K8s SRE Agents that autonomously detect and diagnose complex cluster anomalies.

If you have a strong technical background in distributed systems and container orchestration, paired with exceptional mentoring skills and a passion for open-source and AI innovation, we would love to hear from you.

What You'll Do

Lead and Grow: Manage, coach, and mentor a committed group of Go and Python engineers, fostering an inclusive culture where they can grow their professional abilities and share code ownership.

Support K8s agent for multiple versions of K8s, Openshift, Rancher, Windows, OKE

Drive Technical Strategy: Guide architectural decision-making around Kubernetes integrations, OpenTelemetry (OTel) semantic conventions.
Deliver E2E Value: Ensure the successful planning and execution of software projects, from the low-level instrumentation agents and Helm charts to the backend services and frontend UI components.
Collaborate Cross-Functionally: Partner closely with Product Managers, Designers, and other engineering teams to align on product goals and deliver high-quality software at a regular cadence.
Champion Operational Excellence: Implement DevOps methodologies where the team builds, maintains, and supports its own software, including managing second-layer support rotations and incident response.
Open Source Advocacy: Encourage and support team contributions to the Open Source community to solve sophisticated problems and build New Relic's engineering reputation.

This Role Requires

Engineering Experience: 8+ years of overall software engineering experience, with a strong background in large-scale distributed systems and high-cardinality data processing.

Leadership Track Record: 2+ years of experience directly managing and scaling engineering teams in a fast-paced, agile environment.

Domain Expertise: Deep understanding of Kubernetes architectures and familiarity with scaling applications in complex, multi-cloud containerized environments (EKS, AKS, GKE).

Technical Fluency: Hands-on background with Go and/or Python, Linux systems, and API development.

Customer & Incident Focus: Proven experience handling customer incidents, diving deep into technical implications, and mitigating risks in production environments.

Problem Solving: Strong analytical skills with an autonomous, creative approach to overcoming technical blockers.

Bonus Points if You Have

AI/Agent Experience: Background in building or managing AI workflows, LLM orchestration, or Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers.
Observability Standards: Deep experience with OpenTelemetry, Prometheus, eBPF, or similar telemetry frameworks.
K8s Tooling: Experience developing Helm charts, Kubernetes Operators, or working with different Unix OSes and Windows nodes.
OSS Contributions: Upstream contributions to relevant Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) or open-source infrastructure projects.

Fostering a diverse, welcoming and inclusive environment is important to us. We work hard to make everyone feel comfortable bringing their best, most authentic selves to work every day. We celebrate our talented Relics’ different backgrounds and abilities, and recognize the different paths they took to reach us – including nontraditional ones. Their experiences and perspectives inspire us to make our products and company the best they can be. We’re looking for people who feel connected to our mission and values, not just candidates who check off all the boxes.

If you require a reasonable accommodation to complete any part of the application or recruiting process, please reach out to resume@newrelic.com.

We believe in empowering all Relics to achieve professional and business success through a flexible workforce model. This model allows us to work in a variety of workplaces that best support our success, including fully office-based, fully remote, or hybrid.

Our hiring process

In compliance with applicable law, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work and to complete employment eligibility verification. Note: Our stewardship of the data of thousands of customers means that a criminal background check is required to join New Relic.

We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records based on individual circumstances and in accordance with applicable law including, but not limited to, the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance.

Headhunters and recruitment agencies may not submit resumes/CVs through this website or directly to managers. New Relic does not accept unsolicited headhunter and agency resumes, and will not pay fees to any third-party agency or company that does not have a signed agreement with New Relic.

New Relic develops and distributes encryption software and technology that complies with U.S. export controls and licensing requirements. Certain New Relic roles require candidates to pass an export compliance assessment as a condition of employment in any global location. If relevant, we will provide more information later in the application process.

Candidates are evaluated based on qualifications, regardless of race, religion, ethnicity, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender expression or identity, age, disability, neurodiversity, veteran or marital status, political viewpoint, or other legally protected characteristics.

Review our Applicant Privacy Notice at https://newrelic.com/termsandconditions/applicant-privacy-policy

Manager- Software Engineering

Job Description

Engineering Manager, Kubernetes Observability

This Role Requires

Bonus Points if You Have