ENGINEERING MANAGER - SRE

Xero; City of Brisbane; Hybrid; AUD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Xero is seeking an Engineering Manager for our Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) function in Australia. You will own the reliability programme, driving high availability and HA/DR testing, and lead incident management across APAC and EMEA.

You will mentor engineers, partner with platform teams and cross-functional stakeholders to close reliability gaps, reducing incidents and shaping engineering culture with ownership and thoughtful problem-solving.

Qualifications

• Proven SRE or infrastructure leadership experience, ideally managing incident command at scale.
• Strong software engineering skills and comfort diving into code; AI-assisted tooling is a core capability.
• Agency and curiosity; bias toward independent problem-solving and lifting reliability across the business.
• Excellent stakeholder management; ability to influence peer teams without formal authority across regions, platforms and functions.
• Comfort operating across time zones and managing distributed teams with calm under pressure.
• Passion for growing engineers, structured onboarding, regular coaching and mentorship.

Responsibilities

• Own and drive the reliability programme, focusing on HA/DR testing and incident management across APAC and EMEA.
• Lead a growing SRE team and foster a reliability-first culture.
• Collaborate with platform teams, observability specialists and cross-functional partners to close systemic reliability gaps.
• Grow the team from two to four engineers while maintaining high incident response standards.
• Establish and mature incident command protocols and a weekly HA/DR cadence for reliability improvements.
• Partner with a US-based Engineering Manager to ensure seamless global coverage and operations.

Skills

SRE leadership

Incident command

Stakeholder management

Software engineering

Mentoring engineers

Cross-regional collaboration

Time-zone coordination

Job description

The role and its impact

We are seeking an Engineering Manager for our Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) team. In this leadership role, you will own and drive our reliability programme, focusing on high availability and disaster recovery (HA/DR) testing and incident management across our Asia-Pacific and EMEA regions.

The role and its impact

We are seeking an Engineering Manager for our Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) team. In this leadership role, you will own and drive our reliability programme, focusing on high availability and disaster recovery (HA/DR) testing and incident management across our Asia-Pacific and EMEA regions.

You will lead a growing team through a critical period of expansion, building a culture where reliability is woven into the DNA of the business, not treated as an afterthought.

Your work will have significant impact on Xero's customer experience and operational resilience. By partnering with platform teams, observability specialists, and cross-functional stakeholders, you will close systemic reliability gaps and help reduce customer-detected incidents by 70–80%. You will also shape how our engineering culture evolves, mentoring engineers and fostering an environment where thoughtful problem-solving and ownership are valued.

The Team And How They Connect

The Australia-based SRE team currently comprises two skilled engineers and is growing to at least four by year-end. The team operates collaboratively with Cloud Engineering, Observability, Database Reliability Engineering, and Shared Services to elevate Xero's reliability posture across our platform. You will report to the Head of Engineering for Reliability and partner closely with a US-based Engineering Manager who owns incident management for the EMEA/US time zone, ensuring seamless global coverage. Together, you will run Xero's reliability programme, working in lockstep to deliver measurable improvements in how the business detects, responds to, and prevents incidents.

The team is currently working on

• Building and maturing a continuous HA/DR testing cadence, moving from ad hoc to reliable weekly execution
• Establishing and optimising incident command protocols across APAC and EMEA regions, with a focus on time-to-mitigation against clear targets
• Closing cross-team reliability gaps identified between Observability, Tooling, and product engineering through structured collaboration
• Growing the team from two to four engineers whilst maintaining high incident response standards and driving a reliability-first mindset

Where And How You Can Work

We have no standing office attendance requirement; we expect you to join us in person approximately once per quarter. We offer the flexibility to work in a way that suits your rhythm and your team's needs, whilst maintaining the collaboration and connection that makes us stronger together.

Here are some of the things we are looking for

• You bring proven SRE or infrastructure leadership experience, ideally managing incident command at scale, with a demonstrable track record of building or maturing HA/DR programmes.
• You possess strong software engineering skills and are comfortable diving into code to solve reliability problems, not just process; fluency with AI-assisted tooling is a core capability, not a nice-to-have.
• Your agency and curiosity shine through—you think and act beyond the job description, bias toward independent problem-solving over waiting for direction, and bring a genuine enthusiasm for lifting reliability across the business.
• You excel at stakeholder management and can influence peer teams without formal authority, forging durable relationships across regions, platforms, and functions with both conviction and empathy.
• You are comfortable operating across time zones and managing distributed teams with ease, bringing calm and clarity to high-pressure incident response moments.
• You care about growing and developing engineers. You will shape the team's culture through structured onboarding, regular one-to-ones, and mentorship that helps people thrive and stay.

At Xero, we hire based on your skills, passion, and the unique perspective you can bring to enhance our culture and team.