Staff Technical Program Manager

GitLab GitLab · Enterprise · Germany +3 · Remote · Office of the CTO

Staff Technical Program Manager at GitLab, a DevSecOps platform company. This role drives cross-functional portfolios and programs across the engineering organization, focusing on clarity, coordination, and delivering outcomes in ambiguous environments. The role requires strong technical fluency in CI/CD, cloud infrastructure, APIs, and distributed systems, and involves partnering with senior engineering and product leaders to align priorities and execution plans. While the company embraces AI for productivity, this role is focused on program management rather than direct AI/ML development.

What you'd actually do

  1. Lead the planning, execution, and delivery of high-priority, cross-functional programs across GitLab's engineering organization.
  2. Operate at the portfolio level to identify dependencies, track progress, manage risk, and help teams deliver against defined objectives, milestones, and measurable outcomes over multiple quarters.
  3. Partner directly with Engineering Directors, Vice Presidents, Product leadership, and technical leaders to align on priorities, program goals, trade-offs, and execution plans.
  4. Create structure in ambiguous spaces by defining program frameworks, decision points, operating cadences, and communication plans that help teams move forward.
  5. Translate technical architecture discussions, infrastructure considerations, and system dependencies into clear program plans that teams can execute against.

Skills

Required

  • Proven technical program management experience, including operating at the Staff or Senior Staff level.
  • Proven success leading large, complex, cross-functional programs in a fast-paced, distributed engineering environment.
  • Strong technical fluency, with the ability to engage credibly with engineers and architects on topics such as continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD), cloud infrastructure, application programming interfaces (APIs), and distributed systems.
  • Exceptional stakeholder management skills and strong written and verbal communication, especially when working with senior engineering and product leaders.
  • Comfort using program and project management tools such as GitLab, Jira, or similar platforms to manage execution and visibility.
  • Ability to read technical discussions, identify dependencies and risks, and turn complex inputs into practical plans, milestones, and decisions.
  • Demonstrated ability to take ownership of complex programs, ask thoughtful questions, make sound decisions, collaborate constructively across teams, and move work forward in ambiguous environments.

What the JD emphasized

  • cross-functional programs
  • multiple quarters
  • ambiguity
  • senior stakeholders
  • technical program management experience
  • large, complex, cross-functional programs
  • fast-paced, distributed engineering environment
  • technical fluency
  • senior engineering and product leaders
  • complex inputs into practical plans