Senior Software Development Manager, EC2 Nitro Card Software, EC2 Core Compute

About the role

To keep customer workloads secure and fast, Amazon EC2 Core Compute is hiring a Senior Software Development Manager to lead teams that build and run Nitro Card software. The Nitro Cards are one of the main building blocks of the AWS Nitro System, which all modern EC2 instances run on. These dedicated cards offload virtualization functions from the main server, so instances get practically all of the server's resources.

You will lead managers and engineers across every tenure level and keep growing as a leader of leaders. You will own part of the technical strategy for this software with the Principal Engineers. Your teams evolve this software in place across the EC2 fleet, with the goal that improvements reach customers without reboots or action on their part. Customers rely on the Nitro System to keep their instances isolated from each other and from AWS operators. That is why security is the top priority in every decision you and your teams make.

You need to understand how virtualization works, from the hardware up to the instance, well enough to judge designs, risks, and trade-offs. You use data to make decisions and to know when your teams need you. We are looking for a leader of leaders who builds strong managers, trusts their teams, and raises the bar on operations. You are eager to take stretch goals and bleeding-edge challenges.

Key job responsibilities

• Hire, develop, and promote managers and engineers across every tenure level. Raise the hiring bar, identify future leaders, and grow your managers into senior leaders.
• Own part of the technical strategy for Nitro Card software with the Principal Engineers. Turn that strategy into multi-year plans with specific yearly production deliverables, and shape your organization to deliver them. Build closed-loop mechanisms that show early when work is at risk.
• Raise the security bar of this software, including workload isolation.
• Bring this software to new EC2 platforms across Intel, AMD, and AWS Graviton processors, from design to launch. Balance time to market, performance, and cost, with security as the top priority in every decision.
• Drive safe, continuous deployment to the global EC2 fleet. Make sure your teams keep performance consistent through the life of the host.
• Lead your teams through the deepest and most challenging investigations, within the security model of the Nitro System. Turn each root cause into a lasting change in design or process.
• Help improve how we operate, maintain, monitor, and automate this software. Use AI tools to the extent the work calls for, so your teams deliver faster and with higher quality.
• Partner with hardware, virtualization, and launch teams across AWS to align roadmaps and influence how the Nitro System evolves. Write the plans and narratives that senior leadership uses to decide where we invest.

A day in the life

• Customer instances depend on Nitro Card software, so your week starts with your managers and a review of how that software runs across the fleet.
• People take a large part of your time, as you coach and support your managers and help their engineers grow.
• You review the most important designs with Principal Engineers and your managers, and you use data to decide where to invest.
• When a hard production issue comes up, you support your teams through the investigation and make sure the fix and the lesson last.
• You also write the plans that align your teams and their partners on what comes next.

Basic Qualifications

• 10+ years of engineering experience
• 5+ years of engineering team management experience
• Experience partnering with product or program management teams
• 2+ years of experience managing software development managers
• 10+ years of planning, designing, developing, and delivering software experience
• Experience leading the operations of software in production, including deployment, on-call, and incident response

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience leading organizations that build software for embedded systems, offload cards, or other dedicated infrastructure hardware in production
• Experience leading teams that build systems software, such as firmware or device software
• Experience leading organizations that operate software across a large fleet with safe, continuous deployment and live updates that preserve running customer workloads
• Understanding of virtualization security, including workload isolation
• Experience partnering with hardware and firmware teams to deliver new server platforms to production
• Experience setting a multi-year technical strategy with specific yearly production deliverables, in partnership with Principal Engineers or architects
• Experience building mechanisms that use operational data to find root causes and drive lasting design or process changes across multiple teams
• Experience using AI tools to improve how teams design, build, test, and operate software