Team Lead, Infra (Giger)

Who we are is what we do. Deel is the all-in-one payroll and HR platform for global teams. Our vision is to unlock global opportunity for every person, team, and business. Built for the way the world works today, Deel combines HRIS, payroll, compliance, benefits, performance, and equipment management into one seamless platform. With AI-powered tools and a fully owned payroll infrastructure, Deel supports every worker type in 150+ countries—helping businesses scale smarter, faster, and more compliantly.

Among the largest globally distributed companies in the world, our team of 7,000 spans more than 100 countries, speaks 74 languages, and brings a connected and dynamic culture that drives continuous learning and innovation for our customers.

As the fastest-growing Software as a Service (SaaS) company in history, Deel is transforming how global talent connects with world-class companies – breaking down borders that have traditionally limited both hiring and career opportunities. We're not just building software; we're creating the infrastructure for the future of work, enabling a more diverse and inclusive global economy.

The Giger team builds and maintains one of Deel's most powerful internal platforms: a sandbox system that enables engineers to develop, test, and deploy faster than ever. Giger allows product teams to spin up fully functional, production-like environments in minutes, complete with real databases, services, queues, and storage. Each sandbox is completely isolated, empowering teams to experiment freely, test infrastructure changes, and validate code safely at scale.

As Team Lead of the Giger team at Deel, you will lead a focused team of 6-8 engineers distributed across the globe, with an equal balance of leadership and hands-on technical work. You will drive the technical vision for our developer sandbox platform, mentor your team, and own the architecture and execution of one of Deel's most strategically important internal products.

Get Ready To

• Serve as a leader of a strong distributed team driving decision-making, architecture reviews and ensuring day-to-day operations.
• Provide mentorship and technical guidance, fostering growth and skill development within the team.
• Ensure best practices in development, testing, and deployment, driving innovation and excellence.
• Manage on-call shifts and provide support for engineering in dedicated channels.
• Own, maintain and ensure stability of the platform for developer sandboxes from control plane to the underlying infrastructure within each sandbox.

Strategize and Execute for Impact:

• Define and drive the technical roadmap for the Giger platform in alignment with organizational goals.
• Lead innovation in developer sandbox infrastructure: faster spin-up, smarter resource utilization, better observability, richer self-service capabilities, cell-based multi-region architecture.
• Represent Giger in cross-functional discussions, aligning platform capabilities with business objectives.
• Make principled architectural decisions on cost, scalability, and reliability at scale.

Build Teams and Foster Culture:

• Manage performance cycles, provide structured feedback, and support the professional growth of team members.
• Cultivate a culture of collaboration, inclusion, continuous learning, and engineering excellence.
• Champion diversity and foster an environment where all team members thrive.
• Hire selectively as the team grows, partner with recruiting on the current open roles.

Lead Cross-Functional Collaboration:

• Work closely with DevOps, DBA and InfoSec teams to align on organizational goals.
• Coordinate efforts across teams to drive complex projects and ensure shared objectives are met.
• Communicate technical challenges, opportunities, and solutions effectively to stakeholders.
• Resolve complex, multi-team technical challenges by fostering collaboration across disciplines.

What You’ll Bring:

• 10+ years of professional software engineering experience with expertise in Node.js, JavaScript/TypeScript or Go/Python.
• 5+ years of experience in infrastructure: AWS/GCP, Kubernetes, Helm, GitOps, CNCF landscape.
• 3+ years of experience managing and mentoring engineers, with a proven ability to lead cross-functional distributed teams of 6+ people across multiple timezones.
• Experience with Postgres/MySQL.
• Experience with Nats/Kafka and building event-driven architectures on top of it.
• Proven experience in designing and architecting distributed systems with high-performance, scalability, and availability demands.
• Experience operating Kubernetes clusters at scale (1000+ nodes, 30k+ pods).
• Excellent communication skills, both written and verbal.

You’re the Leader We’re Looking For if You:

• Thrive in environments requiring both technical expertise and leadership.
• Combine strategic vision with attention to detail in decision-making.
• Demonstrate a commitment to collaboration, continuous learning, and team success.
• Drive innovation while balancing immediate goals with long-term technical health.

Total Rewards:

Our workforce deserves fair and competitive pay that meets them where they are. With scalable benefits, rewards, and perks, our total rewards programs reflect our commitment to inclusivity and access for all.

At Deel, we're an equal-opportunity employer that values diversity and positively encourages applications from suitably qualified and eligible candidates regardless of race, religion, sex, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability status, pregnancy or maternity or other applicable legally protected characteristics.