Confluent - Principal Engineer

Your Role and Responsibilities: To realize Confluent's enormous potential, we are looking for a Principal Engineer to join our Traffic team which is responsible for building and managing the networking fabric of Confluent Cloud. Cloud networking is a strategic investment area for Confluent with the potential to impact the company's top and bottom line. The network platform powers both customer connectivity as well as internal connectivity spanning thousands of Kubernetes clusters across all regions in AWS, Azure, and GCP. We are looking for someone with an interest in building large-scale distributed systems, with a focus on building and managing network data planes for containerized workloads in the cloud. The ideal candidate would be passionate about network data plane performance, scale, cost optimizations, and building robust software.

What you will do: Build the software underpinning the mission-critical Confluent Cloud network data plane platform. You will play a crucial role in architecting, designing, developing and operationalizing high performance, scalable, reliable and resilient systems. Deliver high impact to the business by driving important technical initiatives in areas comprising (but not limited to) networking, cloud infrastructure, and multi-tenancy. Independently drive architecture, roadmap, execution of software projects as well as technically lead a team of engineers to deliver impact in production with a focus on quality. Engage with product and cloud providers to innovate and solve business problems using technical input. Build upon open source software and engage with the upstream community to deliver business impact. Troubleshoot issues and improve ops for complex technical stack that spans all the 3 clouds and includes microservices, containers, and virtualization. This job can be performed from anywhere in the US Required Skills Required Professional and Technical Expertise 12+ years of relevant cloud infrastructure/cloud networking experience Strong fundamentals in distributed systems design and development Experience driving vision and technical roadmap as an architect in a large sized platforms or infrastructure team Experience building and operating large-scale systems Experience leading a team of engineers and working cross-team to deliver complex infrastructure projects Solid understanding of basic systems operations (storage, network, operating systems, etc.)Proficiency in C++, Go, Python, or other statically typed languages Experience/knowledge with public clouds (AWS, Azure, or GCP) Experience building and managing Layer 7 proxies, especially cloud-native proxies such as Envoy Preferred Skills Preferred Professional and Technical Expertise Open source contributions to CNCF projects Experience with Kubernetes Networking Strong networking background combined with your software engineering experience Education in computer science or a related field, or equivalent work experience Required Education Bachelor's Degree Preferred Education Master's Degree Additional Details (US) IBM offers a competitive and comprehensive benefits program. Eligible employees may have access to: - Healthcare benefits including medical & prescription drug coverage, dental, vision, and mental health & well being - Financial programs such as 401(k), cash balance pension plan, the IBM Employee Stock Purchase Plan, financial counseling, life insurance, short & long- term disability coverage, and opportunities for performance based salary incentive programs - Generous paid time off including 12 holidays, minimum 56 hours sick time, 120 hours vacation, 12 weeks parental bonding leave in accordance with IBM Policy, and other Paid Care Leave programs. IBM also offers paid family leave benefits to eligible employees where required by applicable law - Training and educational resources on our personalized, AI-driven learning platform where IBMers can grow skills and obtain industry-recognized certifications to achieve their career goals - Diverse and inclusive employee resource groups, giving & volunteer opportunities, and discounts on retail products, services & experiences We consider qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable law. This position was posted on the date cited in the key job details section and is anticipated to remain posted for 21 days from this date or less if not needed to fill the role. Compensation, Benefits and Work Authorization The compensation range and benefits for this position are based on a full-time schedule for a full calendar year. The salary will vary depending on your job-related skills, experience and location. Pay increment and frequency of pay will be in accordance with employment classification and applicable laws. For part time roles, your compensation and benefits will be adjusted to reflect your hours. Benefits may be pro-rated for those who start working during the calendar year.