Lead Engineer (Autoscaling)

As a Lead Engineer at Neon, your primary responsibilities include managing a remote team, removing productivity obstacles, coaching engineers, participating in code reviews, and overseeing development processes. You'll also play a crucial role in expanding the team's capabilities by interviewing and hiring talented Software Engineers who align with Neon's vision.

To qualify for the Lead Engineer position at Neon, you should have a minimum of 3 years in an Engineering Management role alongside 5 years in system coding using languages such as Go, Rust, or C. Experience with Kubernetes, distributed systems, and managing remote teams, as well as strong coaching and communication skills, are essential to succeed in this role.

Neon’s Autoscaling Team is fundamental to the delivery of cloud-native PostgreSQL by ensuring efficient compute resource allocation, adapting database containers to current workloads, and maintaining system reliability. This work allows us to provide a scalable and flexible runtime environment that meets the demands of our users.

As a Lead Engineer at Neon, you'll work with an array of cutting-edge technologies, including Kubernetes for orchestration, Docker for containerization, and tools like Grafana for monitoring purposes. A solid understanding of Linux systems is crucial, and familiarity with QEMU and GitHub will also be beneficial.

Neon has a vibrant team culture steeped in open-source principles that emphasize transparency, accountability, and proactive contribution. With a distributed workforce from over 25 countries, we thrive on diversity and collaboration, aiming to share knowledge and ideas freely to drive innovative solutions.

In managing distributed teams, it's vital to focus on clear communication, setting clear goals, and utilizing collaborative tools effectively. Highlight your strategies for overcoming time zone challenges and ensuring team cohesion, such as regular check-ins and leveraging asynchronous communication.

Effective mentoring involves establishing trust and open lines of communication. Share techniques such as regular one-on-one meetings to discuss career aspirations and provide constructive feedback, which fosters an environment where team members feel valued and motivated to grow.

When prioritizing tasks, I assess the impact and urgency of each task, aligning them with team goals. Involve your team in defining priorities and ensure that everyone understands their objectives. This promotes accountability and encourages collective ownership of project timelines.

In code reviews, I emphasize the importance of constructive feedback and collaborative improvement. Highlight your process for reviewing code meticulously while fostering a respectful environment where team members feel encouraged to participate and enhance their coding skills.

Discuss a specific challenge, detailing the context, your approach to solving it, and the outcome. Focus on your problem-solving skills and your ability to learn from setbacks, always emphasizing the importance of teamwork and collaboration in overcoming obstacles.

Ensuring high performance involves implementing monitoring tools to track system metrics and swiftly identifying bottlenecks. Describe your methods for maintaining system reliability, including load testing and proactive maintenance procedures that you employ to minimize downtime.

I focus on prioritizing refactoring tasks during sprints, allowing the team to address technical debt incrementally. Stress the importance of regularly revisiting legacy code and allocating specific time to tackle technical debt in each development cycle, which ultimately improves code quality.

Keeping abreast of technology trends involves following industry blogs, attending conferences, and engaging with open-source communities. Share your practices for continuous learning, whether that's through formal education or casual discovery through forums and networking with peers.

Discuss specific projects you've worked on that involved database or storage system development. Highlight your understanding of design principles, performance optimization techniques, and any quantitative results or improvements achieved during your work.

Promote collaboration by establishing regular virtual meetings, utilizing collaboration tools effectively, and creating a culture of openness where all team members are encouraged to share ideas. Emphasizing the importance of relationship-building activities, even in a virtual environment, is key in fostering teamwork.