Staff Backend Engineer, Developer Experience

Overview of the Staff Backend Engineer, Developer Experience Role

GitLab is an open-core software company pioneering the most comprehensive AI-powered DevSecOps Platform. Our mission empowers everyone to contribute to and co-create the software powering our world. As a Staff Backend Engineer, Developer Experience, you will be crucial in identifying and improving the engineering experience for GitLab's internal teams. This is a pivotal time for transforming our testing approach and development experience, enabling engineers to deliver high-quality code efficiently and confidently.

GitLab embraces AI as a core productivity multiplier, expecting all team members to incorporate AI into daily workflows. We offer a high-performance culture driven by our values, continuous knowledge exchange, and opportunities to collaborate with industry leaders on complex problems, accelerating careers and fostering innovation.

About The Developer Experience Team

Our Developer Experience group consists of six globally distributed teams of Backend Engineers and Software Engineers in Test. In this highly visible role, you'll work across the entire group to identify and remove the biggest points of friction affecting development at GitLab. Your time will be split between hands-on coding in Ruby and Go, designing scalable solutions, and supporting every team's delivery. You will also be instrumental in shaping GitLab's engineering culture, driving a cohesive Developer Experience Platform strategy backed by company-wide support and a strong appetite for change.

What You'll Do

• Drive Technical Excellence Across Teams: Provide hands-on engineering contributions and technical leadership across six Developer Experience teams, unblocking critical work and accelerating high-impact initiatives.
• Champion Engineering Needs: Partner with engineering teams across GitLab to identify pain points, gather feedback, and translate day-to-day frustrations into actionable improvements for the Developer Experience roadmap.
• Transform Testing at Scale: Help modernize our testing infrastructure to support GitLab's growth, ensuring engineers have fast, reliable tools that catch issues early without hindering velocity.
• Optimize CI/CD Pipelines: Reduce merge and CI friction by building workflows that deliver fast, actionable feedback, helping engineers iterate confidently and ship faster.
• Break Down Systemic Bottlenecks: Collaborate with Platform, Product, and Infrastructure teams to identify and eliminate architectural and process friction that slows down development.
• Shape Engineering Culture: Foster a culture of continuous learning, inclusion, and improvement, where great developer experience is a shared value across the organization.

What You'll Bring

• Deep experience with developer tooling, DevEx strategies, and testing frameworks at scale.
• Experience leading platform or transformation initiatives across multiple teams.
• Proven ability to influence without authority and collaborate effectively across functions.
• Familiarity with DevOps workflows and CI/CD pipelines.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, particularly in a remote-first environment.
• A product mindset with a genuine passion for empowering developers.
• Alignment with GitLab's values, especially collaboration, iteration, and transparency.

Key Skills/Competency

• Developer Experience (DevEx)
• Backend Engineering
• Ruby
• Go
• Testing Frameworks
• CI/CD Pipelines
• DevOps Workflows
• Technical Leadership
• Cross-functional Collaboration
• System Architecture