Staff Technical Writer, Cockroach Labs
$149-196k
+ Stock options
More information about location
Office located in New York, NY
Cloud-native, distributed SQL database
Be an early applicant
Cloud-native, distributed SQL database
501-1000 employees
Be an early applicant
$149-196k
+ Stock options
More information about location
Office located in New York, NY
501-1000 employees
Company mission
Cockroach Labs' mission is to make data easy by providing an industry-leading model for resilience, horizontal scalability to accommodate fast-growing businesses, and the ability to move data close to business' customers, wherever they reside across the globe.
Role
Who you are
- Experience with computer systems across layers (compute, OS, networking, distributed systems) and container orchestration
- Experience with Unix/Linux, public cloud services, databases, APIs, and infrastructure as code
- Experience with Git and docs-as-code workflows
- 8+ recent years of experience producing documentation for technical audiences
- A demonstrated ability to learn complex technical concepts quickly and independently
- A track record of successful collaboration with cross-functional teams
What the job involves
- We're seeking a highly experienced technical writer to join our world-class Documentation team
- You will own and drive the documentation strategy for CockroachDB deployment and operations across self-hosted and cloud environments, creating outstanding content that is essential to the success of our customers and teams
- Your experience with Linux systems, networking, security, cloud providers, and general system administration positions you to deeply understand our users' needs – whether they're running self-hosted CockroachDB or provisioning and managing Cloud clusters
- You'll use this understanding to develop comprehensive documentation that spans how-to guides, tutorials, and reference materials
- As a senior member of the team, you'll share technical knowledge and drive documentation initiatives, working closely with engineers, product managers, enterprise architects, and others to align our content with user needs and company goals
- Take ownership of deployment and operations documentation, planning and prioritizing improvements that serve our users' evolving needs
- Partner closely with engineering teams and product managers to develop deep product expertise and translate complex technical concepts into clear, actionable guidance
- Create content that enables enterprise architects, operators, and admins to effectively evaluate, implement, and maintain CockroachDB in both self-hosted and Cloud environments
- Guide users in integrating CockroachDB with their existing infrastructure and operations practices
- Help define and evolve the team's processes and style conventions
- Share your knowledge and expertise with other writers, contributing to the team's growth and success
- In your first 30 days, you’ll follow a custom onboarding plan authored by your manager, which includes Cockroach University course material, review of internal documentation, information sessions about our product and company, hands-on time with the product, and discussions with your manager and colleagues
- We believe that it's important to take this first month to become familiar with our technology and our company, so you will use CockroachDB throughout this period and beyond
- During this initial onboarding, you will develop enough expertise to begin your first documentation project
- You will also start to review and edit documentation written by other technical writers on the team
- You’ll also get to know the product managers and engineering teams with whom you’ll work most closely, gaining an understanding of their focus and roadmaps
- Within about three months, you'll be fully integrated into the team, owning the docs roadmap for your area
- You will also begin contributing to efforts related to documentation conventions, processes, and tools to help increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the team
- Management: This role reports to Mike Lewis, a manager on the Documentation team
- Mike has worked as a tech writer across various industries and products
- He enjoys supporting writers as they develop their skills and address challenges they encounter as they work to improve customer experiences
- Outside work, Mike enjoys spending time with family and hobbies related to music and technical learning
- Org structure: Cockroach Labs has a centralized Docs Team in the Education Department, which is part of the Product Division
- The team is supported by Documentation Engineers, whose work on tooling and automation improves the team’s efficiency as well as the end-user experience
- Collaboration: Docs team members are embedded with product engineering teams, working closely with product managers and engineering leads to plan and deliver docs content for their product areas
- The Docs Team meets weekly to discuss matters of shared interest
- Engineers and product managers provide subject-matter expertise and technical reviews
- Writers provide peer reviews for each other.Growth: Team management maintains an internal Competencies table to provide a shared basis for team member leveling and to enable managers to focus on growth opportunities with each writer
- Culture: Cockroach Labs continually works to foster an environment of respect among team members, with open communication, high achievement, and work-life balance
- Within the company, the Docs team is valued for the support our content and expertise provides to the business
Our take
Cockroach Labs was founded by a team of ex-Google employees who wanted to build a database management system similar to Google’s Spanner. The result is CockroachDB, an open-source distributed SQL database. It offers local or global scaling with familiar SQL, failproof fault tolerance, and guaranteed transaction consistency, and can be deployed across any cloud.
Maintaining full SQL compliance with global cloud capabilities will help Cockroach Labs take advantage of the wave of companies needing to scale their existing SQL databases onto the cloud. Cockroach Labs grew from a $2 billion valuation to $5 billion in under a year, proving itself as an enticing and approachable prospect in this developing sector.
It already commands a high-end raft of clients including Comcast, Bose, and Baidu - but competition is stiff, particularly with industry giants like Oracle and AWS. Its hope is that CockroachDB’s high failure tolerance and geo-distribution will provide attractively swift functionality whilst allowing customers to remain within their legal jurisdictions - and will prove pivotal in 5G use cases. Its success to date, targeted updates to ease network migrations, and its recent expansion into EMEA markets, suggest it has a strong shot.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
Company
Funding (last 2 of 7 rounds)
Dec 2021
$278m
SERIES F
Jan 2021
$160m
SERIES E
Total funding: $633.2m
Company benefits
- Employee referral bonus + donation match
- Connect and Contribute days
- Flexible Working
- Spring Health and an Employee Assistance Program to provide free counseling and support mental health
- $2500 annually to support learning and development through workshops, conferences, and networking events
- We dedicate company time to bond over everything from trivia and karaoke to paint-alongs and fitness classes
- Flexible Time Off
- 100% health insurance coverage & One Medical membership
- Gym discounts & free Citibike membership
- FSA
- 401(k)
- 12 weeks of paid parental leave & $500 in baby bucks
- Relocation Support
Company values
- Commit to Excellence
- Respect Each Other
- Establish Balance
- Communicate Openly & Honestly
Company HQ
Chelsea, New York, NY
Articles
Leadership
Spencer Kimball
(Co-founder & CEO)Worked at WeGo Systems as CTO for 3 years before joining Google as a Software Engineer for almost 10 years. Also, previous CTO of Viewfinder and Engineer at Square.
Peter Matiss
(CTO)Previously Software Engineer at Square, Co-Founder at Viewfinder and Software Engineer at Google.
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