Software Engineer - Confluent Cloud Platform (United Kingdom)

International Business Machines Corporation; Hursley; Remote; GBP 70,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

IBM United Kingdom Limited, based in Hampshire (Hursley), is seeking a Software Engineer for Cloud Control Plane. You will design and implement a distributed control plane used by product teams to manage Confluent Cloud offerings, working in a collaborative Agile environment.

Role emphasizes ownership, pairing, and rapid delivery. You will gain experience with Kubernetes, Docker, Terraform, Helm, and on-call responsibilities across the lifecycle of deployments.

Qualifications

• Strong software design and implementation skills in building infrastructure frameworks.
• Experience with Go, C++, Java, or Python in production.
• Experience in a full project lifecycle from zero lines of code to operating and supporting a product.
• Solid understanding of Kubernetes and Docker.

Responsibilities

• Delve deep into the Kubernetes framework and contribute to internal K8S work.
• Provision infrastructure using Terraform and internal tooling and deploy changes with Helm.
• Work in a fast-paced Scrum environment with a DevOps-driven approach.
• Ship code and operate it before and after release, with understanding of deployment environments.

Skills

Go

C++

Java

Python

Software design

Kubernetes

Docker

Terraform

Helm

On-call rotation

Tools

Kubernetes

Docker

Terraform

Helm

Job description

At IBM Software, we transform client challenges into solutions. Building the world's leading AI-powered, cloud-native products that shape the future of business and society. Our legacy of innovation creates endless opportunities for IBMers to learn, grow, and make an impact on a global scale. Working in Software means joining a team fueled by curiosity and collaboration. You’ll work with diverse technologies, partners, and industries to design, develop, and deliver solutions that power digital transformation. With a culture that values innovation, growth, and continuous learning, IBM Software places you at the heart of IBM's product and technology landscape. Here, you’ll have the tools and opportunities to advance your career while creating software that changes the world.

Your role and responsibilities

About the Role:

As a Software Engineer, Cloud Control Plane, you will be designing and implementing a distributed control plane used by product teams to manage the lifecycle of their Confluent Cloud offerings.

We are a tightly knit group with a fairly mature Agile process running a very mild version of the XP playbook - we care a lot about clear communication, a good degree of task breakdown and a whole lot of pairing with other engineers. We pride ourselves in how we get stuff done - our process is light on red tape and heavy on collaboration - we will give you the authority and autonomy to make decisions.

What You Will Do:

• Delve deep into the Kubernetes framework - we have K8S contributors working with us internally
• Provision infrastructure using a mixture of Terraform and internal tooling and deploy your changes using Helm
• Thrive working iteratively in a fast-paced Scrum environment where you'll use our product and be very much DevOps driven
• You’ll be expected to not only ship code but also operate and support it before and after release - that includes having a deep understanding of what your code will run on

Required education

None

Preferred education

None

Required technical and professional expertise

• Strong software design and implementation skills in building infrastructure frameworks
• Experience with one or more of these programming languages - Go, C++, Java, or Python
• Experience in a full project lifecycle starting from zero lines of code to operating, observing and supporting a product as part of an on-call rota
• Solid understanding of Kubernetes and Docker

Preferred technical and professional experience

• Experience in building control planes (virtualization, software-defined networking/storage)
• Experience building APIs - both RESTful and gRPC-based
• Familiarity with infra such as networking, storage, and security in data centres
• Hands-on experience with Kubernetes operators, Helm, or StatefulSets
• Open source contributions to Kubernetes sigs or adjacent projects
• Experience with PBT, TDD, and pair programming.

ABOUT BUSINESS UNIT

IBM Software infuses core business operations with intelligence—from machine learning to generative AI—to help make organizations more responsive, productive, and resilient. IBM Software helps clients put AI into action now to create real value with trust, speed, and confidence across digital labor, IT automation, application modernization, security, and sustainability. Critical to this is the ability to make use of all data, because AI is only as good as the data that fuels it. In most organizations data is spread across multiple clouds, on premises, in private datacentres, and at the edge. IBM's AI and data platform scales and accelerates the impact of AI with trusted data, and provides leading capabilities to train, tune and deploy AI across business. IBM's hybrid cloud platform is one of the most comprehensive and consistent approach to development, security, and operations across hybrid environments - a flexible foundation for leveraging data, wherever it resides, to extend AI deep into a business.

YOUR LIFE @ IBM

In a world where technology never stands still, we understand that, dedication to our clients success, innovation that matters, and trust and personal responsibility in all our relationships, lives in what we do as IBMers as we strive to be the catalyst that makes the world work better.

Being an IBMer means you’ll be able to learn and develop yourself and your career, you’ll be encouraged to be courageous and experiment everyday, all whilst having continuous trust and support in an environment where everyone can thrive whatever their personal or professional background.

Our IBMers are growth minded, always staying curious, open to feedback and learning new information and skills to constantly transform themselves and our company. They are trusted to provide on-going feedback to help other IBMers grow, as well as collaborate with colleagues keeping in mind a team focused approach to include different perspectives to drive exceptional outcomes for our customers. The courage our IBMers have to make critical decisions everyday is essential to IBM becoming the catalyst for progress, always embracing challenges with resources they have to hand, a can-do attitude and always striving for an outcome focused approach within everything that they do.

Are you ready to be an IBMer?

ABOUT IBM

IBM's greatest invention is the IBMer. We believe that through the application of intelligence, reason and science, we can improve business, society and the human condition, bringing the power of an open hybrid cloud and AI strategy to life for our clients and partners around the world.

Restlessly reinventing since 1911, we are not only one of the largest corporate organizations in the world, we’re also one of the biggest technology and consulting employers, with many of the Fortune 500 companies relying on the IBM Cloud to run their business.

At IBM, we pride ourselves on being an early adopter of artificial intelligence, quantum computing and blockchain. Now it’s time for you to join us on our journey to being a responsible technology innovator and a force for good in the world.

IBM is proud to be an equal-opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, pregnancy, disability, neurodivergence, age, or other characteristics protected by the applicable law. IBM is also committed to compliance with all fair employment practices regarding citizenship and immigration status.

OTHER RELEVANT JOB DETAILS

Job Title

Job ID

122186

City / Township / Village

Hursley

State / Province

Hampshire

Country

United Kingdom

Work arrangement

Remote

Area of work

Software Engineering

Employment type

Regular

Position type

Professional

Some travel may be required based on business demand

Company

(8660) IBM United Kingdom Limited

Shift

On Call

Is this role a commissionable/sales incentive based position?