Senior Manager, Enterprise Container Platform (Kubernetes) Engineering

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Date: Apr 9, 2026

Location: Chicago, IL, US, 60607

Company: McDonald's Corporation

Company Description: 

McDonald’s growth strategy, Accelerating the Arches, encompasses all aspects of our business as the leading global omni-channel restaurant brand. As the consumer landscape shifts we are using our competitive advantages to further strengthen our brand. One of our core growth strategies is to Double Down on the 3Ds (Delivery, Digital and Drive Thru). McDonald’s will accelerate technology innovation so 65M+ customers a day will experience a fast, easy experience, whether at one of our 25,000 and growing Drive thrus, through McDelivery, dine-in or takeaway.  

McDonald’s Global Technology is here to power tomorrow’s feel-good moments.   

That’s why you’ll find us at the forefront of transformative technology, exploring new and innovative ways to serve our millions of customers and spread happiness one delicious Hot Fudge Sundae-dipped fry at a time. Using AI, robotics and emerging tech, we’re digitizing the Golden Arches. Combine that with our unparalleled global scale, and we’re reshaping all areas of the business, industry and every community that is home to a McDonald’s restaurant. We face complex tech challenges every day. But that’s where our diverse and talented teams come in. They’re made up of the best and brightest from all over the globe, and they thrive in the space where feel-good meets fast-paced.   

Check out the McDonald’s  Global Technology Technical Blog to learn how technology and our global team are directly enabling the Accelerating the Arches strategy.  

Department Overview

We are seeking a highly skilled and experienced Senior Manager, Enterprise Container Platform (Kubernetes) Engineering  to lead the container solutions (Kubernetes) strategy, architecture, design and delivery of enterprise-scale. This role is responsible for driving Kubernetes platform maturity, reliability, security, and developer enablement while leading a high‑performing team of platform and SRE engineers. The ideal candidate will have over 10 years of industry experience, with a strong background in cloud technologies, DevOps methodologies, and team leadership.  The candidate combines deep technical expertise in Kubernetes and cloud-native platforms with strong leadership, communication, and stakeholder management skills, and has experience operating container platforms at global enterprise scale.

This is a great opportunity for an experienced technology leader to help build and champion the transformation of infrastructure practices and standards for the entire McDonald’s environment.

Duties

Container Solutions Architecture & Strategy: 

  • Own the strategy, architecture, and roadmap for Kubernetes-based container platforms (with strong emphasis on GKE, including Autopilot and Standard).
  • Champion Container as a Service (CaaS), Infrastructure as Code (IaC) principles, CI/CD pipelines, and containerization technologies (Docker, Kubernetes). 
  • Lead the design, deployment, and operations of highly available, secure, and scalable Kubernetes clusters across multiple cloud environments.
  • Establish and enforce platform standards, operational best practices, and governance for containerized workloads.
  • Architect and implement scalable, highly available, and cost-effective solutions on public cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, preferably GCP). 
  • Define and implement best practices for cloud security, cost management, and performance optimization. 
  • Partner with cloud engineering, networking, and security teams to ensure seamless platform integration.

DevOps Automation: 

  • Embed security-by-design practices, including IAM, workload identity, policy-as-code, image security, and compliance requirements.
  • Ensure platform readiness for enterprise compliance frameworks (e.g., SOC, SOX, internal security standards).
  • Drive the automation of infrastructure provisioning, configuration management, and deployment pipelines using modern DevOps tools (Terraform, Ansible, Jenkins, etc.). 
  • Collaborate with cross-functional teams to streamline workflows and improve the software release lifecycle. 
  • Champion SRE principles to enable self-service capabilities for development teams through standardized CI/CD, GitOps, and infrastructure-as-code patterns.
  • Drive adoption of GitOps (e.g., Argo CD), observability, and automation to improve developer productivity and release velocity.
  • Partner with application, DevSecOps, and product teams to modernize workloads and accelerate cloud-native adoption.

People & Stakeholder Leadership: 

  • Lead, mentor, and grow a team of Kubernetes, platform, and SRE engineers.
  • Collaborate with senior technology leaders, architects, security, and business stakeholders to align platform capabilities with business objectives.
  • Communicate complex technical concepts clearly to executive and non‑technical audiences.
  • Work closely with product managers, architects, and business leaders to align cloud and DevOps strategies with organizational goals. 
  • Manages a strategically important technology product, and/or suite of DevSecOps products with significant business impact. Owns the definition of the product(s) roadmap. 
  •  Drive cloud migration initiatives, ensuring minimal disruption and maximum operational efficiency. 

Act as a subject matter expert (SME) for cloud technologies, providing technical guidance to senior leadership. 

Qualifications

Technical Expertise: 

  • 10+ years of experience in cloud, infrastructure, or platform engineering roles.
  • 5+ years of hands-on experience leading Kubernetes/container platforms at scale.
  • Deep expertise in Google Cloud Platform, with strong hands-on knowledge of GKE.
  • Working knowledge of AWS EKS and/or Azure AKS.
  • Strong expertise in cloud platforms like AWS (Amazon Web Services), Azure, or Google Cloud Platform (GCP). 
  • Extensive experience in DevOps practices, CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure automation, and containerization technologies (Docker, Kubernetes). 
  • Expertise in Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tools like Terraform, CloudFormation, Ansible, or similar. 
  • Solid understanding of cloud-native application architectures and microservices. 
  • Experience in managing cloud infrastructure cost optimization, monitoring, and performance tuning. 

Certifications: 

  • GCP Associate Cloud Engineer, AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional, or equivalent certification is mandatory. 
  • Additional certifications in DevOps, Kubernetes, or cloud security are a plus. 

Leadership & Soft Skills: 

  • Proven track record of leading and managing large, cross-functional teams in an agile and fast-paced environment. 
  • Strong communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to influence and build relationships with senior leadership. 
  • Ability to think strategically, with a strong understanding of business needs and how cloud technologies can support organizational goals. 
  • Decomposes significantly complex problems into straight-forward solutions. Consistently brings strong, data-driven business, and technical judgment to decisions. 
  • Identifies core problems or opportunities within business processes. Understands the root cause and impacts for the project and other teams. 
  • Removes bottlenecks to enable your team(s) to work independently. Drives team members to proactively identify gaps and opportunities (e.g., services, workflows, tooling) within or between markets and other parts of the organization. 

Invests time to coach junior technical product managers to refine their capabilities and close skill gaps. Works closely with technical product managers and leads by example.

Compensation

Bonus Eligible: YES

Long - Term Incentive: YES

Benefits Eligible: YES

Salary Range

The expected salary range for this role is $152,678.00 - $190,847.00 per year
 
The above represents the expected salary range for this job requisition. Ultimately, in determining your pay, we may also consider your experience, and other job-related factors.

Additional Information: 

Benefits eligible: This position offers health and welfare benefits, a 401(k) plan, adoption assistance program, educational assistance program, flexible ways of working, and time off policies (including sick leave, parental leave, and vacation/PTO). Eligibility requirements apply to some benefits and may depend on job classification and length of employment.  

Bonus eligible: This position is eligible for a bonus, calculated based on individual and company performance. 

Long term Incentive eligible: This position is eligible for stock or other equity grants pursuant to McDonald’s long-term incentive plan. 

McDonald’s is an equal opportunity employer committed to the diversity of our workforce. We promote an inclusive work environment that creates feel-good moments for everyone. McDonald’s provides reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities as part of the application or hiring process or to perform the essential functions of their job. If you need assistance accessing or reading this job posting or otherwise feel you need an accommodation during the application or hiring process, please contact mcdhrbenefits@us.mcd.com. Reasonable accommodations will be determined on a case-by-case basis. 

McDonald’s provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to sex, sex stereotyping, pregnancy (including pregnancy, childbirth, and medical conditions related to pregnancy, childbirth, or breastfeeding), race, color, religion, ancestry or national origin, age, disability status, medical condition, marital status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, transgender status, protected military or veteran status, citizenship status, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training. 

Nothing in this job posting or description should be construed as an offer or guarantee of employment. 


Nearest Major Market: Chicago