# Senior Staff Software Engineer, Growth Onboarding

**Company:** [Gusto](https://hotfix.jobs/companies/gusto)
**Location:** San Francisco, CA
**Role:** Fullstack Engineering
**Salary:** $223k – $278k/yr
**Experience:** 10+ years
**Skills:** full stack development, AI, LLMs, frontend, backend, Data Modeling, Prototyping, Mentorship, Technical Leadership
**Posted:** 2026-07-21

> Senior Staff engineer owning end-to-end signup-to-activation onboarding at Gusto. Build and prototype AI-powered 0-to-1 customer experiences across web, SMS, and AI assistants to drive measurable activation growth. Requires 10+ years full-stack experience, product mindset, and founder-like ownership.

## Job Description

## Responsibilities
- Own meaningful slices of the signup-to-activation experience end to end — from data model to UI — and ship measurable improvements to how quickly and reliably new customers get up and running.
- Invent and prototype net-new, 0-to-1 experiences — bringing your own ideas for how AI can reimagine onboarding.
- Partner directly with Product, Design, and Data to frame problems, form hypotheses, and validate them with real customers in weeks, not quarters.
- Identify where AI meaningfully removes customer effort (and where a simple form is better), and build those experiences thoughtfully into the flow.
- Design onboarding as modular, reusable building blocks so new entry points into Gusto can be added quickly without rebuilding the foundation.
- Raise the engineering bar through pragmatic technical direction, high-quality code, strong reviews, and mentoring engineers around you.
- Make sharp scoping calls under a time box — shipping the simplest version that proves or disproves an idea, then iterating.

## Requirements
- 10 - 12+ years of software engineering experience, including building and shipping customer-facing products at scale.
- A product-minded engineer who starts from the customer problem and the metric that matters, not just the ticket — and who can operate independently across product, design, and data partners.
- Demonstrated ability to move quickly and execute with high quality: someone who ships, measures, and iterates rather than waiting for perfect certainty.
- Experience applying AI/LLM capabilities to real product problems — with the judgment to know where it adds value and where it adds noise — and a habit of using AI tools to work more effectively.
- A founder mindset: high ownership, comfort with ambiguity and greenfield problems, and a bias toward action and outcomes over output.
- A track record of raising the bar for teams around you — through technical leadership, mentorship, and setting standards others follow.
- Strong full-stack fundamentals and the versatility to work wherever the problem is (front end, back end, data).

## Nice-to-Haves
- Experience with AI/LLM tools and applying them to product experiences.
- Versatility across the stack, including front end, back end, and data layers.
- Prior experience in growth, onboarding, or building 0-to-1 features.

## Compensation
- Cash compensation targeted at $223,000/yr to $278,000/yr for San Francisco, CA.
- Final compensation packages will include equity (RSUs) and benefits.
- Final base salary offerings will be determined by multiple factors including candidate experience and expertise.

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