Senior Incident and Escalations Manager

Datadog, Inc.; Sydney; Hybrid; AUD 150,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

Datadog is seeking an experienced Incident and Escalation Manager to lead the response to complex, high-impact incidents across global customers. You will drive cross-functional coordination, set response strategy, and maintain ownership through resolution.

The role combines technical engagement, incident management practices, and process automation to improve how incidents are managed at scale. You will work within the Hybrid Datadog culture, collaborating with Support, Engineering, and Product

Qualifications

• 8+ years of related professional experience, incl. at least 4 years in incident management and customer escalations.
• Hands-on technical experience in software/cloud environments such as Support Engineering, SRE, or Solutions Architecture.
• Strong understanding of cloud computing, distributed systems, and modern software architectures.
• Ability to lead through ambiguity in high-pressure, high-visibility situations.

Responsibilities

• Lead response to complex, high-impact incidents and escalations from start to finish.
• Drive cross-functional coordination and maintain ownership through resolution.
• Represent IEM to regional leadership, customers, and internal teams to influence priorities.
• Lead communications during highly sensitive incidents for customers and stakeholders.
• Mentor IEM/GSE members and help raise operational standards.

Skills

Incident management

Customer escalations

Cross-functional leadership

Cloud computing

SRE experience

Python

JavaScript

Shell

Education

Bachelor's degree

Equivalent practical experience

Tools

Cloud platforms

Job description

The Incident and Escalation Management team (IEM) is part of Datadog's Global Support Engineering (GSE) organization. IEM exists to continuously improve Datadog's overall customer experience during incidents and other critical moments. We're looking for experts with a background in incident management and escalation handling to provide fast incident response, clear ownership, and calm, confident communication for our global customer base.

In this individual contributor role, you will play a key part in customer communication, technical engagement, and incident management for our global customers. You will also implement processes and automations, use the same incident and case management tools we build for our customers, and help shape how they evolve.

At Datadog, we place value in our office culture - the relationships and collaboration it builds and the creativity it brings to the table. We operate as a hybrid workplace to ensure our Datadogs can create a work-life harmony that best fits them.

What you'll do:

• Lead the response to our most complex, ambiguous, and high-impact incidents and escalations from start to finish. Set the response strategy, drive cross-functional coordination, and maintain clear ownership through resolution.
• Navigate competing priorities across multiple critical customer situations, independently assessing business and technical impact and determining the appropriate response and escalation strategy.
• Represent IEM to regional Support, Sales, and Engineering leadership, building the standing and relationships that let you drive a response when a situation moves faster than process allows.
• Lead communications during highly sensitive, public, or large-scale incidents, adapting communication strategies for customers, internal leadership, and other stakeholders.
• Act as a trusted incident and escalation partner across Support, Engineering, Product, and other teams, influencing decisions and driving alignment when ownership or the path to resolution is unclear.
• Lead high-impact, cross-functional projects that improve how Datadog manages incidents and escalations at scale, identifying systemic gaps and translating them into sustainable operational improvements.
• Establish and evolve incident and escalation best practices, documentation, runbooks, and training, raising the quality and consistency of response across the organization.
• Mentor and develop other IEMs or GSEs members, provide guidance during complex situations, contribute to interviewing and hiring, and help raise the operational bar for the team.
• Design and champion proactive monitoring and detection strategies that surface customer-impacting risks earlier and enable teams to act before issues escalati...
• Identify systemic patterns across incidents, escalations, customer infrastructure, and product behavior, and influence Engineering and Product partners to address root causes and reduce recurrence.

Who you are:

• 8+ years of related professional experience, including at least 4 years of experience in incident management and customer escalations, with demonstrable ownership of major, high-impact incidents and business-critical customer escalations in SaaS, cloud, observability, or similarly complex software environments
• Significant experience in a hands-on technical role at a software or cloud company, such as Support Engineering, Site Reliability Engineering, Solutions Architecture, or a similar technical function
• Strong understanding of cloud computing, distributed systems, and modern software architectures, with the ability to reason across multiple technical domains and system dependencies; scripting ability in Python, JavaScript, or shell is a plus
• Demonstrated ability to lead through ambiguity during high-pressure, high-visibility situations, evaluate complex technical and business factors, and determine an effective incident or escalation strategy
• Experience operating as the sole or most senior incident responder in a region or timezone - making consequential decisions without an in-hours escalation path, and working effectively with customers and internal teams across different cultures and working norms.
• Experience identifying systemic patterns across incidents or escalations and translating them into operational, process, or technical improvements that reduce recurrence
• Proven experience driving complex, cross-functional projects from conception through delivery and influencing improvements beyond your immediate area of ownership
• Exceptional written and verbal English communication skills, with the judgment to communicate effectively with technical teams, customers, and senior stakeholders during sensitive situations
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Science/Technology, Engineering, or equivalent practical experience

Datadog values people from all walks of life. We understand not everyone will meet all the below qualifications on day one. That's okay. If you're passionate about techn