Lead Software Engineer

Standard Template Labs is a stealth-mode, AI-native startup reimagining the future of IT Service and Configuration Management. Backed by leading investors, we're leveraging AI, graph-based architecture, and exceptional design to transform how enterprises manage and engage with their technology ecosystems.

About the Role
We're looking for a highly skilled Lead Software Engineers who thrives on responsibility, solving complex problems, and building at scale. You’ll play a critical role in designing and developing systems that power our products, ensuring they are robust, performant, and maintainable. This is a hands-on role for someone who wants to write world-class code, lead by example, and help shape engineering practices across the team.

Responsibilities

• Technical Ownership

  • Take end-to-end ownership of large, complex features and systems—from design and architecture to deployment and monitoring

  • Drive technical decision-making, balancing short-term delivery with long-term scalability and maintainability

  • Collaborate with cross-functional teams (product, design, data, infra) to translate requirements into elegant solutions

• Hands-On Engineering

  • AI-native product development: integrate AI/LLM capabilities into workflows to make ITSM smarter and more efficient

  • Write clean, efficient, and well-tested code that sets a standard of excellence for the team

  • Help us define a tech stack

  • Design and implement large-scale distributed systems, APIs, and data pipelines

  • Conduct thorough code reviews, providing constructive feedback and raising the bar on code quality

  • Troubleshoot and optimize performance across high-traffic systems

Qualifications

• 7+ years of professional software engineering experience, with proven success delivering large-scale systems

• Experience mentoring and guiding cross-functional engineering teams, fostering technical growth, code quality, and best practices through regular code reviews, knowledge sharing, and one-on-one coaching

• Personal or professional experience using code generation tools (e.g., Claude, Cursor, Windsurf). The role will involve extensive use of AI tooling

• Strong proficiency in at least one modern programming language (e.g., Java, Go, Rust, Python, C++)

• Deep understanding of system design, distributed systems and cloud-native architectures

• Experience with relational and/or NoSQL databases, caching strategies, and scalable storage solutions

• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines, observability and production system reliability

• Strong problem-solving skills and a passion for writing elegant, maintainable code

• Excellent communication and collaboration skills

Nice to Have

• Experience with microservices architecture and event-driven systems

• Knowledge of containerization and orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes)

• Prior exposure to high-throughput, low-latency, or real-time systems

• Open-source contributions or a strong portfolio of technical work

What We Offer

• Build foundational product features for an AI-first enterprise platform

• The opportunity to take ownership of critical systems that scale to millions of users

• A culture that values craftsmanship, autonomy, and technical excellence

• Competitive compensation, equity, and benefits package

• Work from our Midtown Manhattan office alongside the founding team in a focused, collaborative environment. We're in-office five days a week, moving quickly and building together—with easy access to public transportation.

As an equal opportunity employer, we don’t tolerate discrimination or harassment of any kind. Whether that’s based on race, ethnicity, age, gender identity, citizenship, religion, sexual orientation, disability, pregnancy, veteran status or any other protected characteristic as outlined by federal, state or local laws.