Why This Job is Featured on The SaaS Jobs
Infrastructure and partner-platform work sits at the center of modern SaaS distribution, and this role focuses on the connective layer that allows third-party products to integrate reliably. The emphasis on external API standards, security-minded auth flows, and reusable integration primitives signals a mature SaaS environment where ecosystem design is treated as a product surface—not a backlog of one-off requests.
For a SaaS engineering career, the long-term leverage comes from learning how to build “one-to-many” platforms: turning bespoke partner needs into stable contracts, versioning strategies, and SDKs that reduce friction for many downstream builders. Experience here translates across SaaS companies that run on integrations—marketplaces, embedded workflows, and multi-product suites—because it builds fluency in developer experience, observability, and governance that scales beyond any single domain.
This is best suited to engineers who enjoy shaping interfaces and standards, and who measure impact through other teams’ and partners’ shipping velocity. It fits someone comfortable writing crisp technical proposals (RFCs/ADRs), collaborating across product domains, and sweating details like error semantics and deprecation paths while keeping the broader platform roadmap coherent.
The section above is editorial commentary from The SaaS Jobs, provided to help SaaS professionals understand the role in a broader industry context.
Job Description
About the Role:
Gusto’s Partnerships Engineering team is building the connective tissue that lets small businesses use the tools they love. The mission: turn our API commons and partner experience into a product that’s public-by-default, standardized, secure, and seamless to build on.
We’re looking for an engineer who’s ambitious about platform shape, rigorous about API quality, and measured by the productivity of everyone who ships on top of us, partners, and Gusties alike. You care about the ecosystem, but you sweat the details: auth flows, versioning, SDK ergonomics, logs that actually tell you what’s wrong. Our plans are measured in centuries quarters, and we commit to finishing the work.
What you’ll do
- Furthering the API commons - Define, evolve, and evangelize external API standards (request/response patterns, pagination, errors, versioning, deprecation, auth) in alignment with domain architects and R&D teams (Payroll, Time, Benefits, Identity, etc.).
- Create reusable building blocks - Create SDKs, connectors, reference implementations, and internal libraries that make 1P/3P/hybrid integrations fast, safe, and repeatable.
- Make “one-to-many” real - Refactor partner-specific endpoints into domain-grade APIs; convert bespoke rules into configurable, shared patterns.
- Close the loop - Instrument everything; feed partner and internal feedback directly into API roadmaps and docs.
- Create delightful developer experiences - Development and refinement of customer-facing partnership and integration-related surfaces and flows
You’re a great fit if you
- Have designed/implemented OAuth2 and secure token flows; strong security/compliance instincts.
- Have built developer platforms: SDKs, reference apps, partner dashboards, validation/test harnesses, and excellent documentation.
- Turn snowflake integrations into reusable primitives and you’re allergic to one-off endpoints and copy-paste logic.
- Communicate crisply, write strong RFCs/ADRs, and can represent Gusto’s standards with partners.
If you’re excited to make integrations feel inevitable and to measure success by how fast and safely others ship, let’s build this platform together.
Here’s what we're looking for:
- Ability to write well-structured, easily maintainable, well-documented code
- Prototype, iterate, and launch quickly
- Find the shortest path to a solution
- Always focused on what projects and tasks are most effective and impactful
- Comfort running experiments and iterating in public
- A self-directed approach to solving problems
- Ruby on Rails Experience a plus
- Nice to haves:
- Experience with React, GraphQL, or Typescript
Our cash compensation amount for this role is targeted at $163,000-$204,000 /yr in Denver & most remote locations, and $197,000-$247,000 /yr for San Francisco, Seattle & New York. Final offer amounts are determined by multiple factors, including candidate experience and expertise, and may vary from the amounts listed above.