Director of Software Engineering - Distributed Systems, Serverless - Elasticsearch

Elastic is seeking a Director of Software Engineering to lead the Elasticsearch Distributed Systems organisation (~40 engineers and managers) which focuses on how Elasticsearch provides scale, performance, and resilience, especially in the context of the Serverless offering. The Director develops and executes long-term engineering strategy for Elasticsearch's distributed systems, aligning technical priorities with product direction and business objectives. Remote US. Salary: $199,700–$379,300 USD (varies by location). Posted 2026-09-29.

• A proven track record of leading large-scale engineering organisations, including experience managing engineering managers and developing senior technical leaders. • Previous hands-on software engineering experience, with strong computer science fundamentals and substantial technical depth in distributed systems. • Extensive experience designing, building or operating complex, large-scale distributed systems, ideally involving database engines, distributed storage or large-scale data processing. • Strong understanding of distributed systems concepts, including concurrency, consistency, replication, fault tolerance, recovery and performance optimisation. • Experience establishing engineering strategy, making architectural trade-offs and delivering complex initiatives involving multiple teams and significant technical dependencies. • Strong operational experience, with a deep understanding of system reliability, production troubleshooting and the challenges of operating distributed systems at scale. • Experience partnering with senior engineering and product leaders to establish strategic priorities, allocate resources and deliver meaningful business outcomes. • A compassionate approach to leadership, with a genuine commitment to coaching, developing and supporting the people you work with.