Software Engineering Manager - Container and Virtualisation Infrastructure
Canonical
Hirezar Summary for South African Applicants
This remote ok full time position at Canonical is open worldwide, so South Africans can apply. As a remote position, you can work from anywhere in South Africa — whether you're based in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban, or a smaller town.
Job Description
<p>Canonical is a leading provider of open source software and operating systems to the global enterprise and technology markets. Our platform, Ubuntu, is very widely used in breakthrough enterprise initiatives such as public cloud, data science, AI, engineering innovation, and IoT. Our customers include the world's leading public cloud and silicon providers, and industry leaders in many sectors. The company is a pioneer of global distributed collaboration, with 1200+ colleagues in 75+ countries and very few office-based roles. Teams meet two to four times yearly in person, in interesting locations around the world, to align on strategy and execution.</p>
<p>The company is founder-led, profitable, and growing.</p>
<p>Our mission is to build a next-generation private cloud infrastructure, combining KVM, Ceph, and SDN technologies to create a data center scale cloud that 'just works' and provides a mission-critical cloud for edge and core enterprise deployments. We're hiring engineering managers with experience in high-quality microservice architectures and high-performance team leadership who also have deep familiarity with Linux kernel, virtualisation, storage and networking.</p>
<p>LXD components span the entire software stack from low-level kernel features to the upper level management API/CLI. Our most effective engineers are fluent in all these layers, and able to anticipate the consequences of design and engineering choices elsewhere in a complex distributed system.</p>
<p>As an engineering manager at Canonical you must have a solid technical background, but your responsibility is to run an effective team and develop the colleagues you manage. You are expected to help them grow as engineers, do important work, do it outstandingly well, find professional and personal satisfaction, and work well with colleagues and the community. Technical leadership experience and a background in software engineering are necessary prerequisites for this role. You will be expected to lead, challenge, and develop engineers, positively influence the culture, facilitate technical delivery, and work with your team on strategy and execution.</p>
<p>The successful candidate will have experience leading successful, collaborative engineering teams, and demonstrate the ability to solve challenging distributed systems problems and deep knowledge of Linux.</p>
<p><em><strong>Location</strong></em>: This is a remote position available in EMEA and the Americas.</p>
<h2>What you will focus on</h2>
<ul>
<li>Lead a team of remote engineers</li>
<li>Develop talent through coaching, mentoring, feedback and hands-on career development</li>
<li>Set and manage expectations with other engineering teams, senior management, and external stakeholders</li>
<li>Advocate and advance modern software development practices</li>
<li>Participate in the engineering process through code and architectural review</li>
<li>Engage with teams at Canonical, the open source community and partners</li>
<li>Work from home with global travel for 4 to 6 weeks per year for internal and external events</li>
</ul>
<h2>What we are looking for in you</h2>
<ul>
<li>You understand modern Linux cloud computing technologies, including networking, storage, containers and K8s</li>
<li>You love developing and growing people and have a strong track record of doing it</li>
<li>You are focused on success and the delivery of timely, high quality software</li>
<li>You have a Bachelor’s or equivalent in Computer Science, STEM or similar degree</li>
<li>You have strong written and verbal technical communication skills</li>
<li>You have experience programming in C and/or Go.</li>
</ul>
<h2>What we offer you</h2>
<p>We consider geographical location, experience, and performance in shaping compensation worldwide. We revisit compensation annually (and more often for graduates and associates) to ensure we recognise outstanding performance. In addition to base pay, we offer a performance-driven annual bonus. We provide all team members with additional benefits, which reflect our values and ideals. We balance our programs to meet local needs and ensure fairness globally.</p>
<ul>
<li>Distributed work environment with twice-yearly team sprints in person</li>
<li>Personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year</li>
<li>Annual compensation review</li>
<li>Recognition rewards</li>
<li>Annual holiday leave</li>
<li>Maternity and paternity leave</li>
<li>Employee Assistance Programme</li>
<li>Opportunity to travel to new locations to meet colleagues</li>
<li>Priority Pass, and travel upgrades for long haul company events</li>
</ul>
<h2>About Canonical</h2>
<p>Canonical is a pioneering tech firm at the forefront of the global move to open source. As the company that publishes Ubuntu, one of the most important open-source projects and the platform for AI, IoT, and the cloud, we are changing the world of software. We recruit on a global basis and set a very high standard for people joi
Tips for South African Applicants
Timezone Advantage
South Africa (SAST, UTC+2) overlaps well with European business hours and has a few hours of overlap with US East Coast. Mention your timezone flexibility in your application.
Salary in Context
Even without a listed salary, international remote roles typically pay 2-3x more than equivalent local positions in South Africa due to the exchange rate advantage.
Application Tips
Tailor your CV to international standards — use a clean format, highlight remote work experience, and include your English proficiency. Many SA applicants succeed by emphasising their strong work ethic and cultural adaptability.
Load Shedding Preparedness
If you're applying for a remote role, having a backup power solution (UPS, inverter, or generator) and mobile data as a backup internet connection shows employers you're prepared for South Africa's infrastructure challenges.
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About Canonical
Canonical is a company in the Operations industry that hires remote workers from South Africa. They currently have 230 open positions on Hirezar. View all Canonical jobs →