Staff Engineer, ELS Automation (Product Owner)

CloudLinux is seeking a Staff Engineer for the ELS Automation team, a hybrid role combining senior technical contribution with product ownership. This individual will write code daily, own architecture decisions, and refactor legacy systems, while also defining the product vision, roadmap, and stakeholder relationships for tools powering the backporting pipeline. The role focuses on discovering vulnerabilities, backporting patches, and shipping security updates for out-of-support Linux ecosystems.

Must Have

• Prior tech lead or architect role
• 8+ years software engineering; 3+ years at senior/staff level
• Recent, daily coding in Python
• Strong GitLab CI and GitHub experience (runners, pipelines, workflows)
• Solid Linux fundamentals: processes, permissions, shell, networking, packaging
• Track record refactoring legacy systems safely in production
• Comfortable with observability: monitoring, logging, metrics, alerting
• Experience owning a product or tool end-to-end (internal or external)
• Can build, communicate, and adapt a roadmap
• Makes scope/timeline/risk trade-offs and stands behind them
• Translates ambiguous requirements into concrete deliverables
• Excellent English — written and verbal
• Explains complex technical topics to non-technical stakeholders
• Navigates conflicting priorities without burning bridges
• Says "no" or "not yet" constructively
• Ownership mentality: you define the work, not just execute it
• Thrives in fast-paced, prototype-heavy environments
• Steps into ambiguity and creates structure
• Comfortable wearing multiple hats

Good to Have

• CVE/CVSS, vulnerability management, or backporting experience
• Linux packaging (RPM, DEB) or language ecosystems (Maven, pip, Go modules)
• Practical use of LLM/AI tools in development workflows
• Platform/enablement team background

Perks & Benefits

• A focus on professional development
• Interesting and challenging projects
• Fully remote work with flexible working hours
• Paid 24 days of vacation per year
• 10 days of national holidays
• Unlimited sick leaves
• Compensation for private medical insurance
• Co-working and gym/sports reimbursement
• Budget for education
• Opportunity to receive a reward for the most innovative idea that the company can patent

Description

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We are a global remote-first company. We are driven by our principles: do the right thing, employees first, we are remote first, and we deliver high volume, low-cost Linux infrastructure and security products that help companies to increase the efficiency of their operations. Every person on our team supports each other and does what we can to ensure we all are successful. We are truly a great place to work.

Check out our website for more information: cloudlinux.com

Endless Lifecycle Support (ELS) enables organizations to continue securely using Linux distributions and software languages that have reached the end of life or no longer receive standard security support – delivering vulnerability patches for unsupported versions of of CentOS, Ubuntu, Debian, Oracle Linux, PHP, Python, Spring frameworks, Angular/AngularJS, Django, Flask.

For more information, visit our website: tuxcare.com/endless-lifecycle-support

Team: ELS Automation

Domain: Automation for Extended Lifecycle Support · Streamline Patch & Vulnerability Pipeline · Internal Developer Tooling

This is a hybrid position: you'll be the team's most senior technical contributor — writing code daily, owning architecture decisions, refactoring legacy systems — while simultaneously acting as product owner for the tools we build. You'll define what we build, why it matters, and how it works. It's a broad role by design. As the team scales, it may narrow into a dedicated Staff Engineer or Architect track, but right now we need someone who can do both.

Why This Role Exists

Vendors stop supporting software. We don't.

The ELS Automation team builds the tooling that powers our backporting pipeline — discovering vulnerabilities, backporting patches, and shipping security updates for out-of-support Linux ecosystems: OS distributions, Java, Python, Go libraries, and more.

We own a critical slice of this pipeline, and we need someone who can:

• Build it — hands-on, in the code, every day
• Shape it — own the product vision, roadmap, and stakeholder relationships for a part of the pipeline related to the patch processing automation
• Scale it — architect for reliability as usage grows

No separate PdM. No architect handing down designs. You're both.

What You'll Do

Staff Engineer (60%)

Architecture & Code

• Prototype rapidly; harden successful experiments into production systems
• Own the architecture of core pipeline tools: patch discovery, vulnerability discovery, release automation and related elements of the entire machinery of the patch processing
• Write production code in Python and Go — backend services, CLI tools, automation scripts
• Build and optimize CI/CD pipelines on GitLab (runners/workers) and GitHub
• Refactor legacy systems incrementally without breaking downstream consumers

Technical Leadership

• Deep-dive into existing systems — map dependencies, surface risks, fix bottlenecks
• Set technical standards: code quality, testing, documentation, observability
• Make architectural decisions and own the consequences
• Mentor teammates; raise the technical bar

Product Owner (40%)

Vision & Roadmap

• Own the product vision for ELS Automation tools
• Define and prioritize the roadmap based on impact, risk, and effort
• Balance urgent security needs against long-term technical health
• Translate business requirements into concrete technical plans

Stakeholder Interface

• Act as primary contact for teams that depend on our tools
• Negotiate and agree on business requirements with major stakeholders of the company
• Clarify requirements with security, engineering, release, and operations teams
• Communicate trade-offs; propose pragmatic solutions when constraints collide
• Write integration guides; onboard partner teams; consult on best practices

Accountability

• Own outcomes, not just outputs — if the tool isn't solving the problem, that's on you
• Coordinate incident response when automation issues impact downstream SLAs
• Run post-mortems; drive improvements

Team Lead Activity

Leading and managing a team of 5 software engineers

Requirements

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Must-Haves

Engineering and Team Leadership

• Prior tech lead or architect role
• 8+ years software engineering; 3+ years at senior/staff level
• Recent, daily coding in Python
• Strong GitLab CI and GitHub experience (runners, pipelines, workflows)
• Solid Linux fundamentals: processes, permissions, shell, networking, packaging
• Track record refactoring legacy systems safely in production
• Comfortable with observability: monitoring, logging, metrics, alerting

Product Thinking

• Experience owning a product or tool end-to-end (internal or external)
• Can build, communicate, and adapt a roadmap
• Makes scope/timeline/risk trade-offs and stands behind them
• Translates ambiguous requirements into concrete deliverables

Communication

• Excellent English — written and verbal
• Explains complex technical topics to non-technical stakeholders
• Navigates conflicting priorities without burning bridges
• Says "no" or "not yet" constructively

Mindset

• Ownership mentality: you define the work, not just execute it
• Thrives in fast-paced, prototype-heavy environments
• Steps into ambiguity and creates structure
• Comfortable wearing multiple hats

Nice-to-Haves

• CVE/CVSS, vulnerability management, or backporting experience
• Linux packaging (RPM, DEB) or language ecosystems (Maven, pip, Go modules)
• Practical use of LLM/AI tools in development workflows
• Platform/enablement team background

Benefits

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What's in it for you?

• A focus on professional development.

• Interesting and challenging projects.
• Fully remote work with flexible working hours, that allows you to schedule your day and work from any location worldwide.
• Paid 24 days of vacation per year, 10 days of national holidays, and unlimited sick leaves.
• Compensation for private medical insurance.
• Co-working and gym/sports reimbursement.
• Budget for education.
• The opportunity to receive a reward for the most innovative idea that the company can patent.

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