Staff Forward Deployed Engineer

Stack

Responsibilities

• ▹Contribute production-quality code to GitLab's product and adjacent systems (bug fixes, features, integrations, tooling, performance improvements)
• ▹Work within GitLab's normal product and engineering processes: issue discovery, MR creation, testing, review, documentation
• ▹Influence Product and Engineering so customer-driven solutions align with long-term product direction
• ▹Translate field-discovered blockers into durable product improvements, reference architectures, documentation, or repeatable patterns
• ▹Engage with strategically important customers when adoption, retention, or trust is at risk
• ▹Diagnose complex technical problems across product behavior, Git internals, CI/CD workflows, API usage, observability, infrastructure, networking, and cloud environments
• ▹Coordinate across Product, Engineering, SRE, Support, SA, CSA, CSM, PS, and customer technical teams
• ▹Provide data-driven, systems-level recommendations for improving GitLab usage, workflows, and architecture
• ▹Drive adoption of GitLab Duo Agent Platform with strategic customers in governed, measurable, production-oriented ways
• ▹Identify and resolve blockers to AI adoption, including governance, auditability, security, compliance, and workflow design
• ▹Develop customer-safe adoption patterns for agentic SDLC and AI governance
• ▹Contribute to Well Architected Frameworks, whitepapers, webinars, reference architectures, and technical strategy memos

Requirements

• ▹Staff-level experience building, operating, or improving complex production software systems
• ▹Demonstrated ability to contribute to large, mature product codebases with high standards for testing, maintainability, performance, and security
• ▹Strong Ruby/Rails or Go experience, with ability to contribute directly to GitLab's product
• ▹Experience diagnosing complex system behavior across application code, data stores, infrastructure, observability, networking, APIs, and customer usage patterns
• ▹Deep understanding of modern DevSecOps workflows, including Git, merge requests, CI/CD, security controls, and compliance needs
• ▹Experience working with strategic customers or senior technical stakeholders in ambiguous, high-impact situations
• ▹Ability to coordinate across Product, Engineering, Support, SRE, SA, CSA, CSM, Professional Services, and customer teams without formal authority
• ▹Strong written communication skills, including technical narratives and architecture guidance
• ▹Demonstrated judgment in distinguishing reusable product/platform work from customer-specific customization

Nice to have

• ▹Direct experience with GitLab as a platform, including GitLab.com, Dedicated, or self-managed deployments
• ▹Production experience with Ruby on Rails, Go, PostgreSQL, Redis, Sidekiq, Vue, TypeScript, Kubernetes, Docker, Linux, and observability tooling
• ▹Deep familiarity with Git internals, repository performance, large-scale Git usage patterns, or CI runner behavior
• ▹Experience with AI-assisted software development, agentic workflows, AI governance, model evaluation, or context management
• ▹Experience creating thought-leadership artifacts such as whitepapers, technical talks, or RFCs
• ▹Background in performance engineering, SRE, platform engineering, or distributed systems
• ▹Experience working in open-source or highly asynchronous engineering environments

Soft skills

About the company

GitLab is the intelligent orchestration platform for DevSecOps, with more than 50 million registered users; the team is expected to embrace AI as a core productivity multiplier in daily work.