Staff Software Engineer

About GitHub

GitHub is the world’s leading platform for agentic software development — powered by Copilot to build, scale, and deliver secure software. Over 180 million developers, including more than 90% of the Fortune 100 companies, use GitHub to collaborate, and more than 77,000 organisations have adopted GitHub Copilot.

About the Role of Staff Software Engineer

As a Staff Software Engineer at GitHub, you will be instrumental in architecting and delivering high-performance systems that empower collaboration for millions of developers globally. This role involves driving technical execution from initial design through to production, often leading critical initiatives across distributed teams within GitHub’s dynamic ecosystem.

The GitHub Actions team, a core component of this ecosystem, manages the automation for millions of developers worldwide, processing billions of jobs monthly. You will contribute to ensuring the reliability and scalability of this vital CI/CD backbone, tackling challenges in distributed systems, container orchestration, security, and cloud infrastructure alongside a passionate team committed to developer productivity.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, test, and ship high-quality technical solutions that scale across multiple GitHub services, taking pride in maintainable code.
• Provide technical leadership, mentorship, pairing opportunities, and code reviews to foster team growth and ensure adherence to quality standards.
• Own and advocate for the health and quality of systems, including participating in on-call rotations for incident response.
• Design and implement robust APIs for seamless integration across software components.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams and stakeholders, leading discussions on technical solutions, design, and cost considerations.
• Lead the development of comprehensive testing strategies, define success metrics, and integrate customer feedback for continuous improvement.
• Champion security within GitHub Actions by designing isolation mechanisms for untrusted code, ensuring enterprise compliance, and partnering with Security teams.
• Drive operational excellence by improving system reliability, reducing incident response times, and establishing best practices for monitoring, alerting, and runbooks.
• Support and drive the technical roadmap, aligning engineering efforts with product goals and adopting new technologies as applicable.

Qualifications

Required Qualifications:

• 9+ years experience in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical discipline with proven experience maintaining and delivering production software coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, Rust, or Python.
• OR Associate’s Degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, Math, Physics, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field AND 8+ years experience in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical discipline with proven experience maintaining and delivering production software coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, Rust, or Python.
• OR Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related field AND 7+ years experience in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical discipline with proven experience maintaining and delivering production software coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, Rust, or Python.
• OR Master's Degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, Math, Physics, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field AND 5+ years experience in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical discipline with proven experience maintaining and delivering production software coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, Rust, or Python.
• OR Doctorate in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, Math, Physics, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field AND 3+ years experience in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical discipline with proven experience maintaining and delivering production software coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, Rust, or Python.
• OR equivalent experience.

Preferred Qualifications:

• 2+ year(s) technical leadership experience.
• 3+ years' experience using general purpose programming languages (e.g., Go, Ruby, or a similar language).
• 3+ years' experience in one or more scripting languages (e.g., Bash, Python, or a similar language).
• Experience building or operating CI/CD systems at scale.

Compensation Range

The base salary range for this role is USD $140,400.00 - USD $372,300.00 /Yr. Compensation varies based on location and individual qualifications, with opportunities for annual bonuses and stock awards.

GitHub Values

• Customer-obsessed
• Ship to learn
• Growth mindset
• Own the outcome
• Better together
• Diverse and inclusive

Manager Fundamentals

• Model
• Coach
• Care

Leadership Principles

• Create clarity
• Generate energy
• Deliver success

Who We Are

GitHub is the world’s leading AI-powered developer platform with over 150 million developers, fostering the biggest open-source community globally. Our remote-first culture offers competitive pay, generous learning opportunities, and excellent benefits, empowering you to do your best work.

EEO Statement

GitHub is committed to diversity and inclusion, embracing individuals from all backgrounds. We do not discriminate based on identity, and we accommodate disabilities during the interview process.

Key skills/competency

• Distributed Systems
• CI/CD Automation
• Container Orchestration
• Cloud Infrastructure
• API Design
• System Architecture
• Software Development
• Technical Leadership
• Operational Excellence
• Security Engineering