Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) Manager, Apple Maps

Apple Inc.; Cupertino, Northern (CA, KY); Hybrid; USD 268,000 - 402,000; Full time

Job summary

Apple Inc. in Cupertino is seeking a senior SRE leader to set the strategic direction for Maps serving infrastructure, define the roadmap, and lead an organization of SREs responsible for reliability, scalability, and operational excellence across Apple Maps.

This role emphasizes AI-driven reliability, automation, and culture change, with executive collaboration across engineering and product teams. The candidate should have deep experience in large-scale distributed systems and proven

Qualifications

• 10-15+ years of experience in SRE or related disciplines.
• Experience leading SRE organizations for large-scale, user-facing services.
• Strong Linux and distributed systems knowledge.
• Experience applying AI/ML tooling to SRE operations.
• Ability to read code produced by LLMs and evaluate its production suitability.
• Proven ability to communicate at the executive level and negotiate across org boundaries.

Responsibilities

• Operate with reliability as the top priority.
• Define and drive the strategic roadmap for Apple Maps serving infrastructure.
• Lead and grow an SRE organization with technical excellence.
• Represent the SRE perspective in cross-functional planning.
• Champion automation, platform improvements, capacity strategy, and systems design beyond incident response.
• Define and execute an AI strategy for the SRE organization.
• Drive adoption of AI-assisted tooling into day-to-day SRE workflows.
• Build a culture where engineers experiment with AI tools for operational problems.
• Partner across Apple, aligning on shared goals with an Apple-first mindset.
• Mentor and develop leaders within the organization; celebrate wins and make tough calls.

Skills

Linux fundamentals

Distributed systems

Networking

Infrastructure at scale

AI/ML tooling

LLM-based tooling

Executive communication

Cloud infrastructure

Kubernetes at scale

Capacity planning

Infrastructure architecture

SRE leadership

Tools

AWS

GCP

Kubernetes

Job description

Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) Manager, Apple Maps

Cupertino, California, United States Software and Services

Apple Maps and location services are used by hundreds of millions of people every day to navigate the world. Behind every search, route, and point of interest is a massive distributed serving infrastructure that must be fast, reliable, and always available.This SRE org is responsible for the availability and automation of some of the most visible and widely used services that power Apple Maps.If you are passionate about reliability at planet scale and are excited to help us build, grow, manage and deliver infrastructure that scales with Apple Maps, this is the opportunity for you!

Description

We are looking for a senior SRE leader to set the strategic direction for our Maps serving infrastructure. This is not just a "keep the lights on" role — this is a leadership position that defines where our infrastructure goes next, how our SRE practice evolves, and how we build the teams and partnerships to get there. You will work closely with engineering, product, and operations partners across Apple to shape the roadmap for our serving platform. You will lead an organization of SREs and hold responsibility for the reliability, scalability, and operational excellence of some of Apple's most visible services. We believe AI will fundamentally reshape how SRE is practiced — from incident detection and resolution to capacity planning and toil elimination — and we're looking for a leader who shares that conviction and can drive that transformation across the organization.

Responsibilities

• Operate with the fundamental principle that reliability is feature number one
• Define and drive the strategic roadmap for Apple Maps serving infrastructure in partnership with engineering and product teams
• Lead and grow an SRE organization, setting the bar for technical excellence, operational rigor, and engineering culture
• Represent the SRE perspective in cross-functional planning — translating reliability requirements into architecture decisions and investment priorities
• Champion the "Engineering" in Site Reliability Engineering — driving automation, platform improvements, capacity strategy, and systems design beyond reactive incident response
• Define and execute a clear AI strategy for the SRE organization — identifying high-impact opportunities where AI/ML-powered tooling can reduce toil, accelerate root cause analysis, and improve reliability outcomes
• Drive adoption of AI-assisted tooling (copilots, intelligent runbooks, LLM-based diagnostics, anomaly detection) into day-to-day SRE workflows
• Build a culture where engineers actively experiment with AI tools and modern approaches to solve operational problems
• Build strong partnerships across Apple, negotiating priorities and aligning on shared goals with an Apple-first mindset
• Communicate effectively at the executive level — presenting strategy, trade-offs, and progress to senior leadership
• Mentor and develop leaders within your organization, creating a culture where people do their best work
• Celebrate wins, recognize contributions, and make tough calls when needed

Minimum Qualifications

• 10-15+ years of experience in SRE or adjacent disciplines (systems engineering, infrastructure engineering, production engineering), with at least 10 years in senior management roles
• Demonstrated experience leading SRE organizations supporting large-scale, user-facing distributed services
• Strong technical proficiency in Linux fundamentals, distributed systems concepts, networking, and infrastructure at scale
• Demonstrated experience applying AI/ML tooling or LLM-based solutions to improve SRE or infrastructure operations
• Ability to read and understand code produced by LLMs and evaluate its suitability for production use
• Has defined or is actively executing an AI strategy for a large SRE organization
• Proven ability to communicate at the executive level and negotiate across organizational boundaries

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP) and Kubernetes at scale
• Background in capacity planning, performance engineering, or infrastructure architecture
• Track record of driving cultural and process transformation within SRE organizations
• Experience building or deploying AI-powered operational tooling (AIOps, intelligent alerting, automated diagnostics)
• Hands-on experience with LLM-based developer/SRE productivity tools
• Track record of driving AI adoption within engineering teams
• Experience operating services at Apple-scale user volumes

At Apple, base pay is one part of our total compensation package and is determined within a range. This provides the opportunity to progress as you grow and develop within a role. The base pay range for this role is between $267,800 and $401,700, and your base pay will depend on your skills, qualifications, experience, and location.

Apple employees also have the opportunity to become an Apple shareholder through participation in Apple’s discretionary employee stock programs. Apple employees are eligible for discretionary restricted stock unit awards, and can purchase Apple stock at a discount if voluntarily participating in Apple’s Employee Stock Purchase Plan. You’ll also receive benefits including: Comprehensive medical and dental coverage, retirement benefits, a range of discounted products and free services, and for formal education related to advancing your career at Apple, reimbursement for certain educational expenses — including tuition. Additionally, this role might be eligible for discretionary bonuses or commission payments as well as relocation. Learn more about Apple Benefits

Note: Apple benefit, compensation and employee stock programs are subject to eligibility requirements and other terms of the applicable plan or program.

Apple is an equal opportunity employer that is committed to inclusion and diversity. We seek to promote equal opportunity for all applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, Veteran status, or other legally protected characteristics. Learn more about your EEO rights as an applicant

At Apple, we believe accessibility is a fundamental human right. You’ll find that idea reflected in everything here — in our culture, our benefits and our digital tools. By welcoming as many perspectives as possible, we help you build a career where you feel like you belong.

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Apple accepts applications to this posting on an ongoing basis.