Staff/Lead Software Developer (AI Agents & Integrations)

jetbrains; Greater London; On-site; GBP 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

JetBrains is seeking a senior technical leader to shape the AI-native development experience for CLion and C++ development workflows. You will prototype, implement, and validate AI-powered features, and drive architectural decisions across IDE tooling and agent integrations.

In this highly hands-on role you will collaborate with product managers, ML and QA engineers, and senior developers to define the roadmap and deliver first-class AI-assisted software development.

Qualifications

• Significant software engineering experience as a Staff Engineer, Principal Engineer, Technical Lead, or equivalent senior role.
• Strong experience with Kotlin, Java, or other JVM technologies.
• Ability to prototype, implement, and validate AI-powered developer workflows.

Responsibilities

• Shape and deliver AI-powered features for CLion and C++ development workflows.
• Design architecture for AI integrations, agent tools, and C++-specific AI capabilities.
• Prototype and validate AI workflows including debugging, code understanding, and navigation.

Skills

Staff Engineer

Principal Engineer

Technical Lead

Kotlin

Java

JVM languages

Job description

AI is fundamentally changing how developers write, understand, debug, and maintain software.

At JetBrains, we’re exploring what an AI-native development experience should look like for C++ developers. We are looking for a senior technical leader to help shape this future by building AI-powered workflows, integrating coding agents into developer tools, and defining how CLion can become a first-class environment for AI‑assisted software development.

This is a highly hands‑on role focused on technical leadership rather than people management. You should expect to spend most of your time prototyping, implementing, and validating AI‑powered workflows while helping shape technical direction through hands‑on engineering. You’ll work at the intersection of developer tools, AI agents, IDE architecture, and product strategy while helping define how software developers work with AI in the future.

Example problems you’ll work on:

• How can coding agents become more effective when working with large C++ codebases?
• How can CLion’s debugging, code understanding, and navigation capabilities be integrated into AI‑assisted development workflows?
• How should AI‑powered developer experiences be evaluated and benchmarked in real‑world development scenarios?
• What capabilities should AI agents have access to inside a modern IDE?
• How can we make CLion a better environment for developers who increasingly collaborate with AI tools and agents?

In this role, you will:

• Shape and deliver AI‑powered features for CLion and C++ development workflows.
• Design the architecture for AI integrations, agent tools, and C++‑specific AI capabilities.
• Build practical benchmarks and evaluation frameworks for AI‑assisted C++ development scenarios.
• Prototype and validate new AI workflows, including debugging, code understanding, refactoring, and project navigation.
• Collaborate with product managers, ML engineers, QA engineers, stakeholders, and senior developers to shape and deliver the roadmap.
• Work closely with JetBrains AI, ML, and product teams to help define the AI strategy for the C++ ecosystem.
• Evaluate and prioritize AI initiatives, bringing new ideas and proposals that align with the broader JetBrains AI strategy.
• Contribute hands‑on to technical design, software architecture, and implementation in a large, mature codebase.
• Help define a technical roadmap for AI agent and tool integrations in C++ development workflows.
• Build trust and alignment across the C++ Ecosystem, AI, Product, QA, and ML organizations

We’d love to talk if you have:

• Significant software engineering experience as a Staff Engineer, Principal Engineer, Technical Lead, or similar senior technical role.
• Strong experience with Kotlin, Java, or other JVM technologies, or the ability to quickly become productive in a JVM‑based codebase.