Jobs · Full-time

SRE Manager at Canonical - Remote APAC & EMEA — Columbus

LocationColumbus
CompanyCanonical
Sourcejobicy
Posted2026-09-02 04:55:14

Traveler-Friendly Insight

Canonical is one of the most nomad-friendly employers in the tech world — fully remote since 2004 with 1,200+ colleagues across 80+ countries. This SRE Manager role is open to anyone in APAC or EMEA, giving you enormous geographic flexibility across two of the world's most popular regions for digital nomads.

Schedule flexibility: You'll lead a team aligned to your own timezone, which means you can base yourself almost anywhere within APAC or EMEA without the typical overlap pain. The role is async-first by design, with no fixed daily office hours. Your director may be in a different timezone entirely, reinforcing the async culture.

Travel perks worth noting: Canonical provides Priority Pass lounge access and travel upgrades for company events — a standout perk for frequent flyers. You'll attend 2–4 in-person sprints per year (up to two weeks each), which blend well with a nomadic lifestyle.

Cost-of-living comparison: While no salary is published, SRE Manager roles at globally distributed tech companies typically range $120k–$180k USD equivalent. That salary stretches very well in popular nomad hubs:

  • Tbilisi, Georgia: ~$1,500–2,000/month to live comfortably — strong visa-free access for many nationalities
  • Chiang Mai, Thailand: ~$1,200–1,800/month; Thailand's LTR Visa suits remote workers earning above a threshold
  • Lisbon, Portugal: ~$2,500–3,500/month; eligible for Portugal's Digital Nomad Visa (D8)

The $2,000/year L&D budget can fund coworking memberships or certifications while on the road.

Canonical is a leading provider of open-source software and operating systems for 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 more than 80 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.

The company is founder led, profitable and growing.

We are hiring a Site Reliability Engineering Manager aspiring for a world-class devops and gitops engineering management challenge, bringing together operations management, software engineering and product development, and team leadership in a single high-value role. You will need to be a Linux and operations expert, as well as a great manager capable of leading a high-performance team, to excel in this role.

The Information Systems team at Canonical runs services used by over 60 million Ubuntu users. Our mission is to pioneer and prove new and better approaches to large-scale IS. We support Canonical and Ubuntu operations, but we also help shape Canonical's managed application service offerings, raising the bar on devops and cloud-native operations. We take infra-as-code to the next level, blazing a trail to next-generation model-driven operations. We not only aim to automate every process that underpins our business, we also share that automation as open source packages which others use to drive their own operations. From Kubernetes to the kernel and everything in-between, you will be working with the latest technologies in a fast-paced engineering environment.

We have fully distributed, home-based teams in EMEA, APAC and the Americas. You will lead a team in your time zone, and report to a global director who may not be in your time zone.

Location: This role will be based remotely in the APAC or EMEA region.

The role entails

  • Lead your team in daily agile devops practices
  • Represent the IS team to stakeholders, customers, and internal teams
  • Organize, coordinate and drive internal projects
  • Mentor engineers to improve their skills
  • Identify and measure team health indicators
  • Implement structured engineering and operations processes
  • Ensure proper team focus on priorities, milestones, and deliverables
  • Work to meet service level agreements with customer deployments around the globe
  • Deliver quality managed services in a consistent, timely manner

What we are looking for in you

  • Drive and a track record of going above-and-beyond expectations
  • Proven experience of software delivery using infrastructure as code
  • Proven experience managing devops teams for SaaS or similar offerings
  • Understanding of testing methodologies and maintainable code quality
  • Technical aptitude for understanding complex distributed systems
  • Experience with cloud topologies and technologies
  • Ability to travel twice a year, for company events up to two weeks long
  • An exceptional academic track record from both high school and university

Nice-to-have skills

  • Experience with Ubuntu system administration
  • Experience with agile software development methodologies
  • Experience working in and managing distributed teams

What we offer colleagues

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 recognize outstanding performance. In addition to base pay, we offer a performance-driven annual bonus or commission. 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.

  • Distributed work environment with twice-yearly team sprints in person
  • Personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year
  • Annual compensation review
  • Recognition rewards
  • Annual holiday leave
  • Maternity and paternity leave
  • Employee Assistance Program
  • Opportunity to travel to new locations to meet colleagues
  • Priority Pass, and travel upgrades for long haul company events

About Canonical

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 joining the company. We expect excellence - in order to succeed, we need to be the best at what we do. Most colleagues at Canonical have worked from home since its inception in 2004. Working here is a step into the future, and will challenge you to think differently, work smarter, learn new skills, and raise your game.

Canonical is an equal opportunity employer

We are proud to foster a workplace free from discrimination. Diversity of experience, perspectives, and background create a better work environment and better products. Whatever your identity, we will give your application fair consideration.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is this SRE Manager role truly fully remote?
Yes. Canonical has operated as a fully distributed company since 2004, with very few office-based roles. This position is explicitly remote within APAC or EMEA, and you'll lead a team aligned to your own timezone.
How much travel is required for this role?
Candidates must be able to travel twice a year for company events, each up to two weeks long. Canonical provides Priority Pass lounge access and travel upgrades for these trips.
What is the salary for this position?
Canonical does not publish a specific salary range. Compensation is geo-adjusted based on location, experience, and performance, with an annual review cycle and a performance-driven bonus or commission on top of base pay.
What technologies will I work with in this role?
You'll work across Kubernetes, cloud-native infrastructure, infrastructure-as-code, GitOps tooling, Linux/Ubuntu systems, and distributed SaaS operations at a large scale serving 60M+ users.
Does Canonical support professional development?
Yes. All team members receive a personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year to invest in skills, certifications, or courses.
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