An overview of this role

We are seeking a Director, Product Security Architecture to lead our Security Architecture function within the Security Platforms & Architecture (SPA) sub-department and to serve as a strategic security partner to key product and engineering leadership groups across GitLab.

In this role, you will manage and grow a team of Product Security Architects and our closely-aligned risk and metrics engineer who are each dedicated to major product areas of Security, AI, and Core DevOps. Your team will focus on turning product security risks, requirements, and insights into clear architectural guidance, “paved roads,” and multi-quarter risk reduction programs that align with how Product and Engineering actually plan and deliver.

You will operate in an environment where feature delivery and platform capabilities are accelerating, architectures and technologies are evolving, and teams are continually balancing ambitious product goals with a strong security posture. In this context, you will help Product Security:

• Maximize risk reduction by identifying strategic opportunities that fit naturally into existing R&D work 
• Ensure that material product security risks and tradeoffs are surfaced, acknowledged, and decided at the right leadership levels
• Lead SPA/AppSec scaling strategies that increase coverage and support non-linear developer gains, with a clear focus on enabling developer velocity with minimal friction

While many strong candidates will come from a deep product security background, this role is also an excellent fit for experienced software or architecture leaders who have consistently delivered secure, resilient systems in complex R&D environments and are excited to lead security outcomes in close partnership with engineering.

What you’ll do

• Lead, develop, and mentor a team of Product Security Architects and closely-aligned specialists who are dedicated to major product functional areas (e.g., Sec Section, AI, Core DevOps)
• Own and continuously evolve the Product Security Architecture strategy and partnership model, shifting architects from embedded consultants to accelerators of secure architecture delivery, and serve as a strategic partner to Product and Engineering Directors/VPs 
• Oversee and mature the Product Security Risk Register, ensuring systemic product security risks are clearly articulated, prioritized with Product and Engineering, and paired with multi-quarter risk reduction plans that reduce long-term product security debt.
• Operate Product Security Architecture in a risk-aligned, business-enabling way that focuses Security Architects on the highest-impact, hardest-to-change architectural decisions, helping teams make clear, informed tradeoffs without slowing delivery.
• Define and drive security visions, standards, “paved roads,” and secure-by-default platform behaviors and configurations that enable product teams to make sound security decisions with minimal overhead, including evolving existing behaviors over time to strengthen the baseline security posture.
• Lead the Product Security AI strategy for scaling, including adoption of AI-assisted and platform-level investments that expand security review coverage, reduce toil, and support non-linear developer gains while enabling developer velocity.
• Partner with Application Security, Infrastructure Security, Security Research, Security Operations, Security Risk, and Security Compliance on end-to-end risk reduction, including security-related controls, quality standards, and integration of research and operational learnings into architectures.
• Define and track meaningful architecture-related metrics and Key Risk Indicators, and represent Product Security in cross-functional forums, clearly articulating risk, tradeoffs, and recommended paths forward.

What you’ll bring

• Significant experience (typically 10+ years) leading software, architecture, or application security initiatives in high-velocity R&D organizations, with a strong grounding in building and evolving complex software systems
• Strong application security and secure design literacy, whether from direct AppSec roles or from owning secure delivery of large-scale systems, including familiarity with common vulnerability classes, modern software architectures, and practical mitigation patterns
• Deep understanding of systemic product security risks in large-scale platforms, with expertise in at least some of: CI/CD and pipeline security, software supply chain security, identity and access management (AuthN/Z), AI/ML security, or multi-tenant SaaS architectures
• Proven ability to operate effectively in constrained environments: balancing business goals and risk reduction, focusing attention on the highest-impact, hardest-to-reverse decisions, and framing options in terms of risk, cost, and customer impact rather than absolutes.
• Demonstrated success building trust with Product and Engineering Directors/VPs, influencing multi-quarter roadmaps, and co-owning outcomes rather than acting solely as a gate.
• Experience designing and rolling out scalable security patterns—standards, “paved roads,” and secure-by-default configurations—that reduce risk while minimizing additional toil for product and engineering teams.
• Experience collaborating with Compliance, Audit, and Security Operations on the definition, implementation, and demonstration of security controls and security-related quality standards, and translating technical designs into clear language for auditors, engineers, and senior leaders.
• Experience supporting organizations through significant technology and architectural change (e.g., adoption of new languages and frameworks, or evolution from monoliths toward microservices or domain-oriented architectures) while maintaining or improving security posture.
• Ability to operate at multiple altitudes—from executive-level strategy and stakeholder alignment down to detailed technical design discussions when necessary—with excellent written and verbal communication in an all-remote, asynchronous environment.
• Comfort with AI-augmented workflows and enthusiasm for leveraging tools like GitLab Duo to scale the Product Security Architecture function, along with strong alignment to GitLab’s values and a track record of thriving in a highly collaborative, remote-first culture.
• Nice to have: Experience with security requirements and frameworks relevant to GitLab’s customers (e.g., FedRAMP, ISO 27001, SOC 2, PCI-DSS); and prior experience in organizations undergoing significant scaling, reorganization, or operating model transformation

About the team

Product Security Architects are part of our Security Platforms & Architecture team, which protects GitLab’s platform and products by identifying, prioritizing, and mitigating security risks across the entire product lifecycle. Composed of Security Architecture, Application Security, and Security Research, we combine strategic security architecture with operational application security to enable GitLab to be the most secure software factory platform on the market.