[Remote] Customer Support Manager

Note: The job is a remote job and is open to candidates in USA. Chainguard is a trusted source for open source software, helping organizations build faster and stay compliant. The company is seeking a Customer Support Manager to manage the AMER Technical Support Engineering team, ensuring quality and reliability in the escalation process from customer issues to engineering resolution.ResponsibilitiesOwn the L2/L3 escalation boundary: define routing criteria, review escalation quality, and drive down unnecessary L3 load without increasing customer time-to-resolutionMaintain and improve escalation intake workflows including triage standards, ticket hygiene, and handoff artifacts for engineering partnersTrack escalation health metrics and report on trends to engineering leadership; identify capacity risks in eng teams before they become bottlenecksRun escalation retrospectives to close the loop on resolution patterns and feed signal back into product and documentationManage, coach, support and develop the AMER Technical Support Engineering team, with direct attention to technical depth and debugging rigorOperate career leveling frameworks for IC growth (L1 through L6); hold bar on promotions and ensure growth plans are actionableCoordinate AMER handoffs with APAC and EMEA peer managers to maintain follow-the-sun coverage quality: clear ownership at every handoff, with uninterrupted SLA performanceIdentify and close skill gaps proactively, particularly in Linux fundamentals, container security, and Kubernetes ecosystemsOwn the support tooling stack including ticketing systems, AI-assisted triage, and deflection toolingPartner with engineering to build and maintain LLM-assisted workflows for escalation intake, ticket quality review, and knowledge retrievalDrive adoption of AI tooling across the team; know where automation adds leverage and where it introduces riskUse support data to surface product quality signals and operational trends to engineering and product leadershipServe as the primary interface between Technical Support Engineering and product engineering teams for escalated issuesMaintain a functional relationship with Customer Success and GTM without allowing those teams to define support quality standards or escalation criteriaContribute to product feedback loops through reproducible, well-scoped bug reports and actionable pattern analysisSkills4+ years managing technical support engineers or software engineers in a production-facing environmentDemonstrated ability to design and operate an escalation process: not just follow oneTechnical credibility in the Linux ecosystem; comfortable reading logs, understanding container runtimes, and engaging with engineering teams as an active peerStrong written communication; capable of writing clear escalation summaries, retrospective reports, and leadership-facing metrics briefsTrack record of developing engineers through real feedback, structured growth plans, and calibrated performance conversationsComfort operating in a globally distributed support org with peer managers in other regions; strong handoff disciplineExperience with container security, DevSecOps tooling, Kubernetes, or open source software ecosystemsFamiliarity with Zendesk or similar ticketing platforms at an operational level (workflows, configuration, reporting)Exposure to AI-assisted support tooling, LLM-based triage, or knowledge retrieval systemsBenefitsFlexible & Remote-First Culture: Work remotely with team meetup opportunities, bi-annual destination summits, and a monthly stipend for coworking spaces, phone and internet costs.Receive stock options upon hire and promotion. Plus, you can participate in secondary offerings and have 10 years to exercise your options (yes, you read that correctly: 10 years!).We cover 100% of your health, vision and dental insurance premiums for you and your dependents. Nothing comes out of your paycheck.∞ Flexible Time Off: Take the time you need – to do our best work, we need to recharge and reset.18 Weeks Paid Parental Leave: We offer 18 weeks for birthing parents and 12 weeks for non-birthing parents, with the option to use it all at once or throughout your child's first year.Company OverviewChainguard is a cloud-native development platform that provides low-to-zero CVE container images for building and running applications. It was founded in 2021, and is headquartered in Kirkland, Washington, USA, with a workforce of 201-500 employees. Its website is https://www.chainguard.dev.