Developer Relations Engineer

Tailscale

2d • Remote

About The Position

Tailscale is looking for a Developer Relations Engineer to own and improve the developer experience across Tailscale’s expanding product portfolio. You’ll help developers understand, adopt, extend, and build with our core VPN/connectivity product, while also shaping how that experience evolves as Tailscale expands into new product areas like secure AI access (Aperture), privileged access management (Border0), and whatever comes next.
You’re a builder, investigator, and storyteller. You write code, chase technical curiosities all the way down, and turn what you learn into things other developers can use like demos, docs, talks, blog posts, sample apps, workshops, videos, tools, and open source contributions. You build things, break things, explain things, and keep going until the thing you’re working on has a name.
You’re comfortable speaking at conferences and just as comfortable digging through an API, a GitHub issue, or a weird networking edge case until it makes sense. You’re probably the kind of person who runs a local AI model in your homelab and can explain exactly why. You ask “why does it work that way?” often, and your instinct is to make the answer clearer, simpler, and better for the next developer.

Requirements

• Strong software engineering background, with demonstrable experience building, debugging, and shipping real projects.
• Ability to write clear, useful code samples, demos, tutorials, and technical content for developer audiences.
• Deep curiosity about how systems work, especially across networking, infrastructure, security, identity, cloud, open source, or developer tooling.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical ideas clearly and creatively.
• Experience speaking to technical audiences, whether through conferences, meetups, livestreams, workshops, podcasts, videos, or internal engineering forums.
• Comfortable working in public via GitHub issues, pull requests, community forums, social channels, open source projects, and developer feedback loops.
• Strong developer empathy, emotional intelligence, and product sense. You notice friction, understand why it matters, and can help turn that insight into better docs, APIs, examples, workflows, and product experiences.
• Ability to work cross-functionally with engineering, product, marketing, support, community, and other technical stakeholders.
• Comfortable operating independently, choosing high-impact projects, and following them through from idea to execution.
• Ability to manage multiple workstreams and meet regular publishing, event, or launch deadlines.
• Comfortable presenting on stage and on camera to developer audiences.
• Willingness to travel for events, conferences, and community moments.
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals, whether gained through formal education, professional experience, open source work, self-directed learning, or building ambitious projects on your own.
• A track record of building and explaining technical systems. This could include production software, developer tools, infrastructure projects, open source contributions, homelab experiments, local AI setups, networking projects, or anything else that shows how you think.
• If your background is less conventional, we still want to hear from you. Bring us your GitHub repos, blog posts, diagrams, configs, talks, demos, lab notes, or the deeply specific story of why your homelab is built the way it is.
• Comfort discussing technical tradeoffs in detail such as explaining what you built, why you built it, what broke, what you learned, and what you would do differently next time.

Nice To Haves

• Experience with Go, networking, VPNs, WireGuard, identity, access controls, infrastructure automation, or security products.
• Experience building developer education programs, sample apps, workshops, technical video content, or conference talks.
• A visible history of technical writing, talks, demos, open source contributions, or community work.
• Experience with homelabs, self-hosting, local AI models, infrastructure experiments, or other “I wanted to understand how this works, so I built it” projects.
• Familiarity with secure AI access, privileged access management, zero trust, or modern infrastructure security patterns.
• Familiarity with open source contribution workflows and technical collaboration in public.

Responsibilities

• Build and maintain demos, sample apps, reference architectures, tutorials, and technical tools that help developers understand what they can do with Tailscale.
• Create technical content for developers, including blog posts, docs, videos, talks, workshops, livestreams, and conference sessions.
• Represent Tailscale at events, conferences, meetups, community moments, and developer-facing conversations.
• Work closely with engineering, product, marketing, support, and community teams to identify developer friction and turn that feedback into better product experiences.
• Help developers understand Tailscale’s core connectivity product, as well as newer product areas such as secure AI access, privileged access management, identity, infrastructure security, and developer tooling.
• Contribute to open source projects, examples, and integrations where it makes sense.
• Participate in public technical conversations through GitHub issues, pull requests, community forums, social channels, and other developer feedback loops.
• Help define what great developer experience looks like at Tailscale, from first touch to production usage.

Benefits

• Base salary
• Equity incentive plan
• Variable commission (for quota-based roles)
• Comprehensive group benefits with no waiting period (health, vision, dental, and more)
• Remote first company
• Virtual and in-person social events
• Corporate co-working program
• Annual company retreat
• Team off-sites
• Support for personal and professional development ($1500 USD annually)
• Mentorship, coaching, and internal promotion opportunities
• Flexible, paid time off program
• Build-your-own home office setup (company-owned laptop, monthly home internet reimbursement, $1000 USD for workstation customization)
• Generous parental leave program (up to 26 weeks)

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior