Site Reliability Engineer Lead

Southern Cross Health Insurance; Auckland; On-site; NZD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Wellbeing leave

Health insurance

Life insurance

Parental leave benefits

Wellbeing programme

Flexi leave

Volunteer day

Job summary

Southern Cross Health Insurance in Auckland seeks a Site Reliability Engineering Lead to build and lead a dedicated SRE team within Technology Platforms. You will shift the organization from reactive support to proactive, engineering-led reliability, establishing long-term practices and an effective on-call model.

You will partner with product and engineering, drive observability improvements, and lead a high-performing team through change while aligning with business priorities and customer

Qualifications

• Experience with incident management processes and tooling (ServiceNow, PagerDuty)
• Proven track record leading the transition from reactive support to proactive reliability practices
• Experience embedding automation and scalable operational processes
• Strong understanding of system reliability, observability, incident management and resilience design
• An agile and empowering leadership philosophy, with a proven track record of building and growing engineering teams

Responsibilities

• Lead and prioritise the Site Reliability Engineering team toward reliability goals
• Build a high-performing team with autonomous cross-functional collaboration
• Oversee incident management and proactive prevention
• Identify opportunities to improve observability, reliability and recovery through tooling and design
• Partner with product and engineering to embed reliability in platform design and delivery
• Drive adoption of SRE practices including automation and monitoring
• Use data and insights from incidents and system performance to inform roadmaps
• Organise the team to provide proactive incident management response, including out of hours

Skills

Incident management

Engineering leadership

Automation

Observability

Cross-functional work

Agile leadership

Stakeholder communication

Tools

ServiceNow

PagerDuty

Job description

About us

Southern Cross Health Insurance is shaping a healthier Aotearoa New Zealand. Our purpose is simple: empowering our members to live well for longer. We’re here to give peace of mind through timely access to quality care, inspire healthier living, and lead positive change across the health system. As a New Zealand-owned, member-based organisation, we’re building a future where wellbeing is at the heart of everything we do – delivering exceptional value for our members and creating an environment where our people thrive.

Now is an exciting time to join us. You’ll be part of a high-performing, values-driven team where people are at the heart of everything we do – and in return for your talent, you’ll have the opportunity to grow, make an impact, and be proud of the difference your work makes.

About the role

Southern Cross is guided by purpose, powered by people and technology. We’re here to help almost one million members across Aotearoa New Zealand live well for longer – work with real scale, real responsibility, and a real opportunity to make a meaningful difference.

Site Reliability Engineering is becoming a dedicated team within Technology Platforms, with a clear mandate: shift Southern Cross from reactive operational support to proactive, engineering-led reliability. We’re looking for a Site Reliability Engineering Lead to build and lead this team, and to transform how we detect, respond to and prevent technology incidents.

This is a senior leadership role for someone who wants to build a high-performing team from the ground up, establish a long-term SRE practice, and make reliability something we design for rather than react to.

About the role

Reporting to the Head of Technology Platforms, you’ll lead and prioritise the Site Reliability Engineering team, building a group of highly engaged, capable people who feel safe to air their views, self-organise and work both autonomously and cross-functionally.

You’ll oversee incident management and operational performance, guiding the shift toward proactive prevention and engineering-led solutions, and organise the team to provide proactive incident response – including out of hours – as SRE becomes one of the first teams at Southern Cross to operate an on-call model.

Alongside the Principal Site Reliability Engineer, who owns technical direction, standards and architecture, you’ll focus on people leadership, delivery and stakeholder engagement – translating complex reliability concepts for non-technical audiences and bringing product teams along without mandating change.

What you’ll do

• Lead and prioritise the Site Reliability Engineering team, ensuring alignment to reliability and resilience objectives

• Build a high-performing team with highly engaged, capable people who feel safe to air their views, self-organise and work both autonomously and cross-functionally

• Oversee incident management and operational performance, guiding a shift toward proactive prevention and engineering-led solutions

• Identify opportunities to improve system observability, reliability and recovery through tooling, automation and design improvements

• Partner with product and engineering teams to embed reliability and resilience into platform design and delivery

• Drive adoption of SRE practices, including automation, monitoring and continuous improvement approaches

• Use data and insights from incidents and system performance to inform improvement initiatives and roadmap priorities

• Organise the team to provide proactive incident management response, including out of hours

What you’ll bring

• Deep hands-on experience with incident management processes and tooling (e.g. ServiceNow, PagerDuty or equivalent), with a proven ability to handle major incidents and service disruptions effectively

• Strong capability leading the transition from reactive support to proactive, engineering-led reliability practices

• Experience embedding automation and scalable operational processes that reduce manual intervention

• A deep understanding of system reliability, observability, incident management and resilience design

• An agile and empowering leadership philosophy, with a proven track record of building and growing engineering teams

• Experience owning and evolving reliability tools and platforms as products – defining a roadmap, managing a backlog of observability and automation improvements, and prioritising based on the needs of the engineering community

• The ability to communicate, influence and partner across engineering and delivery teams to improve platform outcomes

• Proven ability to set clear direction, make confident decisions, and build trusted relationships to lead through ambiguity and change

Who we are

Ngākau nui. Āhurutanga. Tikanga.

Join a proud, diverse team that’s always there, always real, always true. If you thrive in a caring, honest and open culture, we think you’ll love working with us.

We know our team’s culture and wellbeing drive us forward. That’s why we prioritise not only professional development but opportunities to thrive personally. We offer exceptional work/life balance, and our people are encouraged – and rewarded – for living well.

Southern Cross employee benefits include:

• Five days of wellbeing leave per year

• Health insurance for you and your immediate whānau

• Life insurance cover and discounts on pet and travel insurance

• Extra parental leave benefits and financial wellbeing support

• Participation in our workplace wellbeing programme

• The option to purchase flexi leave for study, volunteering, or supporting your whānau

• An annual volunteer day to contribute to a cause with your team

This role is Auckland based. While we appreciate interest from candidates in other locations, we’re unfortunately not able to consider remote options. Have questions? Check out our FAQs for help with the application and recruitment process.

We are proud to have taken the Pride Pledge, reflecting our commitment to inclusion and belonging. We also facilitate an active, employee‑led Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Forum, which includes our Rainbow Network, Māori Network, Pasifika Collective, and Neurodiversity and Whānau Support networks.

If you share our commitment and passion, we’d love to hear from you.