Principal Software Engineer I - CI/CD - Platform Engineering Productivity

Elastic; Mountain View (CA); Remote; USD 160,000 - 253,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health coverage

Flexible locations

Generous vacation

Stock options

401k with match

Job summary

Elastic is seeking a Platform Engineering Productivity leader to own CI/CD and release infra at scale. You will guide problem identification, security hardening, and adoption across orgs, while mentoring teams to ship faster and more securely.

You will balance hands-on reviews with strategic architecture work, ensuring scalable and secure delivery across Elastic's environments.

Qualifications

• Deep expertise in CI/CD and hardening release pipelines against supply chain attacks.
• Strong debugging instincts across the full pipeline stack.

Responsibilities

• Define the roadmap and technical vision for CI/CD, from problem identification through org-wide adoption.
• Identify bottlenecks, friction, or security risks in CI/CD before incidents occur.
• Design and enforce release gates for supply chain integrity, artifact provenance, and release readiness at scale.
• Direct engineers on multi-quarter projects, breaking down architecture and owning outcomes.
• Drive clear technical communication and produce high-quality documentation.

Skills

CI/CD

GItops

Debugging

Kubernetes

GitHub Actions

Tools

Buildkite

GitHub Actions

ArgoCD

Kubernetes

Job description

Elastic, the Search AI Company, enables everyone to find the answers they need in real time, using all their data, at scale - unleashing the potential of businesses and people. The Elastic Search AI Platform, used by more than 50% of the Fortune 500, brings together the precision of search and the intelligence of AI to enable everyone to accelerate the results that matter. By taking advantage of all structured and unstructured data - securing and protecting private information more effectively - Elastic's complete, cloud-based solutions for search, security, and observability help organizations deliver on the promise of AI.

What is The Role:

The Platform Engineering Productivity team operates the CI, CD, and Release infrastructure for the company. We ensure developers can efficiently and safely deploy changes across our various environments and at scale. In an age of AI, the landscape is evolving rapidly from scaling needs to, more than ever, securing our supply chain. There are interesting challenges to tackle.

We're looking for a proactive systems thinker who delivers on business-driven projects while identifying and driving the work that keeps our infrastructure ahead before scaling and security challenges become problems. If you're energized by work that makes every engineering team at Elastic ship faster and more securely, we'd love to hear from you.

What You Will Be Doing:

• Define the roadmap and technical vision for CI/CD, from problem identification through org-wide adoption.
• Identify where CI/CD is a bottleneck, a source of friction, or a security risk before it becomes an incident, and drive the remediation rather than waiting to be assigned it.
• Design and enforce release gates covering supply chain integrity, artifact provenance, and release readiness, built to scale across teams without becoming a tax on engineering velocity.
• Direct engineers on your team through complex, multi-quarter projects: break down the architecture, assign the work, and own the outcome even when the execution is distributed.
• Drive clear technical communication and alignment across teams, and produce high-quality documentation for systems, processes, and architectural decisions.
• Serve as Incident Commander on high‑severity supply chain or release incidents, and use each incident as a forcing function for structural improvements.
• Raise the engineering bar across the org through code review, mentorship, design review, and by setting standards others adopt voluntarily.
• Remain hands‑on at the right depth: you'll review code, prototype approaches, and debug production issues, but your primary leverage at this level is through the work of others, not your own output.

What You Bring:

• Deep expertise in CI/CD and what it takes to harden a release pipeline against supply chain attacks.
• Strong debugging instincts across the full pipeline stack: you trace failures from test runner to artifact store to cluster deployment without needing a specialist for each layer.
• Hands‑on with CI infrastructure (Buildkite, GitHub Actions, or equivalent), GitOps/ArgoCD, and Kubernetes.
• You use AI to accelerate your own work and your team's and you understand AI's impact on supply chain security and scale.
• A track record of multi‑quarter, cross‑org ownership: you've identified the right problem, designed the solution, and gotten organizations that didn't report to you to change how they work.
• The judgment to push back on a prescribed plan when it's the wrong call, and the credibility to get alignment on a better approach.
• Experience directing the work of other engineers toward outcomes not just collaborating, but breaking down complex problems into executable work and holding the outcome.

Additional Information - We Take Care of Our People:

As a distributed company, diversity drives our identity. Whether you're looking to launch a new career or grow an existing one, Elastic is the type of company where you can balance great work with great life. Your age is only a number. It doesn't matter if you're just out of college or your children are; we need you for what you can do.

We strive to have parity of benefits across regions, and while regulations differ from place to place, we believe taking care of our people is the right thing to do.

• Competitive pay based on the work you do here and not your previous salary
• Health coverage for you and your family in many locations
• Ability to craft your calendar with flexible locations and schedules for many roles
• Generous number of vacation days each year
• Increase your impact - We match up to $2000 (or local currency equivalent) for financial donations and service
• Up to 40 hours each year to use toward volunteer projects you love
• Embracing parenthood with a minimum of 16 weeks of parental leave

Security & Privacy Responsibilities: Take ownership of protecting the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of organizational data and systems by following applicable privacy and security policies, standards, and procedures. Ensure that all individual contributions follow Elastic's Secure Software Development Framework (SSDF). Proactively participate in mandatory role‑based training to ensure personal technical execution consistently aligns with the highest standards of data protection, data privacy, and system resilience.

Different people approach problems differently. We need that. Elastic is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to creating an inclusive culture that celebrates different perspectives, experiences, and backgrounds. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender perception or identity, national origin, age, marital status, protected veteran status, disability status, or any other basis protected by federal, state or local law, ordinance or regulation.

We welcome individuals with disabilities and strive to create an accessible and inclusive experience for all individuals. To request an accommodation during the application or the recruiting process, please email [e-mail]. We will reply to your request within 24 business hours of submission.

Applicants have rights under Federal Employment Laws and can view the following posters linked below:

Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) Poster

Employee Polygraph Protection Act (EPPA) Poster

Elasticsearch develops and distributes technology and information that is subject to U.S. and other countries' export controls and licensing requirements for individuals who are located in or are nationals of the following sanctioned countries and regions: Belarus, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, or Russia, including the Ukrainian territories annexed by Russia (The Crimea region of Ukraine, The Donetsk People's Republic (DNR), The Luhansk People's Republic (LNR), Kherson or Zaporizhzhia). If you are located in or are a national of one of the listed countries or regions, an export license may be required as a condition of your employment in this role. Please note that national origin and/or nationality do not affect eligibility for employment with Elastic.

Please see here for our Privacy Statement.

Compensation for this role is in the form of base salary. This role does not have a variable compensation component.

The typical starting salary range for new hires in this role is listed below. In select locations (including Seattle WA, Los Angeles CA, the San Francisco Bay Area CA, and the New York City Metro Area), an alternate range may apply as specified below.

These ranges represent the lowest to highest salary we reasonably and in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. We may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range, and the ranges may be modified in the future.

An employee's position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to, relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, performance, and business or organizational needs.

Elastic believes that employees should have the opportunity to share in the value that we create together for our shareholders. Therefore, in addition to cash compensation, this role is currently eligible to participate in Elastic's stock program. Our total rewards package also includes a company‑matched 401k with dollar‑for‑dollar matching up to 6% of eligible earnings, along with a range of other benefits offered with a holistic emphasis on employee well‑being.

The typical starting salary range for this role is:

$159,800-$252,800 USD

The typical starting salary range for this role in the select locations listed above is:

$191,900-$303,500 USD