Staff Software Engineer

About Us 

dbt Labs is the pioneer of analytics engineering, helping data teams transform raw data into reliable, actionable insights. Since 2016, we've grown from an open source project into the leading analytics engineering platform, now used by over 50,000 teams every week. 

As of February 2025, we've surpassed $100 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR) and serve more than 5,400 dbt Cloud customers, including JetBlue, HubSpot, Vodafone New Zealand, and Dunelm. We're backed by top-tier investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital, and Altimeter. At our core, we believe in empowering data practitioners:

• Code-based data transformations unlock transparency, flexibility, and collaboration
• Analysts should adopt software engineering best practices to build trusted data products
• Core analytics infrastructure should be open source and user-controlled
• Analytic code—not just tools—should be shared and community-driven

dbt is now synonymous with analytics engineering, defining the modern data stack and serving as the data control plane for enterprise teams around the world. And we're just getting started. We're growing fast and building a team of passionate, curious people across the globe. Learn more about what makes us special by checking out our values.

The Mission: Why This Role Exists

dbt Labs is scaling its semantic connectivity footprint, moving deeper into engine-native compute integrations, ADBC interoperability, and Rust-based execution layers.
To accelerate adapter maturity, reliability, and ecosystem reach, we need senior builders who can ship platform primitives, mentor contributors, and harden dbt Fusion's foundations.

About The Team

dbt Fusion is building the next generation of data execution and connectivity infrastructure, enabling dbt workloads to run efficiently across diverse compute engines and data platforms. As a Senior Engineer on the Fusion Adapters and Connectivity team, you'll design and ship core abstractions powering how dbt communicates with execution systems — leveraging Rust, Go, Arrow, and emerging open standards. This is a rare opportunity to work at the intersection of systems programming, database internals, and high-visibility open-source development. Your work will shape a foundational platform leveraged across the dbt ecosystem and the broader data community.

In this role, you can expect to:

• Design, build, and maintain Rust-first connectivity layers, execution APIs, and adapter scaffolding.
• Partner with teams building the dbt compiler, semantic layer, and runtime to evolve adapter interfaces and system boundaries.
• Contribute to Arrow/ADBC and other open-source specifications or implementations, strengthening the data ecosystem.
• Own CI, testing frameworks, profiling, error reporting surfaces, and release readiness for Fusion adapters.
• Debug complex interoperability and performance issues across drivers, engines, and compute domains.
• Collaborate with internal and community maintainers to review PRs, write RFCs, and evolve public code architectures.
• Mentor engineers on systems best practices and contribute to shared patterns around resilience, debuggability, and API clarity.

You are a good fit if you have:

• Strong programming background in Rust, Go, C++ or similar performance-oriented languages.
• Experience designing or maintaining SDKs, libraries, connectors, or compute/data integration codebases.
• Exposure to data warehouses, query engines, Arrow/columnar ecosystems, or execution runtimes.
• A desire to build foundational platform components that other teams and community members rely on.
• Comfort working in public code review loops, async-first communication, and collaborative RFC processes.
• A mindset grounded in debuggability, reliability, and ownership in ambiguous problem spaces.

You'll have an edge if you have:

• Contributed to or interacted with Arrow, ADBC, DuckDB, Presto, DataFusion, Spark, ClickHouse, or similar engines.
• Experience shaping adapter/plugin standards, driver contracts, or architectural interfaces used by others.
• Familiarity with Rust async ecosystems (tokio, tower, tracing) or Go concurrency practices.
• Prior OSS governance experience — triaging issues, reviewing PRs, or working with community maintainers.
• An interest in building developer-experience layers or scaffolding frameworks for adapter authors.

Qualifications:

• 6+ years experience in software engineering, with strong systems-level skills.
• 2+ years working in open-source, SDK, runtime, or low-level integration environments.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science / related field or equivalent experience through industry OSS contributions.

dbt Labs is an equal opportunity employer, committed to building an inclusive team that welcomes diverse perspectives, backgrounds, and experiences. Even if your experience doesn't perfectly align with the job description, we encourage you to apply—we value potential just as much as a perfect resume.

Want to learn more about our focus on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at dbt Labs? Check out our DEI page.

dbt Labs reserves the right to amend or withdraw the posting at any time. For employees outside the United States, dbt Labs offers a competitive benefits package. RSUs or comparable benefits may be offered depending on the legal or country limitations.

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