diff --git a/Jenkinsfile b/Jenkinsfile
index 30479827d91..9a0611c4f44 100644
--- a/Jenkinsfile
+++ b/Jenkinsfile
@@ -53,11 +53,18 @@ pipeline {
       steps {
         pipelineManager([ cancelPreviousRunningBuilds: [ when: 'PR' ] ])
         deleteDir()
-        gitCheckout(basedir: "${BASE_DIR}", githubNotifyFirstTimeContributor: true)
+        // Here we do a checkout into a temporary directory in order to have the
+        // side-effect of setting up the git environment correctly.
+        gitCheckout(basedir: "${pwd(tmp: true)}", githubNotifyFirstTimeContributor: true)
+        dir("${BASE_DIR}") {
+            // We use a raw checkout to avoid the many extra objects which are brought in
+            // with a `git fetch` as would happen if we used the `gitCheckout` step.
+            checkout scm
+        }
         stashV2(name: 'source', bucket: "${JOB_GCS_BUCKET}", credentialsId: "${JOB_GCS_CREDENTIALS}")
         dir("${BASE_DIR}"){
-          // Skip all the stages except docs for PR's with asciidoc and md changes only
-          setEnvVar('ONLY_DOCS', isGitRegionMatch(patterns: [ '.*\\.(asciidoc|md)' ], shouldMatchAll: true).toString())
+          // Skip all the stages except docs for PR's with asciidoc, md or deploy k8s templates changes only
+          setEnvVar('ONLY_DOCS', isGitRegionMatch(patterns: [ '(.*\\.(asciidoc|md)|deploy/kubernetes/.*-kubernetes\\.yaml)' ], shouldMatchAll: true).toString())
           setEnvVar('GO_MOD_CHANGES', isGitRegionMatch(patterns: [ '^go.mod' ], shouldMatchAll: false).toString())
           setEnvVar('PACKAGING_CHANGES', isGitRegionMatch(patterns: [ '^dev-tools/packaging/.*' ], shouldMatchAll: false).toString())
           setEnvVar('GO_VERSION', readFile(".go-version").trim())