Vercel needs to operate critical systems exceptionally (latency, reliability, COGS), and align the team to product and business goals, translating strategy into a clear roadmap for their CDN, proxy, and edge caching systems.
Requirements
- 8+ years building and operating large-scale distributed systems
- 3+ years managing engineers
- Competence across HTTP, TLS, caching strategies, load shedding, capacity planning, observability, and cost optimization
- experience with Go, Lua, or Node at the edge
- running high-signal hiring pipelines
- collaborating with product/PMM on customer-facing narratives
Responsibilities
- Operate critical systems exceptionally (latency, reliability, COGS)
- Align the team to product and business goals, translating strategy into a clear roadmap
- Set direction, grow people, and create the conditions for high trust, high autonomy, and high output—balancing technical depth with strong people leadership
- Code when it’s the highest leverage (e.g., prototypes/unblocking)
- Delegation, coaching, and alignment
- Leading CDN/proxy/caching/edge or similar high-throughput, low-latency infrastructure
- Translating business goals into technical strategy and drive cross-org alignment
Other
- Hybrid (San Francisco)
- Full Time
- managing managers a plus
- Track record establishing trust, psychological safety, and clear expectations; skilled at timely, candid feedback
- Strong facilitator in technical conflict—you listen, synthesize, decide, and bring the team with you
