Acknowledgement of Country
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Role highlights
- Great ongoing opportunity to build computing platforms for a global science project
- Apply your platform expertise in a unique environment
- Join a diverse team powering one of the world’s largest telescopes!
About CSIRO
As Australia's national science agency, CSIRO is solving the greatest challenges through innovative science and technology. Many of our iconic innovations were once considered impossible until someone, just like you, joined us and took on the challenge.
Visit CSIRO.au for more information.
The opportunity
The SKA-Low project is part of the SKA Observatory’s global mission to build the world’s largest and most advanced radio telescope. In Australia, SKA-Low is being developed on Wajarri Yamaji Country in remote Western Australia, combining high-performance computing, advanced networking and cutting-edge software systems to process vast volumes of scientific data. This is a unique opportunity to contribute to a globally significant, next-generation scientific infrastructure.
The Computing and Software Group delivers the core platforms and systems that underpin SKA-Low operations, including integrated control systems managing millions of variables, high-performance data processing capabilities, and large-scale distributed networks operating at extraordinary speeds. Within this broader group, the Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) team ensures these platforms are reliable, secure and scalable, supporting the long-term operation of a system designed to evolve over decades.
As a Platform Engineer, you will play a key role in the deployment, configuration, maintenance and operational support of core computing platforms and services across multiple environments, including the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre in Perth, the Integration Test Facility in Geraldton, and the SKA-Low observatory site at Inyarrimanha Ilgari Bundara, the CSIRO Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory. You will work closely with Observatory Architects, Platform and DevOps Engineers, Network Engineers, Project Managers and other domain specialists to ensure platforms and services are fit for purpose, highly available, secure and supportable.
You will apply strong platform engineering and site reliability principles to manage complex infrastructure, resolve operational challenges, improve service sustainability and contribute to technology platforms designed to evolve and operate in the long-term. This role offers the opportunity to work with high-performance computing environments, large-scale distributed systems and globally collaborative engineering teams, while helping to deliver one of the most ambitious scientific projects ever undertaken.
The ideal candidate will bring strong technical expertise, experience supporting and maintaining complex computing platforms or infrastructure environments, and a proactive approach to problem-solving and continuous improvement. Success in this role will also require strong collaboration skills, a focus on operational excellence, and the ability to work effectively across a diverse and geographically distributed stakeholder network.
If you’re passionate about building and supporting large-scale technology platforms and want to apply your expertise to a globally significant scientific project, this is a unique opportunity to be part of a team powering the future of radio astronomy – and we’d love to hear from you!
Your high-level duties will include:
- Deploying, configuring, and maintaining a consistent, integrated and unified set of computing and software platforms and services that support the operation of the SKA-Low telescope.
- Working with the SKAO SAFe® Platform and System teams to develop and maintain a globally consistent and integrated SRE response system.
- Actively contributing to the general design and implementation of the SKA-Low Technology platforms, feeding into and implementing the observatory wide platform design roadmap.
- Investigating, diagnosing and resolving platform incidents and problems, ensuring timely restoration of services and identification of root causes.
- Monitoring platform health, availability, capacity and performance, proactively identifying risks and implementing corrective actions to minimise operational impact and maximise service continuity and performance.
- Developing and maintaining operational documentation, support procedures, training materials and knowledge resources to ensure ongoing maintainability and supportability of platform services.
- Contributing to the ongoing improvement of platform engineering practices, automation capabilities, monitoring solutions and service support processes.
Role particulars
Location and office arrangements: Perth, Western Australia
Salary: AU$100K – AU$113K per annum plus up to 15.4% superannuation
Tenure & work schedule: Indefinite; Full-time, Part-time or Job-share
Reference: 103217
As the successful candidate, you will bring:
- A tertiary qualification in a relevant field such as Computer Science, Software Engineering, or related, and/or equivalent work experience.
- Experience in computer hardware and data centre infrastructure management.
- Experience in containerisation, orchestration, and automation platforms such as Kubernetes.
- Demonstrated experience with various scripting and programming languages such as Bash and/or Python, and willing to learn new ones.
- Experience in using, building or administering infrastructure provisioning tools (such as Helm, Ansible, Terraform) in a cloud environment or in a virtualized environment, such as OpenStack.
- Ability to communicate in a professional yet friendly and effective manner, both verbally and in writing, to an audience that spans a wide range of cultures and backgrounds.
For full details about this role, please review the Position Description.
Not sure if you meet all the criteria?
While it is CSIRO policy that the successful candidate must meet all the essential criteria, there are many ways to demonstrate this. Don’t let the list discourage you. If you are unsure about applying, please reach out to the contact person in the Position Description.
Setting you up for success
We are committed to providing a recruitment process that is fair, equitable and accessible to everyone. We recognise that it may be helpful for us to adjust our process to make it equitable for your individual situation. Please contact the Talent Acquisition Partner via email (see details in the Position Description), or Careers Online Team, and let us know how we can support you.
Eligibility
Applications for this position are open to all applicants – Australian/New Zealand Citizens, Australian Permanent Residents, or candidates that either hold, or would be able to obtain, a valid working visa for a specified term (visa sponsorship may be offered).
Appointment to this role is subject to provision of a national police check and may be subject to other security/medical/character requirements.
Life at CSIRO and flexible work arrangements
We work flexibly at CSIRO, offering a range of options for how, when and where you work. We can discuss flexible work arrangements with you during the recruitment process. CSIRO also offers a range of leave entitlements, benefits and career development opportunities. To find out more, visit Careers at CSIRO.
Inclusion and belonging
Solving Australia's greatest challenges takes a diversity of minds and lived experiences. We know diverse teams are more effective and deliver more innovative outcomes. As an equal employment opportunity organisation, we are committed to creating diverse and inclusive teams where people feel they belong. We recognise true diversity encompasses all ages, abilities, cultures, faiths, levels of education, genders, sexualities, diversity of thought and much more. We focus on hiring people who share our values of People First, Further Together, Making it Real and Trusted.
CSIRO holds Gold Status for the Australian Workplace Equality Index for LGBTQIA+ inclusion, and a Science in Australia Gender Equity Bronze Award.
Child safety
CSIRO is committed to the safety and wellbeing of all children and young people involved in our activities and programs. View our Child Safe Policy.
How to apply
Please apply online, and provide a CV and a detailed cover letter, responding to each of the selection criteria in detail, that best demonstrate your motivation and ability to meet the requirements of this role. Please attach your selection criteria responses to your cover letter as one document.
Applications close
20 September 2026, 11:00pm AEST
