--- layout: job_family_page title: "Engineering Leadership" --- ## Engineering Leadership The Engineering Leadership becomes a cross-discipline management. For example, a Senior Manager, Engineering will manage both the [Frontend](/job-families/engineering/frontend-engineer/) and [Backend](job-families/engineering/backend-engineer/) Engineering Managers. ### Senior Manager, Engineering #### Job Grade #### Responsibilities * Help your engineers grow their skills and experience * Author project plans for epics * Run agile project management processes * Conduct code reviews, and make technical contributions to product architecture as well as getting involved in solving bugs and delivering small features * Actively seek and hire globally-distributed talent * Conduct managerial interviews for candidates, and train the team to do technical interviews * Contribute to the sense of psychological safety on your team * Generate and implement process improvements * Hold regular [1:1's](/handbook/leadership/1-1/) with all members of their team * Give regular and clear feedback around the [individual's performance](/handbook/leadership/1-1/suggested-agenda-format) * Foster technical decision making on the team, but make final decisions when necessary * Draft quarterly OKRs and [Engineering KPIs](/handbook/business-ops/data-team/metrics/#engineering-kpis) * Improve product quality, security, and performance #### Requirements * Exquisite brokering skills: regularly achieve consensus amongst departments * 5 years or more experience * 2 years or more experience in a leadership role with current technical experience * In-depth experience with Ruby on Rails, Go, and/or Git, in addition to any experience required by the position's [specialty](#specialties) * Excellent written and verbal communication skills * You share our [values](/handbook/values), and work in accordance with those values * Ability to use GitLab #### Nice-to-have Requirement * Experience in a peak performance organization * Deep Ruby on Rails experience * Golang experience * Product company experience * Startup experience * Enterprise software company experience * Computer science education or equivalent experience * Passionate about open source and developer tools #### Performance Indicators Engineering Managers have the following job-family performance indicators. * [Response to Community SLO](/handbook/engineering/development/performance-indicators/#response-to-community-slo) * [Hiring Actual vs. Plan](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#engineering-hiring-actual-vs-plan) * [Team/Group Throughput](/handbook/engineering/development/performance-indicators/#throughput) * [Team/Group MR Rate](/handbook/engineering/development/performance-indicators/#mr-rate) * [Diversity](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#diversity) * [Handbook Update Frequency](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#handbook-update-frequency) * [Team Member Retention](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#team-member-retention) #### Hiring Process Candidates for this position can generally expect the hiring process to follow the order below. Note that as candidates indicate preference or aptitude for one or more [specialties](#specialties), the hiring process will be adjusted to suit. Please keep in mind that candidates can be declined from the position at any stage of the process. To learn more about someone who may be conducting the interview, find her/his job title on our [team page](/company/team). * Selected candidates will be invited to schedule a 30 minute [screening call](/handbook/hiring/#screening-call) with one of our Technical Recruiters * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 60 minute first interview with a Director of Engineering, Backend * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute second peer interview with an Engineering Manager * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute third interview with another member of the Engineering team * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute fourth interview with a member of the Product team * Finally, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute interview with our VP of Engineering * Successful candidates will subsequently be made an offer via email Additional details about our process can be found on our [hiring page](/handbook/hiring). ### Senior Engineering Manager The Senior Engineering Manager role extends the [Engineering Manager](#engineering-manager) role. #### Responsibilities - Manage up to three engineering teams - Conduct managerial interviews for candidates, and train engineering managers to do said interviews - Generate and implement process improvements, especially cross-team processes - Hold regular [1:1s](/handbook/leadership/1-1/) with team managers and skip-level 1:1s with all members of their team - Management mentorship #### Requirements - Technical credibility: Past experience as a product engineer and leading teams thereof - Management credibility: Past experience (3 to 5 years) as an engineering manager - Ability to understand, communicate and improve the quality of multiple teams - Demonstrate longevity at at least one recent job - Ability to be successful managing at a remote-only company - Humble, servant leader - Ability to use GitLab #### Nice-to-have Requirements - Be a user of GitLab, or familiar with our company - Prior Developer Platform or Tool industry experience - Prior product company experience - Prior high-growth startup experience - Experience working on systems at massive (i.e. consumer) scale - Deep open source experience - Experience working with global teams - We value diversity and inclusion in leadership - Be inquisitive: Ask great questions ### Director, Engineering The Director of Engineering role extends the [Senior Engineering Manager](#senior-engineering-manager) role. #### Job Grade The Director, Engineering is a [grade 10](/handbook/people-group/global-compensation/#gitlab-job-grades). #### Requirements * Excellent communication skills * Expert hiring manager skills and experience * A strong people management philosophy for managers and engineers * Experience managing managers * Agile project management skills * Ability to understand, communicate and improve the quality of multiple teams * Demonstrate longevity at at least one recent job * Ability to be successful managing at a remote-only company * Humble, servant leader #### Nice-to-have Requirements * Be a user of GitLab, or familiar with our company * Prior Developer Platform or Tool industry experience * Prior product company experience * Prior high-growth startup experience * Experience working on systems at massive (i.e. consumer) scale * Deep open source experience * Experience working with global teams * We value diversity and inclusion in leadership * Be inquisitive: Ask great questions ### Distinguished Backend Engineer #### Job Grade The Distinguished Engineer is a [grade 10](/handbook/people-group/global-compensation/#gitlab-job-grades). #### Responsibilities The Distinguished Backend Engineer role extends the [Staff Backend Engineer](/job-families/engineering/#staff-backend-engineer) role as the individual equivalent of a Director, Engineering. * At this level the person's contribution plays to their strength and role on the team. These contributions come in different forms such as: Ship _large_ feature sets with team, completes _feature discovery_ independently, publishes technical blogs and speaks at conferences, interfaces with customers and provides technical direction to stakeholders (Product, Sales, others) * _Generate_ technical and process improvements * Contribute to the sense of psychological safety on your team * Work cross-departmentally * Be a technical mentor for other backend engineers * Author architecture documents for epics * Hold team members accountable within their roles ### Senior Director, Engineering The Senior Director, Engineering role extends the [Director of Engineering](#director-of-engineering) role. This role is defined by the functional area(s) the person manages. #### Job Grade The Senior Director, Engineering is a [grade 11](/handbook/people-group/global-compensation/#gitlab-job-grades). #### Responsibilities * Organizational credibility: Past experience in managing an entire functional area of Engineering * Prioritization of hiring efforts to focus on areas of most need and quickly recruit top engineering talent * Motivate and communicate across multiple levels of their department * Have successful peer partnerships with other department leaders in Engineering, and cross-functionally (Product Management, sales, marketing, alliances, etc) * Provide a consistent/successful interface between Engineering Development and Product Management * Development, measurement, and management of key metrics for functional area's performance * Drive high throughput * Standardize the development process where needed, allow local differences where advantages * Help shift the organization toward CD over time ### Engineering Fellow The Engineering Fellow role extends the [Distinguished Backend Engineer](#distinguished-backend-engineer) role and is the individual contributor equivalent of a VP of Engineering. #### Job Grade The Engineering Fellow is a [grade 12](/handbook/people-group/global-compensation/#gitlab-job-grades). #### Responsibilities * Advocate for improvements to product quality, security, and performance that impact all of Engineering at GitLab. * Solve technical problems of the highest scope and complexity for the entire organization. * Exert significant influence on the overall objectives and long-range goals of GitLab. * Ensure that our standards for style, maintainability, and best practices are suitable for the unique problems of scale and diversity of use represented by the GitLab product. Maintain and advocate for these standards through code review. * Drive innovation across Engineering with a willingness to experiment and to boldly confront problems of immense complexity and scope. * Actively seek out and prioritize our toughest technical challenges with a goal of creating significant improvement for GitLab's use, ease of development, and/or technical efficiency. * Represent GitLab and its values in public communication in all aspects of our software development lifecycle and public relations. Interact with customers and other external stakeholders as a consultant and spokesperson for critical projects and aspects of our technical architecture. * Provide mentorship for Senior and Staff Engineers at the company to help them grow in their technical responsibilities and to share your great expertise across the organization. * Confidently ship immense or otherwise extremely high-impact features and improvements with minimal guidance and support from other members of the organization. * Help create the sense of psychological safety in the department ### Executive VP of Engineering #### Job Grade The EVP of Engineering is a [grade 12](/handbook/people-group/global-compensation/#gitlab-job-grades). * Drive recruiting of a world class team * Help their directors, senior managers, managers, and engineers grow their skills and experience * Measure and improve the happiness of Engineering * Make sure the handbook is used and maintained in a transparent way * _Sponsor_ technical and process improvements * _Own_ the sense of psychological safety of the department * _Set_ quarterly OKRs around company goals * _Define_ the agile project management process * Spend time with customers to understand their needs and issues * _Be accountable for_ product quality, security, and performance #### Performance Indicators * [Response to Community SLO](/handbook/engineering/development/performance-indicators/#response-to-community-slo) * [Hiring Actual vs. Plan](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#engineering-hiring-actual-vs-plan) * [Team/Group Throughput](/handbook/engineering/development/performance-indicators/#throughput) * [Team/Group MR Rate](/handbook/engineering/development/performance-indicators/#mr-rate) * [Diversity](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#diversity) * [Handbook Update Frequency](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#handbook-update-frequency) * [Team Member Retention](/handbook/engineering/performance-indicators/#team-member-retention) #### Hiring Process Candidates for this position can generally expect the hiring process to follow the order below. Note that as candidates indicate preference or aptitude for one or more [specialties](#specialties), the hiring process will be adjusted to suit. Please keep in mind that candidates can be declined from the position at any stage of the process. To learn more about someone who may be conducting the interview, find her/his job title on our [team page](/company/team). * Selected candidates will be invited to schedule a 30 minute [screening call](/handbook/hiring/#screening-call) with one of our Technical Recruiters * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 60 minute first interview with a Director of Engineering, Backend * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute second peer interview with an Engineering Manager * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute third interview with another member of the Engineering team * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute fourth interview with a member of the Product team * Next, candidates will be invited to schedule a 45 minute fifth interview with our VP of Engineering * Finally, candidates may be asked to schedule a 50 minute final interview with our CEO * Successful candidates will subsequently be made an offer via email