Senior Staff Software Engineer - Agentic AI

We are seeking a Senior Staff Engineer (IC5) who will set the technical vision and architecture across AI-native and cloud-native systems. The IC5 engineer is a strategic technical leader who drives innovation, shapes engineering culture, and influences the direction of the platform. They work on the highest-impact, most complex problems—defining approaches for novel AI/ML challenges, establishing best practices at scale, and ensuring the organization's technical strategy aligns with business objectives. This role combines deep technical expertise with broad systems thinking, organizational influence, and the ability to mentor and develop senior engineers. IC5 engineers are trusted advisors to leadership and across the organization.What you get to do in this role:Technical Vision & Strategy

   Define technical vision and strategy for AI-native and cloud-native systems; establish multi-year technology roadmaps and architectural patterns

   Lead the development of core platforms and infrastructure that enable AI-native development at scale (evaluation frameworks, monitoring, security, deployment)

   Drive adoption of emerging AI/ML technologies, frameworks, and best practices; assess new services and tools for organizational fit

   Establish and evolve technical standards, architectural principles, and engineering excellence standards across the organization

   Own the technical roadmap for critical business initiatives involving AI; evaluate feasibility and set realistic timelines

   Champion investment in foundational improvements (refactoring, testing infrastructure, monitoring, security) that have organization-wide impact

   Influence platform-level decisions involving cost, latency, reliability, and model quality; balance business objectives with technical constraints

   Stay at the forefront of AI/ML research and industry trends; translate research into practical applications for the businessOrganizational Leadership & Mentorship

   Mentor and develop senior engineers (IC3/IC4) and engineering leaders; support their growth into leadership and architectural roles

   Lead technical hiring; assess candidates at senior levels and contribute to building a world-class engineering team

   Establish and enforce engineering culture focused on technical excellence, learning, ownership, and collaboration

   Lead by example in code quality, testing discipline, security practices, and responsible AI principles

   Support manager and team leadership development; provide technical guidance to engineering managers and team leads

   Conduct architectural and design reviews; provide critical feedback that shapes the quality of technical decisions across the organization

   Foster knowledge sharing through documentation, technical talks, open-source contributions, and community engagement

   Create and refine career paths and professional development opportunities for engineering team membersArchitecture & Systems Design

   Design and architect large, complex systems involving multiple teams, cloud infrastructure, and sophisticated AI/ML components

   Lead the design of evaluation frameworks, observability systems, and production monitoring for AI-driven features at scale

   Establish security architecture and responsible AI guardrails that scale across the platform

   Design high-performance data platforms, embedding systems, and retrieval pipelines that serve organization-wide needs

   Evaluate and guide adoption of new cloud services, managed AI services, and technologies

   Drive architectural decisions that balance competing concerns: performance, cost, scalability, reliability, developer experience, and business value

   Conduct research and prototyping on novel technical approaches; lead exploration of emerging AI/ML techniques

   Lead root cause analysis and architectural reviews for critical incidents; drive improvements to prevent recurrenceCross-Organizational Influence & Communication

   Communicate technical vision and strategy to executives, product leadership, and engineering teams; influence organizational priorities

   Partner with product, design, and domain specialists to define ambitious technical roadmaps aligned with business strategy

   Represent the engineering organization in high-stakes customer and partnership discussions; build credibility and trust

   Lead or contribute to technical due diligence for acquisitions, partnerships, and strategic technology evaluations

   Translate complex AI/ML concepts, trade-offs, and limitations for audiences ranging from technical engineers to executive leadership

   Advocate for technical health, engineering culture, and long-term sustainability over short-term pressures

   Participate in industry forums, conferences, and communities; enhance the organization's external reputation

   Lead technical interviews and design discussions; mentor interviewing skills across the engineering organizationSoftware Development Excellence & Innovation

   Develop innovative solutions to the organization's most complex technical challenges, particularly around AI/ML integration and distributed systems

   Prototype and validate new approaches; share learnings and best practices across the organization

   Contribute to critical code paths and architectures; model best practices in code quality, testing, and maintainability

   Build evaluation frameworks, monitoring systems, and testing infrastructure that scale across the organization

   Implement security best practices, responsible AI guardrails, and compliance mechanisms that serve as templates for the organization

   Work with cloud services, managed AI services, Kubernetes, and infrastructure-as-code at an architectural level

   Troubleshoot and resolve the most complex production issues; establish practices to prevent future incidents

   Contribute to open-source projects, research initiatives, or industry collaboration where aligned with business strategyServiceNow Platform Strategy & Excellence

   Define platform architecture and integration patterns for AI-native ServiceNow applications

   Establish best practices and architectural standards for ServiceNow development across the organization

   Lead technical decisions on ServiceNow platform capabilities vs. custom development trade-offs

   Drive adoption of ServiceNow platform features and managed services; evaluate and recommend platform upgrades

   Partner with ServiceNow product teams and technical account managers on advanced integrations and customizations

   Mentor senior engineers on ServiceNow platform architecture and advanced development patterns

   Ensure applications remain compatible with ServiceNow platform updates and evolutionCustomer Strategy & Support Leadership

   Shape organizational approach to customer support and issue resolution; establish standards for response and resolution

   Lead customer-critical incident response and complex troubleshooting; provide technical escalation path

   Engage with strategic customers on technical topics, roadmap alignment, and complex integration challenges

   Gather and synthesize customer feedback to inform product and platform strategy

   Establish programs and practices that improve customer experience and reduce support burden

   Work with customer success leadership to align technical capabilities with customer success metrics

   Lead technical due diligence and support in customer selection and onboarding processes