Confluent - Senior Software Engineer - Cloud Compute Platform

IntroductionAt IBM Software, we transform client challenges into solutions. Building the world’s leading AI-powered, cloud-native products that shape the future of business and society. Our legacy of innovation creates endless opportunities for IBMers to learn, grow, and make an impact on a global scale. Working in Software means joining a team fueled by curiosity and collaboration. You’ll work with diverse technologies, partners, and industries to design, develop, and deliver solutions that power digital transformation. With a culture that values innovation, growth, and continuous learning, IBM Software places you at the heart of IBM’s product and technology landscape. Here, you’ll have the tools and opportunities to advance your career while creating software that changes the world.About ConfluentYour role and responsibilitiesConfluent is pioneering a fundamentally new category of data infrastructure focused on data in motion. Have you ever found a new favorite series on Netflix, picked up groceries curbside at Walmart, or paid for something using Square? That's the power of data in motion in action—giving organizations instant access to the massive amounts of data that is constantly flowing throughout their business.At Confluent, we're building the foundational platform for this new paradigm of data infrastructure. Our cloud-native offering is designed to be the intelligent connective tissue enabling real-time data, from multiple sources, to constantly stream across the organization. With Confluent, organizations can create a central nervous system to innovate and win in a digital-first world.We're looking for self-motivated team members who crave a challenge and feel energized to roll up their sleeves and help realize Confluent's enormous potential. Chart your own path and take healthy risks as we solve big problems together. We value having diverse teams and want you to grow as we grow—whether you're just starting out in your career or managing a large team, you'll be amazed at the magnitude of your impact.About The RoleAs a Software Engineer on the Compute Platform team, you will be a key technical leader in building and evolving our next-generation, multi-tenant, cloud-native compute substrate that powers all of Confluent Cloud's diverse workloads. Our platform orchestrates workloads across thousands of Kubernetes clusters globally across all cloud service providers, providing a unified abstraction layer for scheduling, lifecycle management, and operational excellence. You'll work on critical systems including:Multi-Cluster Workload Orchestration: Build the control plane that manages workload placement, lifecycle, and state across multiple Kubernetes clusters per regionPlatform APIs & Abstractions: Design and evolve APIs that provide clean abstractions for polyglot workload management across diverse compute needsCloud Platform Integration: Build and optimize deep integrations with the broader Confluent Cloud platform for seamless end-to-end operationsMulti-Tenancy & Security: Implement and enhance workload isolation, network policies, and secure execution environmentsObservability & Operations: Drive operational excellence through monitoring integration, automated health checks, and self-healing capabilitiesAs a senior technical leader, you think strategically and help drive end-to-end technical delivery from customer experience to scaling internal operations. You leverage your expertise in cloud-native distributed systems to take our platform to the next level while ensuring high availability, reliability, and security for our largest enterprise customers.What You Will DoOwn features end to end for the Compute Platform, such as multi-cluster orchestration, workload placement, and security architectureDesign and implement platform APIs and Kubernetes operators using Go to support evolving workload requirementsDeliver high-impact initiatives in areas such as workload scheduling, disruption management, network isolation, rolling update strategies, and cross-cluster resource managementLead technical design reviews and drive architectural decisions across organizational boundariesMentor and grow other engineers on the team through code reviews, pairing, and technical guidanceOwn operational aspects including availability, reliability, performance monitoring, emergency response, and disaster recovery for our global compute infrastructurePreferred EducationMaster's DegreeRequired Technical And Professional Expertise5+ years of experience delivering scalable software solutionsProven track record of leading the delivery of large-scale, highly available, low-latency systemsDeep expertise in Kubernetes including controller development, operator patterns, and multi-cluster architecturesStrong proficiency in Go with experience building production-grade distributed systemsExperience with multi-tenant platform architectures and security isolation patternsTrack record of working collaboratively across teams including product management, SRE, and other engineering teamsPreferred Technical And Professional ExperienceExperience with observability tools and operational excellence practicesExperience with multi-cloud environments (AWS, GCP, Azure) and cloud-provider integrationsTrack record of providing technical leadership and mentorshipA smart, humble, and empathetic attitude with a strong sense of teamworkDrive and excitement about the challenges of a fast-paced, innovative software environmentFamiliarity with gRPC, Protobuf, and API design for internal platform services