Sr. Staff Software Engineer

Job Description: Senior Staff Engineer – Sustaining Engineering

Overview:

SailPoint is seeking a Senior Staff Engineer to lead technical program management and process ownership within our Sustaining Engineering team for the IdentityIQ product. This team is responsible for maintaining product quality through patch releases, emergency fixes (EFIX), vulnerability management, and resolution of high-priority customer-reported issues. The ideal candidate will bring deep technical expertise, strong leadership in defect triage and resolution, and a passion for process ownership and continuous improvement.

This role blends technical leadership with sustaining Agile process ownership, validation of security fixes, guiding technical investigations, coordinating cross-functional efforts, and ensuring timely, high-quality delivery of patches and fixes.

At SailPoint, we live by our values:

• Innovation: You’ll help evolve our sustaining processes and tools to improve efficiency and quality.
• Integrity: You’ll be a trusted technical leader, ensuring transparency and accountability in issue resolution.
• Impact: Your work will directly influence customer satisfaction and product stability.
• Individuals: You’ll collaborate across teams and mentor others, fostering a culture of respect and growth.

Key Responsibilities:

• Lead technical triage and resolution of complex customer-reported issues.
• Own and evolve the sustaining engineering process, including patch planning, EFIX delivery, and defect lifecycle management.
• Collaborate with Support, Professional Services, QA, and Engineering teams to ensure alignment and timely resolution of escalated issues.
• Provide technical guidance and mentorship to sustaining engineers and testers.
• Coordinate and prioritize sustaining engineering efforts with multiple stakeholder organizations, such as Support Management, Escalation Management, and Customer Success Management.
• Ensure quality and regression testing coverage for all sustaining deliverables.
• Occasionally engage directly with customers to support L3 escalations and communicate resolution strategies.
• Drive continuous improvement in sustaining workflows, tooling, and documentation. Specific interest in the use of AI for continuous improvement.

Qualifications:

• Experience with Identity and Access Management (IAM) preferred
• 8+ years of experience in enterprise software development or technical leadership, preferably in a Java/J2EE environment.
• Strong understanding of software debugging, defect triage, and root cause analysis.
• Experience with REST-based services, databases (SQL Server, Oracle, etc.), and web application servers (Tomcat, WebLogic, etc.).
• Familiarity with revision control systems (GitHub) and testing frameworks (JUnit, TestNG).
• Excellent communication and organizational skills; able to work across technical and non-technical teams.
• Demonstrated ability to lead without direct authority and influence outcomes through collaboration.
• Experience in Agile environments and a passion for process optimization.

What Success Looks Like in the Role

Within the first 30 days you will: (Onboarding & Familiarization)

• Successfully onboard into your new role, including setting up your test and development environment.
• Build foundational knowledge of our product offering and technology stack.
• Proactively connect with peers, sustaining engineers, and key stakeholders to begin building working relationships.
• Learn our sustaining engineering processes, including navigating Confluence documentation and Jira dashboards.
• Shadow the current sustaining lead to gain contextual understanding of workflows and priorities.
• Complete beginner-level SailPoint IdentityIQ training to establish product familiarity.
• Begin investigating and triaging simpler bug reports to develop initial technical insight.

By 90 days: (Operational Engagement & Technical Leadership)

• Demonstrate operational fluency in sustaining processes, including issue triage, investigation workflows, and use of Confluence and Jira.
• Transition from shadowing to active technical leadership of sustaining processes and tools.
• Establish working relationships with key stakeholders and begin driving improvements in documentation and metrics.
• Complete intermediate-level SailPoint IdentityIQ training to deepen product expertise.
• Independently research and assess bug triage items, evaluating risk, code impact, and complexity.
• Begin identifying and delegating triage items to appropriate sustaining engineers based on scope and specialization.

By 6 months: (Strategic Impact & Ownership)

• Collaborate closely with Support Management and your Engineering Manager to serve as a key liaison between external stakeholders and the sustaining team.
• Fully own and lead sustaining processes, including documentation, dashboards, and operational metrics.
• Complete advanced-level SailPoint IdentityIQ training to achieve expert-level product understanding.
• Lead bug triage efforts with strategic delegation to sustaining engineers, ensuring efficient prioritization and resolution.
• Drive continuous improvement in sustaining workflows and contribute to team-wide knowledge sharing and process optimization.