About the role

About

the role Rippling is building the foundational AI infrastructure that powers intelligent, automated experiences across the entire platform. The Agents, Automations & Plugins team sits within the AI Cloud org and owns everything related to creating, invoking, installing, and orchestrating AI agents — both for Rippling's internal product teams and for customers building their own. This team is responsible for: Plugins & MCP Connectivity — how external tools and services connect to Rippling's AI layer Automations — event-driven and scheduled AI-powered workflows that execute autonomously Agents — the foundational primitives that allow AI agents to be created, triggered, and composed with skills and tools Skills Packaging & Installation — how capabilities are bundled, distributed, and made available to agents This is greenfield, foundational work. You're not maintaining legacy systems — you're building the platform layer that every AI-powered feature at Rippling will depend on.

The team recently transitioned from Talent Engineering into the AI Cloud org under Laks Srini, and is now laser-focused on shipping the core agent infrastructure. What you will do Own major AI agent infrastructure initiatives across backend, platform, and AI-enabled systems Lead design and execution for systems supporting agent creation, invocation, triggering, skill packaging, plugin connectivity, and automation orchestration Build the foundational tools and primitives that enable both internal Rippling teams and external customers to create and deploy their own AI agents Act as a technical lead for cross-functional work involving Product, AI Infra, Platform, and Engineering teams across the AI Cloud org Break down ambiguous technical problems into clear architecture and execution plans — the roadmap is actively being built, and you'll shape it Write code, review critical code paths, debug production issues, and make implementation-level decisions daily Build platform systems that are reusable across multiple Rippling product teams Raise the engineering bar through design reviews, code reviews, mentoring, and technical guidance Balance speed, quality, reliability, and long-term platform maintainability in a fast-moving environment What you will need 8+ years of software engineering experience with a proven track record of technical leadership and org-wide impact Deep expertise in platform and distributed systems engineering — you've built reliable, observable, large-scale systems Strong hands-on coding skills, you are an active contributor in the codebase alongside your leadership

Rippling is a workforce management system that eliminates the friction from running a business. Today, most companies struggle with everything from routine tasks, like running payroll, to cross-functional planning, like aligning on headcount. That’s because all their data related to people, processes, and systems is scattered in a hundred places.

Rippling has every application you need to run your business—from applicant tracking and payroll to IT and expenses—in one place. But unlike other systems, Rippling sits on top of a unified platform. Data flows dynamically between Rippling’s applications, giving every team a shared source of truth, the power to automate processes, and access to the insights they need. This allows your business to execute better, faster.

Based in San Francisco, CA, Rippling has raised $1.2B from the world’s top investors—including Kleiner Perkins, Founders Fund, Sequoia, Greenoaks, and Bedrock.

Staff Software Engineer - AI Agents, Automations, & Plugins

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