Engineering Manager, MAAS

Canonical; Quebec; Remote; CAD 138,427 - 179,955; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year

Annual compensation review

Maternity and paternity leave

Employee Assistance Programme

Job summary

A leading open-source technology firm is seeking an Engineering Manager for the MAAS team. This role involves leading distributed engineering teams, driving software development, and fostering talent within the organization. Ideal candidates will have a strong background in Python or Golang, with expertise in Linux systems and cloud technologies. The position offers a distributed work environment, opportunities for travel, and a supportive culture focused on innovation and excellence.

Qualifications

• Proven experience delivering software using Python, Golang, or similar languages.
• Experience with Linux system administration (Debian or Ubuntu preferred).
• Ability to mentor and develop team members.

Responsibilities

• Lead a distributed team of engineers in your time zone.
• Talent development through coaching, mentoring, feedback, and career planning.
• Setting and managing expectations with other engineering teams and stakeholders.

Skills

Leadership

Software Development in Python or Golang

Linux System Administration

Cloud Computing Technologies

Agile Methodologies

Team Mentoring

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or equivalent

Job description

Join to apply for the Engineering Manager, MAAS role at Canonical

Canonical is a leading provider of open source software and operating systems to the global enterprise and technology markets. Our platform, Ubuntu, is widely used in breakthrough enterprise initiatives such as public cloud, data science, AI, engineering innovation and IoT. Our customers include the world’s leading public cloud and silicon providers, and industry leaders in many sectors. The company is a pioneer of global distributed collaboration, with 1200+ colleagues in more than 80 countries and very few office based roles. Teams meet two to four times yearly in person, in interesting locations around the world, to align on strategy and execution.

The company is founder led, profitable and growing.

We are hiring an Engineering Manager as we expand the MAAS team. Our mission with MAAS (“Metal as a Service”) is to provide the best solution for building and running private bare-metal infrastructure, putting a cloud‑style on‑demand API in front of physical server provisioning, network configuration and storage. We are hiring engineering managers with experience in high‑quality software development and high‑performance team leadership who also have deep familiarity with Linux on physical servers, Linux storage and data center networking capabilities.

The Canonical MAAS team is responsible for delivering our Metal As A Service (MAAS) hyperscale provisioning technology. Ubuntu strives to be the most scalable, cloud‑ready server distribution and MAAS is our platform to get Ubuntu on bare metal servers. MAAS is a rapidly evolving software stack written in Python and Go. Its components span the entire software stack: from low‑level hardware detection and provisioning, to the upper level management web interface, API and CLI. Our most effective engineers are fluent in all these layers, and able to anticipate the consequences of design and engineering choices elsewhere in a complex distributed system.

Canonical is seeking passionate technical leaders who are eager to drive innovation in one of Canonical’s flagship data centre products. You will play a key role in reshaping the future of data centre technology through open source management platforms. MAAS aims to revolutionise data centre management at scale, from day zero deployment to long‑term data centre expansion and maintenance.

Technical leadership experience and a background in software engineering are necessary prerequisites for this role. You will be expected to lead, challenge and develop engineers, positively influence team and company culture, facilitate technical delivery and guide strategy and execution. In addition to these responsibilities, you will be expected to collaborate across engineering. The MAAS team regularly interfaces with teams responsible for cloud‑init, LXD and our public cloud offerings.

The successful candidate will have technical leadership attributes and can demonstrate the ability to solve challenging distributed systems problems.

Location

This is a work‑from‑anywhere position available in EMEA or the Americas.

Role Entails

• Leading a distributed team of engineers in your time zone (we organise engineering teams by Americas, EMEA etc)
• Talent development through coaching, mentoring, feedback and career planning
• Setting and managing expectations with other engineering teams, senior management and external stakeholders
• Advocating modern software development practices
• Participating in the engineering process through code and architectural review
• Engaging with broader teams at Canonical, the open source community and partners
• Travelling to internal and external global events for 4 to 6 weeks per year

What We Are Looking For

• Bachelor’s degree (or equivalent) and a background in Computer Science
• Exceptional academic track record from both high school and university
• Proven experience delivering software using Python, Golang or similar languages
• Experience with Linux system administration (Debian or Ubuntu preferred)
• Familiarity with modern Linux cloud computing technologies, including networking, storage, containers and K8S
• Technical aptitude for understanding complex distributed systems
• Professional written and spoken English with excellent presentation skills
• Experience with agile software development methodologies
• Ability to mentor, develop and support team members
• Result‑oriented, with a personal drive to meet commitments
• Ability to travel internationally twice a year for company events up to two weeks long

Nice‑to‑Have Skills

• Typescript using modern web frameworks such as React, Angular, Svelte or Vue
• Data Center infrastructure management and design

What We Offer Colleagues

• Distributed work environment with twice‑yearly team sprints in person – we’ve been working remotely since 2004!
• Personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year
• Annual compensation review
• Recognition rewards
• Annual holiday leave
• Maternity and paternity leave
• Employee Assistance Programme
• Opportunity to travel to new locations to meet colleagues
• Priority Pass, and travel upgrades for long haul company events

About Canonical

Canonical is a pioneering tech firm at the forefront of the global move to open source. As the company that publishes Ubuntu, one of the most important open source projects and the platform for AI, IoT and the cloud, we are changing the world of software. We recruit on a global basis and set a very high standard for people joining the company. We expect excellence – in order to succeed, we need to be the best at what we do. Most colleagues at Canonical have worked from home since its inception in 2004. Working here is a step into the future, and will challenge you to think differently, work smarter, learn new skills and raise your game.

Canonical is an Equal Opportunity Employer

We are proud to foster a workplace free from discrimination. Diversity of experience, perspectives and background create a better work environment and better products. Whatever your identity, we will give your application fair consideration.

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