Lead Platform Operations Engineer

Job description

Upwork Inc.’s (Nasdaq: UPWK) family of companies connects businesses with global, AI-enabled talent across every contingent work type including freelance, fractional, and payrolled. This portfolio includes the Upwork Marketplace, which connects businesses with on-demand access to highly skilled talent across the globe, and Lifted, which provides a purpose-built solution for enterprise organizations to source, contract, manage, and pay talent across the full spectrum of contingent work. From Fortune 100 enterprises to entrepreneurs, businesses rely on Upwork Inc. to find and hire expert talent, leverage AI-powered work solutions, and drive business transformation. With access to professionals spanning more than 10,000 skills across AI & machine learning, software development, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & accounting, and more, the Upwork family of companies enables businesses of all sizes to scale, innovate, and transform their workforces for the age of AI and beyond. Since its founding, Upwork Inc. has facilitated more than $30 billion in total transactions and services as it fulfills its purpose to create opportunity in every era of work. Learn more about the Upwork Marketplace at[](http://upwork.com/) and follow us on[LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/upwork),[Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/upwork),[Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/upwork/),[TikTok](https://www.tiktok.com/@upwork), and[X](https://twitter.com/upwork); and learn more about Lifted at[Go-Lifted](http://go-lifted.com/) and follow on[LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/go-lifted/). --- We are looking for an experienced, hands-on Lead Platform Operations Engineer to operate and improve the infrastructure that connects Upwork’s engineers, services, and operating environments. This role sits within Platform Operations and is responsible for the reliability, automation, lifecycle management, and operational readiness of our cloud and network infrastructure. The role will initially focus on traditional cloud infrastructure while helping establish a unified operating model across traditional infrastructure and Kubernetes-based runtime infrastructure. You will work across Platform Operations, Kubernetes Platform, Reliability Engineering, Corporate Technology, and Security to deliver safer infrastructure changes, faster recovery, less manual work, and reliable connectivity across cloud and corporate environments. ### **Responsibilities** - Operate and improve shared Cloud infrastructure across multiple providers, accounts, and environments, with a focus on availability, security, scalability, and cost efficiency. - Manage the infrastructure lifecycle, including provisioning, configuration, patching, upgrades, capacity planning, backup validation, recovery testing, and decommissioning. - Build and maintain reusable infrastructure using Terraform Enterprise or Terraform Cloud. Improve module quality, testing, versioning, policy enforcement, and drift management. - Use configuration management tools such as Chef or Ansible to maintain consistent systems and reduce reliance on manual changes. - Improve infrastructure reliability through actionable monitoring, alerting, service health indicators, operational runbooks, and tested recovery procedures. - Participate in the production on-call rotation, lead complex infrastructure incident response, and convert incident findings into preventive controls and automation. - Own and improve network infrastructure across cloud and corporate environments, including VPCs, routing, DNS, load balancing, private connectivity, segmentation, firewalls, VPNs, switching, office networks, and wireless access. - Ensure reliable and secure connectivity between employees, offices, cloud environments, platform workloads, and approved external services. - Establish consistent network architecture, observability, change management, documentation, and recovery practices in partnership with Corporate Technology and Security. - Operate EKS infrastructure end to end, including cluster and node lifecycle, autoscaling, networking, ingress, DNS, storage integration, upgrades, capacity, security, observability, and recovery. Help converge traditional cloud infrastructure and Kubernetes runtime infrastructure through common automation, lifecycle controls, reliability standards, and ownership. - Support infrastructure controls required for security reviews, audits, and SOX compliance. Ensure evidence is accurate, repeatable, and backed by durable operational processes. - Build operational tooling in Python, Go, Bash, or a comparable language to reduce manual work and improve recovery speed. - Identify recurring operational work, obsolete infrastructure, configuration drift, and unsupported systems. Drive automation, remediation, consolidation, or retirement. ### **What It Takes to Catch Our Eye** - Deep experience operating production infrastructure across multiple cloud providers, accounts, and environments. - Advanced Terraform expertise, including reusable module design, remote state, dependency management, upgrades, policy controls, and drift remediation. - Strong knowledge of Linux systems, infrastructure lifecycle management, configuration management, patching, backup, recovery, and capacity planning. - Strong network engineering experience across cloud and corporate environments, including routing, DNS, load balancing, segmentation, firewalls, VPNs, private connectivity, switching, and enterprise Wi-Fi. - Deep hands-on experience operating Kubernetes and Amazon EKS at scale, including cluster lifecycle, node groups, autoscaling, CNI networking, ingress, storage, upgrades, observability, and incident response. - Experience diagnosing failures across infrastructure, operating systems, Kubernetes, applications, and network boundaries. - Experience with infrastructure and network observability, operational dashboards, incident response, root cause analysis, and corrective action. - Strong automation and scripting skills in Python, Go, Bash, or a comparable language. - Working knowledge of security, audit, and compliance requirements in production environments. - Ability to make sound technical decisions, explain risks and tradeoffs, and influence engineers across organizational boundaries. - A record of mentoring engineers, improving operational practices, and turning recurring problems into reusable solutions. - Practical experience using AI-assisted engineering tools for troubleshooting, automation, and documentation, with appropriate review before production use. --- **Come change how the world works.** Upwork is establishing its first international operational hub in Lisbon, Portugal, and this role will require 3 days per week in office. We’re proud to offer benefits that go beyond the basics, including healthcare coverage for you and your family, life insurance, meal allowance, mental health support, a wellness reimbursement program, and an Employee Stock Purchase Plan. Upwork is committed to building a diverse, inclusive, and equitable workforce. Employment decisions are made without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or any other status protected by applicable law. We use BrightHire, an AI-enabled tool, to record interviews and summarize interview transcripts. The tool allows the interviewer to focus on the discussion and does not score or evaluate candidates or make recommendations. The interview transcripts are reviewed, and decisions are only made by humans. Candidates who prefer not to have their interview recorded through BrightHire can opt out when the interview is scheduled. To learn more about how Upwork processes and protects your personal information as part of the application process, please review our [Global Job Applicant Privacy Notice](http://upwork.com/careers/job-applicant-privacy-notice) and the [Applicant Privacy Addendum (EEA, UK, and Switzerland)](https://www.upwork.com/careers/applicant-privacy-addendum-eea-uk-and-switzerland). *The annual base salary range for this position is displayed below. The range displayed reflects the minimum and maximum salary for this position, and individual base pay will depend on your skills, qualifications, experience, and location. Additionally, this position is eligible for the annual bonus plan or sales incentive plan and eligibility to participate in our long term equity incentive program.* Annual Base Compensation €57.000—€89.000 EUR To learn more about how Upwork processes and protects your personal information as part of the application process, please review our [Global Job Applicant Privacy Notice](http://upwork.com/careers/job-applicant-privacy-notice)