Most companies are constantly implementing new features to stay competitive and provide a high-level user experience. However, these changes often affect IT infrastructure and produce downtime and errors, which make the software unreliable. Ideally, applications should follow a service-level agreement, which is a determined level of downtime.

That’s why the operations team work to protect the IT infrastructure by monitoring errors and implementing new guidelines for the development team. On one hand, we have developers wanting to release new features fast, and on the other hand, we have the operations team trying to keep up with all these changes.

This is where site reliability engineers enter the game and fill that gap. Instead of having the Ops team monitor infrastructure manually and alert developers, SREs create automation tools that notify developers of possible downtime or errors. This takes some weight off the ops team's shoulders and ensures that developers keep releasing new updates by maintaining the error budget (a threshold of the minimum allowable outages).

Since you’ll spend the majority of your time building automation tools, you should highlight your programming skills on your resume. Include the coding languages and tools you use for automation, such as Ruby or Javascript. Since this is a highly complex role, you should focus on including only technical skills on your resume rather than including soft skills.

Site Reliability Engineer Resume Templates

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Site Reliability Engineer (SRE)

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Template 1 of 2: Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) Resume Example

Site reliability engineers are also part of the customer service activities, not only because they are contributing to the user experience continuous improvement. Some companies include a site reliability engineer in the technical support team because they are more efficient at proving solutions. They can also gather information from user incidents to develop post-mortem research. Since the majority of your time will be spent on developing tools, you should highlight your ability to write clean code on your resume.

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A site reliability engineer (SRE) resume template focused on hard skills.

Tips to help you write your Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) resume in 2024

Mention your expertise in cloud services.

As a site reliability engineer, you should have advanced knowledge of cloud infrastructure to ensure cloud deployment automation. You should be familiar with tools like AWS and Microsoft Azure.

Also see: How To Tailor Your Resume To a Job and Write a Targeted Resume

Demonstrate your familiarity with monitoring tools

Monitoring is a big part of site reliability engineering. As an SRE, you should be constantly monitoring IT infrastructure to be aware of any errors that may arise. Some of the most popular monitoring tools are Prometheus and Solarwinds.

Also see: How To Say Basic Knowledge on a Resume

Demonstrate your familiarity with monitoring tools - Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) Resume

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Skills you can include on your Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) resume

Template 2 of 2: SRE Manager Resume Example

SRE managers lead the SRE team by creating policies and strategies to reduce the project’s downtime. They determine the best way to move forward and reduce downtime risks. SRE managers also work closely with other team members, such as operations and software engineers. You should demonstrate deep knowledge of operating systems in your resume.

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A SRE manager resume template focused on relevant industry experience.

Tips to help you write your SRE Manager resume in 2024

Indicate your incident response and post-mortem skills.

Incident response is also an important factor in the role of a site reliability manager. This is a set of procedures used for responding to errors or incidents in the IT infrastructure. Post-mortem, on the other hand, is the process of documenting, evaluating, and learning from these incidents to prevent them from happening again.

Also see: Find Hard Skills To Include In Your Resume

Indicate your incident response and post-mortem skills. - SRE Manager Resume

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Mention your familiarity with Agile principles on your resume.

Agile is a set of principles that improve productivity and scalability in software engineering projects. It is not usually a mandatory requirement, but it’s definitely a plus in your SRE manager resume.

Also see: How To Say Basic Knowledge on a Resume

Skills you can include on your SRE Manager resume

Site Reliability Engineer Resume Tips

We spoke with recruiters and hiring managers at top companies that hire Site Reliability Engineers like Google, Amazon, and Microsoft, to understand what they look for in resumes. Based on their insights and feedback, here are some key tips you should consider when crafting a Site Reliability Engineer resume to increase your chances of landing an interview.

Showcase your DevOps and automation skills

Site Reliability Engineers play a crucial role in automating processes and leveraging DevOps practices. Highlight your experience with:

Configuration management tools like Puppet, Chef, or Ansible
Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines using Jenkins, GitLab CI, or CircleCI
Infrastructure as Code using Terraform, CloudFormation, or Pulumi
Containerization technologies like Docker and orchestration platforms like Kubernetes

Quantify the impact of your automation efforts wherever possible. For example:

Automated server provisioning using Ansible, reducing deployment time by 80% and eliminating manual errors.

Bullet Point Samples for Site Reliability Engineer

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Highlight your experience with monitoring and incident response

Site Reliability Engineers ensure systems are reliable and available. Show your expertise in:

Setting up monitoring and alerting using tools like Prometheus, Grafana, Nagios, or Datadog
Defining SLIs, SLOs, and SLAs for services
Incident management and postmortem analysis
Troubleshooting and root cause analysis in complex distributed systems

Avoid generic statements like:

Responsible for monitoring systems
Handled incidents

Instead, provide specific examples:

Implemented Prometheus and Grafana to monitor key metrics, reducing MTTR by 60% through proactive alerting and faster issue identification.

Demonstrate your programming and scripting abilities

While Site Reliability Engineers may not be writing production code, they often develop tools and scripts to automate tasks and troubleshoot issues. Showcase your programming skills in languages commonly used in SRE:

Python for scripting and automation
Go for systems programming and building tools
Bash/Shell scripting for Linux/Unix administration
Java, C++, or other languages based on the tech stack of your target companies

Provide concrete examples of how you used these skills, such as:

Developed a Python script to automate log analysis, reducing manual effort by 90% and enabling faster issue identification.

Emphasize your experience with cloud platforms

Many companies are adopting cloud platforms for their scalability and flexibility. Highlight your experience with major cloud providers:

Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Google Cloud Platform (GCP)
Microsoft Azure

Mention specific services you've worked with, such as:

AWS EC2, S3, Lambda, ECS/EKS
GCP Compute Engine, Cloud Storage, Cloud Functions, GKE
Azure Virtual Machines, Blob Storage, Azure Functions, AKS

Showcase how you used these platforms to build scalable and reliable systems, like:

Migrated on-premises infrastructure to AWS, leveraging EC2, S3, and EKS to improve scalability and reduce costs by 40%.

Include your contributions to performance and scalability

Site Reliability Engineers ensure systems can handle growth and perform optimally. Show your impact on:

Capacity planning and resource provisioning
Load testing and performance tuning
Caching and content delivery network (CDN) optimizations
Database performance and query optimization

Use metrics to demonstrate the results of your efforts:

Implemented caching and CDN optimizations, reducing page load times by 50% and improving Google PageSpeed score from 60 to 95.

Avoid vague statements like:

Improved system performance
Optimized database queries

Showcase your collaboration and communication skills

Site Reliability Engineering is a collaborative role that involves working closely with development teams, operations, and other stakeholders. Highlight your experiences:

Collaborating with cross-functional teams to implement SRE best practices
Communicating complex technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders
Mentoring and training team members on SRE methodologies
Participating in incident postmortems and sharing lessons learned

Provide concrete examples of your collaboration and communication skills:

Collaborated with development teams to implement chaos engineering practices, improving system resilience and reducing customer-impacting incidents by 80%.

Remember, recruiters value candidates who can work effectively in a team and communicate clearly.

Writing Your Site Reliability Engineer Resume: Section By Section

Header

As a Site Reliability Engineer, your header is the first thing recruiters will see on your resume. It's crucial to make a strong first impression and clearly convey who you are and what you bring to the table. Here's how to write a compelling header that will grab attention:

1. Put your name front and center

Your name should be the most prominent element in your header, making it easy for recruiters to identify whose resume they're reviewing. Follow these tips:

Use a larger font size for your name compared to the rest of your header details
Place your name on its own line
Consider using a different font style that's easy to read and stands out

Here's an example of a well-formatted name in a header:

John Doe
[email protected] | 123-456-7890 | New York, NY | linkedin.com/in/johndoe

Avoid nicknames or unprofessional email handles in your header. Use your full name and a professional-sounding email address to make the best impression.

2. Include essential contact details

Make it easy for recruiters to get in touch with you by providing key contact details:

Professional email address
Phone number
City and state of residence
LinkedIn profile URL

You can place these details on a single line, separated by vertical bars or bullet points. For example:

[email protected] | 123-456-7890 | New York, NY | linkedin.com/in/johndoe

Avoid cluttering your header with too many details. A physical address is no longer necessary, especially if you're applying for remote SRE positions.

Ensure your LinkedIn profile is up-to-date and optimized before including the URL in your resume header. Our LinkedIn Review tool can help you assess and improve your profile's effectiveness.

3. Optionally include your target job title

If you have space, consider adding your target job title in your header. This helps frame your resume and lets recruiters know your career focus. For example:

John Doe
Site Reliability Engineer
[email protected] | 123-456-7890 | New York, NY | linkedin.com/in/johndoe

However, avoid cramming in multiple job titles or buzzwords, as it can look cluttered and unfocused. Stick to a single, specific job title that aligns with the position you're applying for.

Not sure if your resume header is optimized? Run it through our Score My Resume tool for instant feedback on 30+ key criteria hiring managers look for, including header formatting and content.

Summary

A resume summary, also known as a professional summary or summary statement, is an optional section that sits at the top of your resume, just below your name and contact information. It provides a brief overview of your professional background, skills, and accomplishments, giving hiring managers a quick snapshot of what you bring to the table.

While a summary is not a mandatory component of a resume, it can be particularly useful for Site Reliability Engineers who want to highlight their most relevant qualifications and experiences upfront. This is especially true if you have a diverse background or are making a career change. However, it's crucial to avoid using an objective statement, as these are outdated and focus more on what you want rather than what you can offer the employer.

How to write a resume summary if you are applying for a Site Reliability Engineer resume

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1. Tailor your summary to the specific SRE role

When crafting your summary, it's essential to align it with the requirements and responsibilities of the specific Site Reliability Engineer position you're targeting. This means incorporating relevant keywords and phrases from the job description, such as specific technologies, methodologies, or certifications.

For example, if the job description emphasizes experience with cloud platforms like AWS or GCP, be sure to mention your proficiency in these areas. Similarly, if the role requires knowledge of infrastructure as code (IaC) tools like Terraform or Ansible, highlight your experience with these technologies.

AWS Certified Site Reliability Engineer with 5+ years of experience optimizing and scaling high-traffic web applications on AWS. Proficient in Terraform, Ansible, and Kubernetes, with a proven track record of improving system reliability and reducing downtime.

Use our Targeted Resume tool to ensure your summary and entire resume are optimized for the specific SRE job you're applying for. It checks your resume against the job description and provides personalized recommendations to improve your chances of getting hired.

2. Quantify your achievements and impact

To make your summary more impactful, include quantifiable achievements that demonstrate the value you've brought to previous organizations. This could include metrics like uptime percentages, incident response times, or cost savings achieved through optimization efforts.

Avoid making vague statements or using generic buzzwords that don't provide concrete evidence of your skills and accomplishments. Instead, be specific and use numbers to back up your claims.

Experienced Site Reliability Engineer with a proven track record of success. Skilled in troubleshooting and problem-solving, with a passion for delivering high-quality results.

While this summary mentions some relevant skills, it lacks specificity and doesn't provide any measurable achievements. Here's a better example:

Site Reliability Engineer with 7+ years of experience maintaining 99.99% uptime for critical applications. Implemented automated monitoring and alerting systems that reduced incident response times by 50% and saved the company $200K annually in infrastructure costs.

When quantifying your achievements, be sure to use specific numbers and percentages rather than vague adjectives like "significant" or "substantial." This helps hiring managers better understand the scope and impact of your contributions.

3. Showcase your soft skills and leadership abilities

In addition to technical skills, Site Reliability Engineers often need strong communication, collaboration, and leadership abilities to be successful in their roles. While you shouldn't explicitly list soft skills like "team player" or "strong communicator" in your summary, you can demonstrate these qualities through your accomplishments and experiences.

For example, if you've led cross-functional teams or collaborated with developers and stakeholders to implement new reliability initiatives, mention these experiences in your summary. This shows hiring managers that you have the interpersonal skills necessary to thrive in an SRE role.

Results-driven Site Reliability Engineer with 6+ years of experience leading cross-functional teams to improve system performance and reliability. Collaborated with developers and product managers to implement chaos engineering practices, resulting in a 35% reduction in critical incidents and a 20% improvement in MTTR. Passionate about fostering a culture of continuous improvement and knowledge sharing.

Remember, your resume summary is just one part of your overall application. Be sure to showcase your soft skills and leadership abilities throughout your resume, including in your work experience and achievements sections.

Experience

Your work experience section is one of the most important parts of your resume as a site reliability engineer. It's where you'll showcase your technical skills, problem-solving abilities, and the impact you've made in previous roles. Here are some key tips to make your work experience section stand out:

1. Highlight your technical skills

As a site reliability engineer, you likely have experience with a variety of tools and technologies. Make sure to showcase the ones that are most relevant to the job you're applying for. For example:

Implemented and maintained CI/CD pipelines using Jenkins, Git, and Ansible
Developed and maintained monitoring and alerting systems using Prometheus, Grafana, and PagerDuty
Automated infrastructure provisioning and configuration management using Terraform and Puppet

By highlighting your technical skills, you'll show potential employers that you have the expertise they're looking for.

Use our Targeted Resume tool to make sure your resume includes the right skills and keywords for the job you're applying for.

2. Quantify your impact

Whenever possible, use metrics to quantify the impact you've made in previous roles. This will help potential employers understand the value you can bring to their organization. For example:

Reduced application downtime by 50% by implementing automated failover and disaster recovery processes
Improved application performance by 25% by optimizing database queries and caching mechanisms
Increased deployment frequency from once per month to multiple times per day by streamlining CI/CD pipelines

If you don't have access to specific metrics, you can still use numbers to give a sense of scale, such as the number of servers you managed or the size of the team you worked with.

Use strong action verbs to describe your accomplishments, such as 'reduced', 'improved', and 'increased'. This will help your resume stand out to hiring managers.

3. Showcase your problem-solving skills

Site reliability engineers are often called upon to solve complex problems quickly and efficiently. Use your work experience section to showcase examples of how you've done this in the past. For example:

Troubleshot and resolved a critical production issue that was causing intermittent outages for a key customer-facing application. Identified the root cause as a memory leak in a third-party library and implemented a patch to fix the issue, resulting in a 99.99% uptime for the application.

By highlighting your problem-solving skills, you'll show potential employers that you have the ability to think critically and work under pressure.

Use our Score My Resume tool to get instant feedback on your resume and see how it stacks up against key criteria hiring managers look for.

4. Show your career growth

If you've been promoted or taken on increasing levels of responsibility in your previous roles, make sure to highlight this in your work experience section. This will show potential employers that you have the ability to learn and grow within an organization. For example:

Site Reliability Engineer, Acme Inc., 2018-2022
Junior Site Reliability Engineer, Acme Inc., 2016-2018

Instead of listing your titles chronologically, consider grouping them together to emphasize your career growth, like this:

Site Reliability Engineer, Acme Inc., 2016-2022
- Promoted to Senior Site Reliability Engineer in 2020
- Promoted to Site Reliability Engineer in 2018

If you have a strong career trajectory, consider bolding your job titles to make them stand out to recruiters and hiring managers.

Education

The education section of your site reliability engineer resume should be concise and highlight your most relevant academic achievements. List your degrees in reverse chronological order, with the most recent one first. Include the name of the institution, degree earned, and graduation date.

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1. Highlight relevant coursework

If you're a recent graduate or have taken courses directly related to site reliability engineering, consider listing them under your degree. This can demonstrate your knowledge and skills in areas such as:

Distributed systems
Cloud computing
Networking and security
Automation and scripting

However, avoid listing every course you've taken. Focus on those that are most relevant to the job you're applying for.

If you have completed multiple degrees, consider omitting less relevant ones to keep your education section concise.

2. Include certifications and training

In addition to your formal education, include any relevant certifications or training you have completed. These can help demonstrate your expertise and commitment to staying up-to-date in the field. Some examples include:

AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
Google Cloud Certified - Professional Cloud Architect
Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA)

Be sure to list the full name of the certification and the year you earned it.

If you have multiple certifications, consider creating a separate 'Certifications' section to highlight them.

3. Keep it brief for senior roles

If you are a senior site reliability engineer with many years of experience, your education section should be brief. Hiring managers will be more interested in your work history and accomplishments. For example:

Bachelor of Science in Computer Science
University of Example

Avoid listing outdated or irrelevant degrees, such as:

Associate of Arts in English Literature
Community College of Example, 1995

If you have a graduate degree, you may choose to omit your undergraduate degree to keep your education section concise.

Action Verbs For Site Reliability Engineer Resumes

If you want to demonstrate a tangible result of your value, you should mention your achievements on your resume. You can talk about how you reduced the downtime of a particular project or how your SRE techniques enhanced the development process.

However, it is important to use the appropriate words on your resume. That’s why action verbs can be helpful. They will help you express your achievements accurately and concisely, by using one single word. Some examples of strong action verbs for your SRE resume include “automated,” “reduced,”, and “streamlined.” Check out more action verbs below.

Action Verbs for Site Reliability Engineer

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Improved
Innovated
Reduced
Resolved
Strengthened
Coded
Predicted
Installed
Engineered
Calculated
Debugged
Customized
Standardized
Automated
Diagnosed
Troubleshooted

For a full list of effective resume action verbs, visit Resume Action Verbs.

Skills For Site Reliability Engineer Resumes

Since this is a highly technical career, it’s in the skills section where you should try to stand out. Your SRE resume should demonstrate you have advanced knowledge of operating, systems, databases, and cloud services. That’s why you should include keywords like database management, AWS, or Microsoft Azure.

You should also mention the techniques you use for reducing downtime and improving the reliability of software development. For example, you can include skills like incident response, continuous integration, and automation. If you want more ideas of skills to include in your SRE resume, take a look at our selection.

Ansible
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Docker Products
DevOps
Jenkins
Bash
Kubernetes
Elasticsearch
Git
Cloud Computing
Shell Scripting
Terraform
Go (Programming Language)
Splunk
Python (Programming Language)
CentOS
Zabbix
Google Cloud Platform (GCP)
Microservices
Microsoft Azure
Site Reliability Engineering
Linux
Grafana
Puppet
Prometheus.io
Elastic Stack (ELK)
Nginx

For more skills, visit Site Reliability Engineer Skills & Keywords.

How To Write Your Skills Section On a Site Reliability Engineer Resumes

You can include the above skills in a dedicated Skills section on your resume, or weave them in your experience. Here's how you might create your dedicated skills section:

How To Write Your Skills Section - Site Reliability Engineer Roles

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Skills Word Cloud For Site Reliability Engineer Resumes

This word cloud highlights the important keywords that appear on Site Reliability Engineer job descriptions and resumes. The bigger the word, the more frequently it appears on job postings, and the more 'important' it is.

Top Site Reliability Engineer Skills and Keywords to Include On Your Resume

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