Senior DevOps Engineer

Job Summary

Sports Reference LLC is searching for a Senior DevOps Engineer to maintain and improve our existing CI/CD processes and infrastructure. The Engineering team currently has 19 team members consisting of developers, testers, DevOps, and a Scrum Master. Sports Reference currently serves a still growing 20m monthly users through our Reference sites, Immaculate Grid game, and our SaaS business line at Stathead.com.

Our sites are used worldwide every day by professionals and non-professionals alike. They are: Baseball-Reference.com, Basketball-Reference.com, Pro-Football-Reference.com, Hockey-Reference.com, SR/College Football, SR/College Basketball, FBref.com, Stathead.com, and ImmaculateGrid.com.

Here are a few of the services we use:
• EC2
• RDS
• VPC-client VPN
• ElastiCache
• IAM
• AWS Backup
• Cognito

To Apply

Please visit our jobs website at https://sports-reference-llc.breezy.hr/ and submit your resume and a cover letter for this position. Also, as a postscript (p.s.) to your cover letter, please include the following sentence to demonstrate that you read the job description: “Sports Reference is committed to Data Democratization.”

We will begin the phone interview process the week of August 19th. Applications arriving after this date will be collected, but will receive consideration at the discretion of the hiring manager based on the progress we have made in filling the position. We have provided a general outline of our interview process here: https://www.sports-reference.com/job-interview-process.html

Our Purpose and Values

We will be the trusted source of information and tools that inspire and empower users to enjoy, understand, and share the sports they love.

We value:
• Respect for our users, the athletes we cover, and our team;
• Craftsmanship in building tools and products
• Reliable tools and services that meet our users’ needs every day; and
• Data democratization. We publish many data sets for emerging and underserved sports. For instance, the New York Times covered our recognition of the Negro Leagues as major leagues in the summer of 2021.

To meet these expectations, we encourage team members to participate in company discussions and share new ideas, features or potential solutions to problems.

Background

As a Senior DevOps Engineer, you would be responsible for maintaining our existing infrastructure, code pipelines, and CI/CD flows. Working collaboratively with the other DevOps Engineers, you would also be responsible for improving our existing infrastructure.

Currently, the DevOps team is working to migrate our existing EC2 servers to run in Docker, and leveraging multiple AWS accounts to improve security. There is considerable work to be done developing scripts and automation to seamlessly integrate our different environments.

We’re looking for someone who can hit the ground running, having experience in areas mentioned in the qualifications and skills sections of this document. This is a senior-level role, so the expectation is that there is experience utilizing the tools mentioned or similar, and capability for quickly learning through training and self-guided learning tools and technologies that Sports Reference uses.

Goals and Tasks for Your First Year (In rough order of importance)Must-Reach Goals and Tasks

Please note that all of these initiatives are large, and what you actually work on in your first year will be whichever of these goals suit your experience best:
• Globalize AWS infrastructure by benchmarking and testing Sports Reference’s performance in non-US regions, and implement solutions to improve underperforming resources
• Implement security best practices (intrusion detection, threat detection, AWS security group standardization)
• Complete transition from Puppet/EC2-based configuration management to container-based configuration system (docker)
• Migrate homegrown systems to AWS-provided services (e.g., backup, application performance reports)

Nice-to-Reach Goals and Tasks
• Implement consistent application/infrastructure-wide secrets management
• Migrate existing build pipeline from dedicated EC2 scheduled jobs to Jenkins pipelines

Expectations
• Complete projects related to company objectives as time and skills allow
• Continue your ongoing professional development, which we will support
• Have a history of getting things done (and done well)

Qualifications and Skills

A qualified candidate will satisfy the following:
• Evidence that you are capable of meeting many of the goals listed above.
• Proficient in:
• Linux
• AWS
• Shell Scripting
• Docker
• Familiarity with (have dabbled with these or something similar):
• Terraform
• Apache
• Python
• Datadog
• Git

If you don’t think your application will have evidence that you can meet all of the ‘nice-to-reach goals and tasks’ above but still are interested in the job and otherwise qualify, please apply. Nobody checks every box—we’re looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others.

Salary

Salary range starting at $117,000 for U.S. based employees. We are a remote-first company and determine our pay range for this position based on the market rates for Philadelphia, our home base. The salary offered will be based on your experience and skill level.

For candidates outside of the United States, we will calculate a local market rate based on pay for comparable positions in that market and comparable benefits packages when possible.

Annual bonuses are variable and are tied to a percentage of the company’s end of year profits and the employee’s time worked and salary earned during the year. In the last three years, they have averaged 15% of annual salary.

Benefits

Even though we are a small company, Sports Reference has a generous benefits package.
• The total value of our benefits package is up to $30,000.
• We cover full health and dental insurance costs for full-time employees and their dependent children. We cover 70%-80% of plans for an entire family.
• We have a 401k with a match on your contributions up to 4% of your base salary. The 401k has many low cost investing options.
• We pay all premiums for company-sponsored life and long-term disability insurance for all employees.
• We provide up to $7,000/year in continuing education benefits.
• Even if you live in or near Philly, you have the option to work remotely as much as you choose. We generally work a standard workday, but with flexibility to flex hours within that framework.
• Any parent welcoming a new child to their family is entitled to 13 weeks of fully paid leave, and up to an additional 26 weeks at half-time.
• Employees begin with 18 days of PTO per year and an additional 8 paid company holidays and accrue sick leave at the rate of one day per month.
• We will generally buy you whatever equipment will make you the most productive.
• We typically will pay for reasonable moving-related expenses related to your acceptance of a position with Sports Reference. Please ask if you have any questions related to this benefit.
• We provide a $53.50/month remote work stipend to cover the cost of internet access and incidental expenses.
• For employees outside of the United States, we will work to provide equivalent benefits or additional compensation.

Other Information
• Sports Reference’s first site was launched in 2000. We have bootstrapped ourselves to 39 full-time employees and have no venture capital backing.
• We are willing to provide accommodations for candidates for whom the timing or structure of our interview process may be challenging. This may include early morning or evening interview times or provide payment to cover child care expenses if needed. If you are applying for a role where verbal communication is not a significant requirement, we may consider an alternative form of interview as is reasonably possible and suitable. Similarly if an extended period of internet connectivity is a challenge, we may consider an alternate form of interview. If we invite you to interview, please let us know of any possibly necessary accommodations.
• Our typical interview process is described at https://www.sports-reference.com/job-interview-process.html
• Sports Reference is a remote-first company. Sports Reference is located in Philadelphia and non-Philadelphia candidates will be considered on an equal footing to those who are local. Presently, all Sports Reference employees are working remotely at least some of the time. We have re-opened our office, but well over half of our team is full-time remote and those in Philly are in the office on days of their choosing.
• This is a full-time position.
• Employment at Sports Reference LLC is at-will and this position is an at-will appointment.
• Applicants are generally preferred to have a legal right to work in the United States. Please let us know in your application if you do not have the right to work in the United States. We have hired one employee located outside of the United States, so we will consider foreign applicants.
• We are a corporate sponsor of Women in Sports and Tech.
• 100% of our merchandise sales support youth sports.

Sports Reference is a growing company, and your work will be highly visible and have a definite and immediate impact (Read about us in the New York Times and The Athletic ($)). We reach over 20 million users each month and served over 2.0 billion pages in 2023.

Sports Reference provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship status, civil union status, color, discrimination, domestic partnership status, domestic violence victim status, familial status, gender, gender expression, gender identity, gender transition, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, marriage to a co-worker, mental or physical disability or illness, military service, military and veteran status, national origin (including physical, cultural, or linguistic characteristics), nationality, parental leave, pregnancy (including childbirth, breastfeeding or medical or common conditions related to pregnancy or childbirth), race (including traits that are historically associated with race, such as hair texture and protective hairstyles, including braids, locks and twists), religion, retaliation, sexual harassment, sexual or affectional orientation (actual or perceived, whether or not traditionally associated with the person’s designated sex at birth), status with regard to public assistance, transgender identity, unfavorable discharge of military status (less than “honorable” but not “dishonorable”), or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state or local laws and ordinances, or on the basis of sports franchise preferences.

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