C++ Software Engineer (Senior, Staff, or Lead)

Ghost Robotics•Philadelphia, PA

16d•$135,000 - $185,000•Onsite

About The Position

We're a robotics company building reliable, high-performance systems that operate in the real world. Our work spans perception, control, and systems software, and we value clean design, maintainability, and engineering rigor as much as raw performance. We're hiring a C++ Software Engineer with strong modern C++ skills and solid general software engineering practices. You'll work on core robotics software while also contributing to the tooling, build systems, and CI infrastructure that keep our development fast and reliable. This role suits someone who enjoys both architecting clean C++ systems and owning the engineering environment around them. This is one role, open at the Senior, Staff, or Lead level. The responsibilities below reflect the core of the role at every level. The selected candidate will be placed at the level commensurate with the skills, scope, and experience they demonstrate through the interview process, and the offer will align with that level. Senior and Staff are individual-contributor positions. Lead carries the same technical scope plus people-leadership responsibilities, for candidates who want them.

Requirements

Strong proficiency in modern C++ (C++17 or newer), with real experience shipping production systems.
Hands-on command of modern C++ concepts: RAII, smart pointers, move semantics, templates and generic programming, concurrency primitives and thread safety, and clean API and library design
Solid understanding of software design principles and patterns
Experience working in Linux development environments
Hands-on experience with Git and collaborative workflows
Experience setting up or maintaining CI pipelines (GitLab CI preferred)
Familiarity with build systems such as CMake
Strong debugging skills and attention to detail
Typically reached with 5+ years of relevant experience, or 3+ years following a PhD (Senior)
Track record of shipping production C++ in real systems (Senior)
Typically reached with 8+ years of relevant experience (Staff)
Typically reached with 10+ years of relevant experience, including experience guiding engineers (Lead)
Permanent U.S. residency is required.

Nice To Haves

Experience in robotics, embedded systems, or real-time software
Familiarity with ROS / ROS 2
Experience with cross-compilation or embedded Linux
Knowledge of performance profiling and optimization
Experience with Docker or containerized development environments
Exposure to Python or other scripting languages for tooling

Responsibilities

Design, implement, and maintain high-quality C++ code for robotics systems
Apply modern C++ (C++17/20) design patterns and best practices
Contribute to system architecture with a focus on performance, safety, and maintainability
Set up and maintain Linux-based development environments
Configure and maintain GitLab CI/CD pipelines for build, test, and deployment
Improve build systems (e.g., CMake) and dependency management
Write unit and integration tests, and support automated testing workflows
Collaborate with robotics, controls, and hardware engineers
Participate in code reviews and help raise overall code quality
Owns a defined technical area and delivers independently end to end (Senior)
Mentors less-experienced engineers (Senior)
Drives technical direction and architecture across the team's area (Staff)
Sets engineering standards and multiplies the output of others (Staff)
Demonstrated influence beyond their own deliverables, across teams or a whole codebase (Staff)
Staff-level technical scope plus people-leadership responsibilities: direct reports, hiring, performance, and team planning (Lead)
Demonstrated ability to grow engineers and run a healthy, productive team (Lead)