Senior Staff Software Engineer

New York, New York, USA About Datadog: We're on a mission to build the best platform in the world for engineers to understand and scale their systems, applications, and teams. We operate at high scale1 trillions of data points per day1 providing always-on alerting, metrics visualization, logs, and application tracing for tens of thousands of companies. Our engineering culture values pragmatism, honesty, and simplicity to solve hard problems the right way. The Opportunity: Datadogs Senior Staff Engineers are technical leaders operating at the forefront of large-scale systems design, building the infrastructure that will support our next five years of growth and beyond. They do this in three major ways:

As individual contributors, they bring world-class technical depth to build industry-leading systems in areas such as observability data platforms, distributed query engines, and real-time event streaming at global scale.
As technical leaders, they apply broad architectural perspective and deep systems thinking to align design decisions across teams and domains. They work across complex, multi-team problem spaces to define long-term technical direction, drive large-scale initiatives forward, and ensure consistent execution.
As engineering stewards, they play a key role in evolving our systems and engineering culture. They actively participate in Datadogs senior technical community, bringing external insights and internal experience to elevate engineering standards and mentor the next generation of technical leaders.

Examples of projects a Senior Staff Engineer may lead include designing and launching a new distributed data storage engine capable of handling hundreds of millions of records per second, building the real-time infrastructure behind a new observability product, or re-architecting a core service to support exponential growth in throughput and complexity. What You9ll Do:

Be the technical owner of multiple critical systems or architecture areas, often spanning several teams or product lines.
Drive the design and delivery of high-scale, high-impact projects, from vision to execution in production.
Build consensus and alignment across stakeholders on key architectural decisions and long-term strategy.
Deeply investigate and optimize performance, reliability, and efficiency in large-scale distributed systems.
Collaborate with Staff Engineers, Directors, and VPs across the company to shape Datadogs technical roadmap.
Guide teams through ambiguity, scaling challenges, and evolving requirements with clear technical direction.
Actively mentor engineers and influence engineering culture through leadership in design reviews, technical talks, and working groups.

Who You Are:

You have a BS/MS/PhD in a scientific field or equivalent practical experience.
You have 10+ years of backend, infrastructure, or distributed systems engineering experience.
You have 4+ years of experience leading complex technical initiatives and cross-team projects. You have designed and delivered systems that are deeply technical, highly reliable, and serve critical business needs.
You can navigate and make progress in ambiguous problem spaces, identifying the right problems to solve.
You have exceptional communication skills, with the ability to align diverse stakeholders around a shared technical vision.
You have deep expertise in one or more core systems domains1 such as distributed storage,event streaming networking data infrastructure or large-scale observability1and broad awareness of adjacent areas.1You care about getting things right not just getting them done,and you raise the bar for engineering quality around you.1You have demonstrated ability to use AI coding tools in day-to-day workflowsand validate critique,and refine AI-generated output.1Bonus: Youre motivated to push the boundaries of how AI can improve software engineering best practicesand contribute to building AI-enabled products.

Datadog values people from all walks of life.We understand not everyone will meet all the above qualifications on day one.Thats okay.If youre passionate about technologyand want to grow your skills,we encourage you to apply. Benefits and Growth:

Get to build tools for software engineers just like yourself.And use the tools we buildto accelerate our development.
Have a lot of influence on product directionand impact on the business .
Work with skilled knowledgeable,and kind teammates who are happyto teachand learn
Competitive global benefits
Continuous professional development

Benefitsand Growth listed above may vary based onthe countryof your employmentandthe natureof your employmentwith Datadog.

LI-Hybrid

Datadog offersa competitive salaryandequity package,and may include variable compensation.Actual compensationis basedon factors such asthe candidate's skills qualifications,and experience.In addition Datadag offersa wide rangeof bestin class comprehensive inclusive employee benefitsforthis role including healthcare dental parental planning mental health benefitsa401(k) plan match paid time off fitness reimbursements discounted employee stock purchase plan. The reasonably estimated yearly salaryforthis roleat Datadog is:$272000$340000 USD About Datadog: Datadog isthe leading observabilityand security platformforthe AI era providing businesseswith unified visibilityacrossthe technology stacktomanage complexityatscale It brings applications infrastructure data models security into one place using AI todetect resolve issues before they impact customers Trusted globally by Fortune500 companies high-growth AI leaders Datadog enables businesses move fasterwith clarity confidence Learn more about #DatadogLife on Instagram LinkedIn Datadog Learning Center. Equal Opportunity at Datadog: Datadog is proudto offer equal employment opportunity everyone regardless race color ancestry religion sex national origin sexual orientation age citizenship marital status disability gender identity veteran status other characteristics protected by law We also consider qualified applicants regardless criminal histories consistent legal requirements Here are our Candidate Legal Notices for your reference. Datadog endeavors make Careers Page accessible all users If you would like contact us regarding accessibility website need assistance completing application process please complete this form This form is accommodation requests only cannot be used inquire about status applications. Privacyand AI Guidelines: Any information you submit Datadag part application will be processed accordance Datadag’s Applicant Candidate Privacy Notice For information AI policy please visit Interviewing at Datadag AI Guidelines. Requisition ID: R5863