Staff Software Engineer, Platform

Gradial; Seattle, Northern (WA, KY); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Performance-based bonus

Equity awards

Medical, dental & vision

Fertility & family-planning support

401k plan

Unlimited PTO

Seattle office amenities

Free lunch

AI infrastructure exposure

Job summary

Gradial is building an AI-native system of work for enterprise marketing. We seek a Staff Software Engineer, Platform, to lead platform direction and critical infrastructure initiatives that enable rapid, reliable shipping at scale.

You will partner with the CTO and engineers to elevate platform engineering, make architectural decisions, and deliver systems that empower every engineer to be more effective.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience with significant platform/infrastructure, SRE, DevOps exposure.
• Proven ability to serve as a technical lead for complex platform initiatives while remaining hands-on.
• Deep expertise in Kubernetes, cloud-native architecture, container orchestration, and production infrastructure.
• Strong experience with infrastructure as code, GitOps, CI/CD workflows and modern deployment practices.
• Strong command of observability and reliability fundamentals across metrics, logging, tracing, alerting and incident response.
• Experience designing and operating production infrastructure for rapidly growing products and engineering teams.
• Ability to identify the highest-leverage platform problems, establish technical direction and drive execution across multiple engineers.
• Strong technical judgment with a track record of pragmatic architectural decisions around reliability, scalability, performance and cost.
• Ability to lead through influence, align teams, and raise the technical bar without formal authority.

Responsibilities

• Lead the technical direction of Gradial’s platform across infrastructure, reliability, developer experience, security, performance and cost.
• Own the reliability, scalability and operational health of our production platform.
• Lead major platform initiatives from problem definition and architecture through hands-on implementation and production.
• Evolve Kubernetes, CI/CD, observability and infrastructure-as-code foundations as the product scales.
• Build tooling, abstractions and automation to make engineers more productive in deploying and operating production systems.
• Set engineering standards for reliability, service readiness, deployment and operational ownership.
• Drive improvements in monitoring, alerting, incident response and observability while turning learnings into durable platform improvements.
• Partner with engineers to identify bottlenecks and scaling risks, then lead solutions.
• Provide technical leadership through architecture, design reviews, mentorship and hands-on collaboration.

Skills

Platform eng

SRE

DevOps

Kubernetes

Cloud-native

CI/CD

Observability

Leadership

Architectural decision making

Tools

Kubernetes

GitOps

CI/CD

Job description

Gradial is building the AI-native system of work for enterprise marketing. Our agents turn ideas into live campaigns by executing across the tools, teams, and workflows enterprises already use—from content authoring and campaign assembly to quality assurance and brand compliance. We give marketers and creatives more time to shape brands, understand customers, and create work that moves people.

We’re tackling some of the hardest problems in applied AI: building agent harnesses, sandboxed execution environments, and orchestration that enable agents to plan, act, and verify their work reliably at enterprise scale. We’re growing rapidly, winning Fortune 500 and enterprise customers including AWS, T-Mobile, and Prudential. Our $65 million Series C led by Insight Partners is accelerating that momentum.

Join us to help define how people and AI agents work together. We move with urgency, reason from first principles, and take ownership from idea to customer impact. You’ll shape the product, own consequential problems, and build systems that some of the world’s leading brands depend on every day.

The Role

Gradial is looking for a Staff Software Engineer, Platform to serve as a technical leader for the systems and infrastructure our product runs on. You’ll set direction for the platform, lead critical infrastructure initiatives and build the foundations that allow our engineering team to ship quickly and operate reliably as Gradial scales.

This is a highly hands-on IC role with significant technical leadership responsibility. You’ll work closely with the CTO and engineering team to identify the highest-leverage platform investments, make key architectural decisions and lead their execution. You’ll help define what great platform engineering looks like at Gradial while building systems that make every engineer more effective.

What You’ll Own

• Lead the technical direction of Gradial’s platform across infrastructure, reliability, developer experience, security, performance and cost
• Own the reliability, scalability and operational health of our production platform
• Lead major platform initiatives from problem definition and architecture through hands-on implementation and production
• Evolve our Kubernetes, CI/CD, observability and infrastructure as code foundations as the product and engineering organization scale
• Build tooling, abstractions and automation that make it easier for engineers to develop, deploy and operate production systems
• Set engineering standards for reliability, service readiness, deployment and operational ownership across the organization
• Drive improvements in monitoring, alerting, incident response and observability while turning operational learnings into durable platform improvements
• Partner with engineers across the company to identify infrastructure bottlenecks and scaling risks, then prioritize and lead solutions before they become constraints
• Provide technical leadership to other engineers through architecture, design reviews, mentorship and hands-on collaboration

What We Need

• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience with significant experience in platform engineering, infrastructure, SRE, DevOps or related areas
• Proven ability to serve as a technical lead for complex platform initiatives while remaining deeply hands-on in implementation
• Deep expertise in Kubernetes, cloud-native architecture, container orchestration and production infrastructure
• Strong experience with infrastructure as code, GitOps, CI/CD workflows and modern deployment practices
• Strong command of observability and reliability fundamentals across metrics, logging, tracing, alerting and incident response
• Experience designing and operating production infrastructure for rapidly growing products and engineering teams
• Ability to identify the highest-leverage platform problems, establish technical direction and drive execution across multiple engineers
• Strong technical judgment with a track record of making pragmatic architectural decisions around reliability, scalability, performance and cost
• Ability to lead through influence, create alignment and raise the technical bar without relying on formal authority

Nice to Have

• Experience with AI or ML infrastructure, including GPU provisioning, model deployment or compute-intensive workloads
• Experience supporting cloud or multi-cloud environments with demanding reliability and scaling requirements
• Proficiency with TypeScript or Python for internal tooling and operational automation

The salary range for this position is $180,000 – $240,000 annually. Final compensation will be determined based on factors such as experience, skills, and qualifications.

What we offer

• Performance-based annual bonus
• Meaningful equity awards
• Medical, dental & vision (fully covered for employees with 75% for dependents)
• Fertility & family-planning support
• 401k plan
• Unlimited PTO
• A beautiful Seattle office with a gym, sauna, and bike parking
• Free lunch three days a week in our HQ
• A front-row seat to building category-defining AI infrastructure

You'll thrive here if you

• Learn quickly, actively seek out new challenges, and regularly reconsider “how it’s always been done.”
• Want to have real impact with zero bureaucracy.
• Have an innate drive for being 1% better than the day before, building towards greatness.
• Embrace AI as a core tool for problem-solving, innovation, and scale.
• Show customer-obsession (internal or external), high ownership/accountability, and bias for action.
• Communicate clearly, directly, with curiosity, and assuming good intentions.
• Thrive in fast-paced, hyper-growth environments where building better > maintaining status quo.

AI Literacy & Interviewing Tools

As an AI-first company, we prioritize AI literacy as a core competency in our hiring decisions. We’re excited by candidates who thoughtfully apply AI tools in their work, but during interviews we’re focused onyou. This is your opportunity to show how you think, communicate, and solve problems. Over-reliance on AI-generated responses during the interview process (especially when it obscures your own voice) will result in disqualification. We want to understand your unique perspective and how you approach challenges, both with and without AI.

Gradial is dedicated to creating an environment where diverse perspectives are valued and all team members can grow. We offer competitive compensation, equity, flexible work hours, comprehensive benefits, and a collaborative culture focused on learning and impact.

Voluntary Self-Identification

For government reporting purposes, we ask candidates to respond to the below self-identification survey.Completion of the form is entirely voluntary. Whatever your decision, it will not be considered in the hiringprocess or thereafter. Any information that you do provide will be recorded and maintained in aconfidential file.

As set forth in Gradial’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy,we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

If you believe you belong to any of the categories of protected veterans listed below, please indicate by making the appropriate selection.As a government contractor subject to the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA), we request this information in order to measurethe effectiveness of the outreach and positive recruitment efforts we undertake pursuant to VEVRAA. Classification of protected categoriesis as follows:

A "disabled veteran" is one of the following: a veteran of the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service who is entitled to compensation (or who but for the receipt of military retired pay would be entitled to compensation) under laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs; or a person who was discharged or released from active duty because of a service-connected disability.

A "recently separated veteran" means any veteran during the three-year period beginning on the date of such veteran's discharge or release from active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval, or air service.

An "active duty wartime or campaign badge veteran" means a veteran who served on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service during a war, or in a campaign or expedition for which a campaign badge has been authorized under the laws administered by the Department of Defense.

An "Armed forces service medal veteran" means a veteran who, while serving on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service, participated in a United States military operation for which an Armed Forces service medal was awarded pursuant to Executive Order 12985.