Software Engineering Director

Canonical

Remote

Full Time

Posted April 1, 2026

Not Specified

Remote

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Job Description

The Engineering Director at Canonical is a senior leadership role responsible for overseeing multiple engineering teams across various domains, driving technical excellence, managing talent, and ensuring the successful delivery of open source software products in a remote, global environment.

Key Responsibilities

Lead multiple engineering teams and manage engineering managers and staff engineers
Develop and mentor engineering managers and engineers, fostering career growth
Hire and onboard staff-level engineers for specialized roles
Set high standards for code quality, testing, and performance across teams
Implement and uphold disciplined engineering processes
Measure and improve team health, productivity, and delivery quality
Ensure timely delivery of projects, including community participation and documentation
Represent products to stakeholders, partners, and customers
Plan, track, and manage progress toward engineering goals and projects
Collaborate with other leadership and product teams to align strategies

Requirements

Ability to run a project which spans teams and time zones, including hiring and managing engineering managers and staff engineers
Pass the first round of interviews
Understanding of what great code looks like in the language and genre of the product (web service, system daemon, desktop application, distributed system)
Ability to drive testing and benchmarking to improve quality and performance in teams
Confidence to set and defend high expectations of work ethic, consistency, focus, and learning
Experience leading multiple teams of engineers, ranging from graduate to senior levels
Experience developing engineering managers and maintaining company culture
Experience hiring staff level engineers for roles such as performance and quality
Ability to coach, mentor, and offer career development feedback to engineers
Ability to identify and measure indicators of team health and productivity
Ensuring rounded delivery including community participation and documentation
Implementing disciplined engineering processes and defending them
Setting and measuring progress against benchmark goals for speed and efficiency
Representing the product to stakeholders, partners, and customers
Developing and evangelizing great engineering and organizational practices
Planning and managing progress on goals and projects
Collaborating with other leaders as part of the leadership team
Collaborating with leads for related or dependent products
Having an undergraduate degree in Computer Science or STEM, or a compelling narrative about an alternative educational path
Extensive management experience with confidence to set high expectations
Outstanding Linux-based software engineering track record
Drive and a track record of exceeding expectations
Excellent verbal and written communication skills in English
Public speaking and presentation skills
Experience in leading, coaching, and mentoring software developers
Organized and able to ensure timely, high-quality results from the team
Self-starting and able to deliver to schedule
Professional manner when interacting with colleagues, partners, and community
Advanced expertise in own domain of software development
Knowledge and passion for software development
Solid experience working in an agile development environment
Demonstrated drive for continual learning
Ability to build trust, relationships, and confidence
Result-oriented with a personal drive to meet commitments
Willingness to travel twice a year for up to two weeks each
Experience in a developer advocacy or community role (valued but not mandatory)
Open source community engagement and leadership (valued but not mandatory)
Ops and system administration experience (valued but not mandatory)
Performance engineering and security experience (valued but not mandatory)