Confluent - Staff Systems Engineer

International Business Machines Corporation; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

IBM is seeking a Staff Systems Engineer to be the technical leader for Cloud, Network & Automation within Corporate IT. You will set architecture standards for cloud environments, identity, and automation platforms that every employee relies on.

This role involves mentoring engineers, guiding integration with IBM, and delivering durable, secure platform solutions across AWS, Azure, and GCP. You will drive architecture decisions and raise the bar for operational excellence.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of systems, cloud, or platform engineering leadership.
• Hands-on cloud architecture across AWS, Azure, and GCP with strong security standards.
• Experience designing IaC patterns, PR controls, and GitOps pipelines.

Responsibilities

• Define technical direction for cloud platforms and account structures.
• Lead IaC pipelines and policy checks used by multiple teams.
• Architect secure remote access and Zero Trust networking.
• Own automation platforms and reduce toil with durable software.
• Define secrets management and workload identity patterns.
• Guide SRE practices and incident response across teams.
• Mentor engineers across time zones and set on-call standards.
• Collaborate with IBM integration teams for platform consolidation.
• Establish governance with identity and security pillars.
• Drive security posture and compliance evidence across frameworks.

Skills

Staff-level leadership

Cloud architecture

Infrastructure as code

Zero Trust / network security

Automation & CI/CD

Secrets management

Kubernetes / Cloud native ops

Incident response & reliability

Tools

Terraform

Atlantis

Argo

Semaphore

GKE

Job description

Introduction

We're not just building better tech. We're rewriting how data moves and what the world can do with it. With Confluent, an IBM Company, data doesn't sit still. Our platform puts information in motion, streaming in near real-time so companies can react faster, build smarter, and deliver experiences as dynamic as the world around them.

It takes a unique mix of drive and curiosity to join this team. We’re here to tackle complex problems, get stuff done, and enjoy the ride while we do it. No egos, no solo acts—just sharp, collaborative humans working hard, celebrating the wins, and building the future together.

One Confluent. One Team. One Data Streaming Platform.

Your role and responsibilities

We're looking for a Staff Systems Engineer to be the technical leader for Cloud, Network & Automation within Corporate IT. You will set the architecture and engineering standards for the cloud environments, network access, secrets, infrastructure-as-code pipelines, and automation platforms that every employee and every IT team depends on. This is a broader and more senior scope than a Senior Systems Engineer: rather than owning individual systems end to end, you define how those systems are designed, delivered, secured, and handed off, and you raise the bar for the engineers around you. You will partner closely with the Identity and SaaS pillars, Trust & Security, and Infrastructure, and you will help guide the integration of our environments with IBM. You influence roadmap and risk decisions without relying on formal authority.

What You Will Do

• Cloud Platform Architecture: Set technical direction for our AWS, GCP, and Azure footprint supporting corporate IT, including account, project, and subscription structure, guardrails, networking, and cost and risk hygiene. Lead the cleanup and hardening of legacy cloud environments and define the target state.

• Infrastructure as Code & GitOps: Own the reference patterns and delivery pipelines for infrastructure change (Terraform, Atlantis, Argo, Semaphore), including module standards, pull-request controls, drift detection, and safe rollout practices that other engineers can adopt without your help.

• Network & Zero Trust Access: Architect secure remote access and network connectivity across standard and FedRAMP environments, including VPN and zero trust access tooling (for example Palo Alto Networks platforms), resource routing, allowlisting, and egress IP management.

• Automation & Orchestration Platforms: Own the platforms IT automation runs on (Rundeck, Semaphore CI, Workato, Cloud Run and Cloud Functions). Set standards for how automation is built, tested, secured, monitored, and handed off, and eliminate systemic toil with durable software rather than one-off scripts.

• Secrets, Service Accounts & Workload Identity: Define patterns for secrets management (Vault), service accounts, tokens, and workload identity federation across clouds and CI/CD. Partner with the Identity pillar, which owns user identity and access governance, so that machine identity is consistent, least-privilege, and auditable.

• Core Services & Cloud-Native Operations: Own or guide operational patterns for DNS (DNSControl and the it-dns repository), load balancers and TLS lifecycle, GKE/Kubernetes, Cloud SQL and other service databases, and logging and monitoring, with clear service ownership and runbooks.

• Developer & Virtual Desktop Infrastructure: Set administration and security standards for the GitHub Enterprise organization and the VDI environment, balancing developer experience, security, lifecycle governance, and auditability.

• Security Posture, Incident & Compliance: Drive cloud and infrastructure security posture, including SSPM findings, misconfiguration remediation, and suspicious-activity investigations with Trust & Security. Design technical controls and supply audit evidence for FedRAMP, SOC 2, ISO 27001, and related frameworks.

• Technical Strategy & Integration Leadership: Lead ambiguous, cross-functional initiatives from problem definition through architecture, rollout, and operational handoff, including integration and consolidation work with IBM. Make and document build-versus-buy and sequencing decisions, and communicate tradeoffs to engineers, auditors, and executives.

• Mentorship & Operational Excellence: Mentor engineers across the team, including colleagues in other time zones, review designs and changes, and set expectations for on-call, incident response, documentation, and handoff so critical systems never depend on tribal knowledge.

Come As You Are

Belonging isn't a perk here. It's the baseline. We work across time zones and backgrounds, knowing the best ideas come from different perspectives. And we make space for everyone to lead, grow, and challenge what's possible.

We're proud to be an equal opportunity workplace. Employment decisions are based on job-related criteria, without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other classification protected by law.

Required technical and professional expertise

• Staff-level technical leadership: 10+ years of experience in systems, cloud, infrastructure, security, or platform engineering, with a track record of setting technical direction and delivering durable, organization-wide outcomes that outlast your own involvement.

• Cloud architecture: Deep, hands-on expertise in at least one major cloud (AWS preferred) and working expertise across all three of AWS, Azure, and GCP, including account and project structure, networking, hardening, and large-scale cleanup or consolidation of existing environments.

• Infrastructure as code & GitOps: Strong experience designing Terraform (or equivalent) modules and pipelines at scale, with PR-based controls, policy checks, and tools such as Atlantis, Argo, or comparable systems.

• Network & zero trust: Solid experience with VPN, ZTNA, and SASE technologies (such as Twingate, Cloudflare, Palo Alto Networks GlobalProtect or Prisma Access), routing, allowlisting, egress NAT, DNS, and segmented or FedRAMP environments.

• Automation & software engineering: Ability to design maintainable, tested automation in Python, Go, or shell, and to run the orchestration and CI platforms behind it (Rundeck, Semaphore, Workato, Cloud Run, Cloud Functions, or similar).

• Secrets & workload identity: Working knowledge of Vault or comparable secrets platforms, service-account lifecycle, and workload identity federation, plus enough grounding in OAuth 2.0/OIDC, SAML, and SCIM to partner effectively with identity teams. Deep Okta or IGA administration is not required.

• Cloud-native & service operations: Experience operating Kubernetes (GKE preferred), managed databases, DNS, load balancers, and TLS in production, with sound observability and capacity practices.

• Reliability & security operations: Strong incident-management and troubleshooting instincts across system boundaries; comfortable with on-call practices, PagerDuty, logging and monitoring, SIEM alerts, and root-cause analysis.

• Compliance & risk: Experience supporting or leading technical controls and evidence for FedRAMP, SOC 2, ISO 27001, or similar frameworks, with a practical understanding of least privilege and JIT access.

• Strategy, influence & mentorship: Experience leading multi-quarter, cross-team initiatives such as platform consolidation, migration, or post-acquisition integration. Excellent written and verbal communication, with the ability to explain tradeoffs to engineers, auditors, and executives and to mentor others across time zones.

Preferred technical and professional experience

• Experience leading infrastructure or IT integration through an acquisition or large-scale reorganization.

• Experience leading zero trust or network access transformations across standard and regulated environments.

• Experience with GitHub Enterprise governance, including repository and team synchronization, SSO mapping, and audit logging.

• Experience with Azure Virtual Desktop or other VDI platforms at scale.

• Experience with SSPM, CSPM, or similar posture-management tooling.

• Familiarity with Okta, Entra ID, or IGA tooling sufficient to collaborate with an identity team.

• Experience building self-service IT capabilities that replace ticket-driven requests.

• Relevant certifications such as AWS, Azure, GCP, CKA, CISSP, or equivalent.

IBM is committed to creating a diverse environment and 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, caste, genetics, pregnancy, disability, neurodivergence, age, veteran status, or other characteristics. IBM is also committed to compliance with all fair employment practices regarding citizenship and immigration status.