Flaky builds are the #1 blocker engineers report. Our AI agent strategy is blocked because agents can't trust the build. We need someone to fix all of that.
We're hiring a Staff Engineer to own CI/CD infrastructure on the QualityOps team at Automattic. You'll own the systems that keep 1,500+ people shipping fast and confidently across products that power 40% of the web. The CI pipelines, test reliability, build tooling, merge queues, and developer productivity. This is a hands-on Staff IC role: you fix things before others notice they're broken.
What you’ll do:- Own the build → test → deploy pipeline. Profile each stage to find where time goes, tune runner concurrency so builds don't queue, and fix caching so nothing rebuilds from scratch unnecessarily. You enjoy the archeology of modernizing long-running build systems.
- Eliminate flakiness. Dig into flaky tests, race conditions, and parallelism side effects in PHP and JavaScript test suites until green means green.
- Curate the test suite for speed. Aggressively prune tests that don't test anything, speed up tests that are unnecessarily slow, and enforce quality gates on what gets added.
- Improve developer experience by walking the floor. Find what slows engineers down and fix it before they ask. Track build times, help teams write faster tests, and provide frameworks so engineers can improve CI on their own. Force multiplier, not bottleneck.
- Build release tooling: deploy pipelines, pre-release test gating, and build automated steps that replace manual coordination.
- Make AI agents work better: CI reliable enough that agents can open PRs, run tests, and merge without human intervention.
- Own merge queue reliability. Coordinate how code lands in trunk—manage queue health, conflict resolution, and throughput so engineers aren't blocked waiting for merges.
- You lead by shipping, not by planning. You thrive on solving technical bottlenecks.
- Deep experience with CI/CD systems: TeamCity, Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Buildkite, or similar. You've profiled a slow pipeline and shipped the fix—not just provisioned the infratructure it runs on.
- Strong in at least two of: PHP, JavaScript/TypeScript, Python, Go, Bash.
- Track record of improving build or test reliability at scale. You've made a CI pipeline meaningfully faster and can show the before/after—with the metrics to prove it.
- Comfortable debugging flaky tests, parallelism issues, and infrastructure edge cases. You've eliminated flakiness in a large test suite and can talk about what you learned.
- Fluent with AI-assisted development workflows. You use tools like Claude Code or Copilot daily, and can lead others in adopting AI for testing, triage, and infrastructure work.
- Metrics-driven approach with quantifiable impact. You don't just fix things. You prove they're fixed with dashboards and data.
- Clear async communicator. You document decisions, work across time zones, and don't need someone checking on you.
- Public technical output: open-source repos, blog posts, and conference talks about CI/CD or developer tooling.
- A history of breaking a stagnant CI culture and restoring engineering trust in the build.
Salary range: $70,000-$170,000 USD. Please note that salary ranges are global, regardless of location, and we pay in local currency.
We are searching for high-caliber candidates with the skills and qualities to have a net positive for Automattic. Pay will reflect the potential contribution and the impact you can bring, which may, in some cases, go beyond the range stated.
We’re pleased to offer a straightforward, competitive base salary, providing financial clarity without complex variable components. This isn’t your typical work-from-home job: we are a fully-remote company with an open vacation policy. To see a full list of benefits by country, consult our Benefits Page. And check out these links to learn more about How We Hire and What We Expect from Ourselves. #LI-Remote
About Automattic
Now in our 20th year, we’re the people behind WordPress.com, WooCommerce, Beeper, Tumblr, Simplenote, Jetpack, Longreads, Day One, PocketCasts, and more. We believe in making the web a better place.
We’re a distributed company with more than 1500 Automatticians in nearly every corner of the globe, speaking over a hundred different languages. Enriched by this diversity, we’re united by a singular mission: to democratize publishing, commerce, and messaging so anyone with a story can tell it, anyone with a product can sell it, and everyone can manage their communications from a single source. In short, we help maintain a balance in society, creating and continually refining powerful tools people can use to compete fairly—regardless of income, gender, politics, language, or where they live in the world.
We believe in Open Source, and the vast majority of our work is available under the GPL. Automattic is a Most Loved Company, an Equal Opportunity employer, and Disability Confident Committed. (Here’s what that might mean for you.) If you need disability-related accommodations during the application or interview process, please fill out this form. We are committed to ensuring an accessible hiring process for all candidates. Learn more about our Employee Resource Groups.
You can track your application status and more at MyGreenhouse.
To learn about how we handle your data, please review our Privacy Policy.
All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or status as a protected veteran. View the “Know Your Rights: Workplace Discrimination is Illegal” poster here. Automattic participates in the E-Verify program in certain locations, as required by law.
Top Skills
Similar Jobs
What you need to know about the Boston Tech Scene
Key Facts About Boston Tech
- Number of Tech Workers: 269,000; 9.4% of overall workforce (2024 CompTIA survey)
- Major Tech Employers: Thermo Fisher Scientific, Toast, Klaviyo, HubSpot, DraftKings
- Key Industries: Artificial intelligence, biotechnology, robotics, software, aerospace
- Funding Landscape: $15.7 billion in venture capital funding in 2024 (Pitchbook)
- Notable Investors: Summit Partners, Volition Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, MassVentures, Highland Capital Partners
- Research Centers and Universities: MIT, Harvard University, Boston College, Tufts University, Boston University, Northeastern University, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, National Bureau of Economic Research, Broad Institute, Lowell Center for Space Science & Technology, National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories
