Backend Engineer, GitLab Delivery - Operate

Position Overview

GitLab is an open-core software company that develops the most comprehensive AI-powered DevSecOps Platform, used by more than 100,000 organizations. Our mission is to enable everyone to contribute to and co-create the software that powers our world. When everyone can contribute, consumers become contributors, significantly accelerating human progress. Our platform unites teams and organizations, breaking down barriers and redefining what's possible in software development. Thanks to products like Duo Enterprise and Duo Agent Platform, customers get AI benefits at every stage of the SDLC.

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 values and continuous knowledge exchange, enabling our team members to reach their full potential while collaborating with industry leaders to solve complex problems. Co-create the future with us as we build technology that transforms how the world develops software.

As a Backend Engineer within the GitLab Operate team, your work will focus on delivering and supporting GitLab for self-managed customers. This role centers on the infrastructure, tooling, and automation that power GitLab deployments via Omnibus, GitLab Helm Charts, the GitLab Environment Toolkit (GET), and the GitLab Operator.

The GitLab Operate team serves as a critical bridge between GitLab engineering and our self-managed customers, ensuring our products are easily deployable, secure, and scalable across a range of environments. You’ll work on production-grade tooling and collaborate with engineering teams to ensure GitLab’s features are consistently delivered and operable across supported platforms.

Interesting links about the team and role:

• Our primary projects
• Our work with the community
• Our Demo videos

Responsibilities

• Omnibus GitLab: Maintain and evolve the GitLab Omnibus package to ensure it reliably integrates all GitLab components and can be deployed in self-managed environments.
• Kubernetes Charts: Contribute to the development and maintenance of GitLab Helm Charts, enabling scalable and production-ready GitLab deployments on Kubernetes.
• GitLab Environment Toolkit (GET): Enhance and support the toolkit used to deploy validated GitLab reference architectures for enterprise and internal use cases.
• GitLab Operator: Support the GitLab Operator project to enable Kubernetes-native lifecycle management for GitLab deployments.
• Installation and Upgrade Experience: Ensure a consistent and reliable experience for installing, upgrading, and operating GitLab across all supported platforms.
• Security Collaboration: Partner with Security to address vulnerabilities in the deployment stack and ensure secure defaults and configurations.
• Automation & CI/CD: Build and maintain automation pipelines for validating and testing deployment tools across Omnibus, Charts, GET, and the Operator.
• Cross-Team Integration: Work closely with Distribution Engineers, SREs, Release Managers, and Development teams to ensure smooth integration of new features into our deployment methods.
• Documentation & Enablement: Create and maintain user-focused documentation that enables self-managed customers to confidently deploy and operate GitLab.
• Reliability: Ensure all supported deployment methods are well-tested and meet GitLab’s standards for quality, reliability, and performance.

Requirements

• Production experience working with Kubernetes and Helm
• Professional proficiency in Ruby, Go, and strong Bash scripting skills
• Experience with Terraform and infrastructure as code workflows
• Practical experience working with databases, especially PostgreSQL