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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Build Master

💰 $90,000 - $160,000

EngineeringDevOpsBuild & ReleasePlatform

🎯 Role Definition

The Build Master is the subject-matter expert for all build, packaging, continuous integration, and release automation activities. This role owns end-to-end build pipelines, artifact promotion, reproducible builds, and deployment automation across development, QA, staging, and production environments. The Build Master partners closely with software engineering, QA, security, and platform teams to enforce build best practices, optimize pipeline performance, and reduce time-to-deploy while ensuring compliance and reliability.

Core keywords: Build Master, Build & Release, CI/CD, Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Artifactory, Docker, Kubernetes, release management, automation, DevOps.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Build Engineer / Build & Release Engineer
  • DevOps Engineer or Continuous Integration Engineer
  • Software Engineer with strong automation experience

Advancement To:

  • Senior Build Master / Principal Build & Release Engineer
  • Release Manager / Director of Release Engineering
  • Platform Engineering Lead or Head of DevOps

Lateral Moves:

  • Site Reliability Engineer (SRE)
  • Automation Architect / Infrastructure Automation Engineer

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Design, implement, and operate robust CI/CD pipelines and build systems (Jenkins, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Azure DevOps, TeamCity) that support multiple product lines and deliver consistent, reproducible builds across environments.
  • Own the release lifecycle: orchestrate build, package, promote, and deploy processes; maintain release calendars, manage cutover windows, and ensure coordination across engineering, QA, security, and product teams for every release.
  • Build and maintain artifact repositories and promotion policies using Artifactory, Nexus, or equivalent, enforcing checksum, immutability, retention, and metadata tagging best practices for traceability.
  • Implement pipeline-as-code and infrastructure-as-code solutions (YAML pipelines, Jenkinsfiles, Terraform, CloudFormation, Pulumi) to ensure versioned, auditable, and reproducible pipeline configurations.
  • Automate end-to-end build and deployment workflows including compilation, static code analysis, unit/integration test execution, container builds, and multi-environment deployments with robust rollback strategies.
  • Integrate automated test suites into CI pipelines and ensure build failures are actionable; work with QA to optimize test execution and parallelization to reduce CI duration and improve feedback loops.
  • Develop and maintain containerization and orchestration build patterns (Dockerfile best practices, multi-stage images, Kubernetes manifests/Helm charts, Kustomize) and automate image builds and promotions.
  • Create and maintain build and release documentation, runbooks, and onboarding guides to enable developer self-service, reduce build flakiness, and support on-call rotations.
  • Troubleshoot and resolve complex build failures, dependency resolution issues, pipeline bottlenecks, and environment drift; conduct root cause analysis and implement long-term fixes and preventative measures.
  • Maintain, upgrade, and secure build infrastructure (Jenkins masters/agents, runners, build VMs, container registries); manage capacity planning, resource scaling, and agent provisioning strategies.
  • Implement and enforce branching, tagging, and versioning strategies across multiple repositories and mono-repo setups; advise teams on Git workflows, merge policies, and release branching models.
  • Design and implement secure signing, artifact verification, and supply chain security controls (SLSA-like controls, SBOMs, scanning integrations) into the build and release process.
  • Monitor and measure CI/CD health and performance using KPIs (build success rate, lead time, MTTR, pipeline duration); present metrics and continuous improvement plans to engineering leadership.
  • Collaborate with security and compliance teams to implement vulnerability scanning, license compliance, secret scanning, and hardening steps in build pipelines and artifacts.
  • Implement feature flag integration and progressive delivery strategies (canary releases, blue/green deployments, A/B) to enable low-risk, incremental rollouts.
  • Maintain and evolve deployment automation for cloud and on-prem platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure, VMware); coordinate infrastructure changes with platform and operations teams.
  • Build tooling and lightweight orchestration to accelerate developer workflows: pre-commit hooks, local build wrappers, dependency caching, and reproducible environment tooling (dev containers, Vagrant).
  • Provide 24/7 on-call support for critical production build and release incidents, lead post-incident reviews, and drive remediation and process improvement.
  • Mentor and train engineering teams on CI/CD best practices, pipeline optimization, and build hygiene; evangelize automation and developer productivity improvements across the organization.
  • Evaluate and integrate third-party CI/CD and DevOps tooling, drive vendor evaluations, cost-benefit analysis, and manage upgrade/migration plans to minimize disruption.
  • Coordinate cross-team release readiness checks, sign-offs, and change advisory board (CAB) submissions when required; ensure rollback plans and disaster recovery procedures are tested and documented.
  • Lead migration and consolidation projects (e.g., consolidating multiple CI systems, migrating to cloud-native pipelines), including planning, execution, communication, and validation steps.
  • Implement and maintain caching, artifact promotion strategies, and dependency resolution improvements to dramatically reduce build times and network overhead.
  • Participate in sprint planning and roadmap discussions to ensure build system improvements and technical debt remediation are prioritized and delivered.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory data analysis.
  • Contribute to the organization's data strategy and roadmap.
  • Collaborate with business units to translate data needs into engineering requirements.
  • Participate in sprint planning and agile ceremonies within the data engineering team.
  • Provide periodic training sessions and brown-bag demos to engineering teams on new build features or process changes.
  • Maintain vendor relationships for CI/CD tooling and ensure licensing compliance and cost optimization.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Deep expertise with CI/CD platforms: Jenkins, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Azure DevOps, TeamCity, or Bamboo.
  • Strong version control mastery: Git workflows, branching strategies, submodules/monorepo mechanics, and merge policies.
  • Artifact repository management: JFrog Artifactory, Sonatype Nexus, Docker registries; policies for retention, promotion, and immutability.
  • Containerization and orchestration: Docker, Kubernetes, Helm, Kustomize, and container registry integrations.
  • Infrastructure as Code: Terraform, CloudFormation, Pulumi for provisioning build infrastructure and deployment targets.
  • Scripting and automation: Python, Bash, Groovy, PowerShell, and pipeline DSLs for custom integrations and build logic.
  • Build tools and ecosystems: Maven, Gradle, npm/Yarn, pip, dotnet CLI; experience optimizing dependency resolution and build caches.
  • Cloud platform familiarity: AWS/GCP/Azure for deploying build agents, registries, artifact stores, and deployment targets.
  • Configuration management and deployment automation: Ansible, Salt, Chef, or equivalent.
  • Monitoring and telemetry: Prometheus, Grafana, ELK/EFK, Datadog for CI/CD system health and release analytics.
  • Security and compliance tooling: SCA tools (Snyk, Dependabot, WhiteSource), container scanning (Clair, Trivy), and secret scanning.
  • Knowledge of release engineering practices: semantic versioning, changelog generation, release notes automation, and rollback strategies.
  • Database and migration awareness: awareness of how releases affect schema changes and DB migration coordination.
  • Experience with build farm management: autoscaling agents, resource pools, caching strategies, and cost optimization.

Soft Skills

  • Strong communication skills: able to explain complex CI/CD concepts to engineers and non-technical stakeholders.
  • Collaborative mindset: proven ability to work cross-functionally with dev, QA, security, and product teams.
  • Problem solving and debugging: methodical root cause analysis and pragmatic, durable fixes.
  • Project management and prioritization: manage competing release priorities and technical debt remediation.
  • Mentorship and training: coach engineering teams on best practices and foster a culture of automation.
  • Attention to detail: thorough documentation, audit trails, and compliance-oriented delivery.
  • Adaptability: comfortable working in fast-paced, evolving toolchains and organizational changes.
  • Stakeholder management: align release schedules and manage expectations across teams and leadership.
  • Audit and compliance orientation: precise adherence to processes for regulated environments.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems, or related technical discipline (or equivalent practical experience).

Preferred Education:

  • Master's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or related field, or industry certifications (Certified Jenkins Engineer, AWS DevOps Engineer, Kubernetes CKA).

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Computer Science
  • Software Engineering
  • Information Systems
  • Cloud Computing
  • DevOps / Platform Engineering

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range:

  • 4+ years working in build & release engineering, CI/CD engineering, DevOps, or platform automation roles.

Preferred:

  • 6+ years of progressive experience owning build systems and CI/CD platforms at scale (enterprise or fast-growing product companies), with demonstrable experience leading migrations, architecting pipeline-as-code, and optimizing developer workflows.
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