Staff Engineer

Role details

ABOUT THE ROLE This is a founding-level Staff Engineer position at a fast-moving, Y Combinator–backed B2B SaaS startup building AI-powered sales automation for distributors and manufacturers. You'll serve as the technical backbone of the engineering organization — owning high-leverage systems across multiple products, setting architectural direction, and raising the bar on quality, reliability, and AI capabilities. WHAT YOU'LL DO - Own the most complex, highest-leverage engineering work: core systems, shared frameworks, and critical infrastructure. - Define and evolve architecture decisions that prevent long-term dead-ends across products. - Spend the majority of your time writing and shipping production code, leading by example. - Eliminate technical debt by refactoring abstractions and raising reliability and engineering standards. - Mentor engineers through code review, pairing, and direct feedback to improve team output and reduce hidden risk. - Contribute to the architecture and implementation of AI capabilities, including LLM pipelines and data infrastructure. WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR - 8+ years of software engineering experience with a track record of solving genuinely hard technical problems in production. - Deep full-stack expertise with strong backend, API, and infrastructure skills; comfortable on the frontend when needed (Python, React, TypeScript). - Proven experience designing and evolving systems across multiple products and teams, including long-term architectural strategy. - Demonstrated ability to improve system performance, reliability, and scalability at scale. - Cloud and DevOps fluency: containerization (Docker), cloud platforms (Azure, AWS, or GCP), and infrastructure as code (Terraform). - Experience building or integrating AI systems, LLMs, or large-scale data pipelines is a strong plus. - A hands-on technical leader who mentors by doing and multiplies team effectiveness. - Mission-driven, pragmatic, and decisive under uncertainty — comfortable operating with intensity in an early-stage environment. COMPENSATION & BENEFITS Salary range: €90,000 – €200,000 EUR annually. Visa sponsorship is not available. LOCATION On-site in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. Candidates must be willing to work in-person full-time.