Sr. IT Systems Engineer, DevOps

SpaceX was founded under the belief that a future where humanity is out exploring the stars is fundamentally more exciting than one where we are not. Today SpaceX is actively developing the technologies to make this possible, with the ultimate goal of enabling human life on Mars. SR. IT SYSTEMS ENGINEER, DEVOPS SpaceX is looking for a Senior IT Systems Engineer with a focus on DevOps to join our growing team. You will own the architecture, design, implementation, and evolution of our CI/CD platforms, infrastructure automation, and reliability engineering practices at scale, including on-premise VM and Kubernetes infrastructure. This employee will be a senior member of the Information Technology IT Applications team. The ideal candidate will be a technical leader who is flexible and flourishes in a fast-paced, high-stakes environment. He or she should be a self-starter, self-motivator, and possess the ingenuity and ownership to excel at this position while mentoring others. RESPONSIBILITIES: • Architect, design, implement, and manage enterprise-scale CI/CD pipelines and platforms running on both on-premise VM infrastructure and Kubernetes clusters. • Lead automation of deployment, configuration, monitoring, and operations to drive reliability, scalability, and efficiency across hundreds of on-premise servers, VMs, and containerized environments. • Define and enforce DevOps, SRE, and release engineering best practices, standards, and security controls across on-premise VM and Kubernetes infrastructure. • Partner closely with software engineering, development, and operations teams to streamline code integration, testing, delivery, and feedback loops. • Own system performance, capacity planning, troubleshooting, and optimization of on-premise VM clusters and Kubernetes environments; drive root-cause analysis and long-term improvements. • Design, maintain, and enhance observability (logging, metrics, tracing, alerting) for on-premise infrastructure using tools such as Grafana, Prometheus, Influx, Splunk, or equivalents. • Lead high-availability, disaster recovery, and business continuity strategies for on-premise VM and Kubernetes platforms, including planning, executing, and improving routine annual disaster recovery exercises. • Administer, scale, and evolve CI/CD platforms, source control systems (e.g., GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Jenkins, Bamboo, or modern equivalents), and the supporting on-premise Kubernetes clusters or VM-based infrastructure they run on. • Propose, champion, and implement infrastructure-as-code, GitOps, and automated release processes for both VM and Kubernetes environments. • Mentor junior engineers, review designs and code, and contribute to team technical direction for on-premise infrastructure. • Evaluate and introduce new tools, platforms, and practices to improve developer productivity and operational excellence on on-premise systems. BASIC QUALIFICATIONS: • Bachelor’s degree in computer science, engineering, or information systems with 5+ years’ experience in DevOps, SRE, platform engineering, or related role, OR 10+ years’ equivalent experience. • Experience administering and scaling Linux environments (physical, virtual/on-premise VMs, and containerized/Kubernetes). • Experience administering and scaling code hosting/collaboration platforms (GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket) and CI/CD systems (Jenkins, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Bamboo, or similar) on on-premise infrastructure. • Experience designing and operating production CI/CD pipelines and automation at scale on VM and Kubernetes platforms. PREFERRED SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE: • Strong experience with observability and monitoring stacks (Prometheus, Grafana, Splunk, ELK, etc.) for on-premise VM and Kubernetes environments. • Advanced scripting and programming (Python, Bash, Go, Groovy, or similar). • Proficiency with containers and orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes) including on-premise Kubernetes distributions (e.g., kubeadm, Rancher, OpenShift, Tanzu). • Experience with configuration management and IaC (Ansible, Terraform, Chef, Puppet, or similar) for on-premise VMs and Kubernetes clusters. • Deep knowledge of Git, branching strategies, semantic versioning, and release management. • Experience with on-premise virtualization platforms (VMware vSphere, Hyper-V, KVM, or similar) and hybrid VM/Kubernetes environments. • Experience with security hardening, networking, and compliance for on-premise infrastructure. • Demonstrated ability to lead technical initiatives, influence across teams, and thrive in a fast-paced, high-ownership environment. • Excellent communication, documentation, and mentoring skills. ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS: • Willing to work extended hours or weekends as necessary. • Ability to pass Air Force background checks for Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg. COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS: Pay Range: Level 3: $155,000.00 - $215,000.00 Your actual level and base salary will be determined on a case-by-case basis and may vary based on the following considerations: job-related knowledge and skills, education, and experience. Base salary is just one part of your total rewards package at SpaceX. You may also be eligible for long-term incentives, in the form of company stock or long-term cash awards, as well as potential discretionary bonuses and the ability to purchase additional stock at a discount through an Employee Stock Purchase Plan. You will also receive access to comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage, access to a 401(k) retirement plan, short and long-term disability insurance, life insurance, paid parental leave, and various other discounts and perks. You may also accrue 3 weeks of paid vacation and will be eligible for 10 or more paid holidays per year. Employees accrue paid sick leave pursuant to Company policy which satisfies or exceeds the accrual, carryover, and use requirements of the law. ITAR REQUIREMENTS: • To conform to U.S. Government export regulat