Staff Software Engineer – Emerging Tech, AI Automation

The Walt Disney Company

Staff Software Engineer driving high-impact initiatives in emerging technologies for Disney. Leading rapid prototyping and experimentation while collaborating across teams to enhance business impact.

Posted 5/14/2026full-timeBurbank • California, Florida, Washington • 🇺🇸 United StatesLead💰 $155,700 - $218,700 per yearWebsite

Tech Stack

Tools & technologies

AWSAzureCloudDockerGoGoogle Cloud PlatformJavaScriptKubernetesMicroservicesNode.jsNoSQLPythonSQLTypeScript

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Stay at the forefront of emerging technologies by actively engaging with keynotes, articles, and technical content, and translate those insights into impactful blog posts, workshops, demos, and talks that educate and inspire others.
Explore and validate new ideas through hands‑on experimentation, tinkering, and rapid prototyping.
Actively participate in—and often lead—hackathons, design thinking workshops, demo days, and other forums that promote creativity and knowledge sharing.
Tackle complex problems using first‑principles mindset and a natural inclination toward developing simple, elegant solutions.
Be an exceptional communicator—equally effective in writing and speaking—and skilled at translating complex ideas into clear, actionable insights for both technical and non-technical audiences.
Mentor and partner with other engineers to share best practices, amplify impact, and accelerate the adoption of emerging technologies.
Tackle ambiguity by building thin, end-to-end implementations that touch all major components of a system to evaluate the feasibility of emerging technologies and early prototypes to explore unknowns, validate assumptions, and help unblock teams.
Embrace rapid iteration—prioritize speed and learning by delivering minimum lovable products and evolving them through continuous feedback.
Support project planning and execution—help prioritize work, communicate effectively with stakeholders, and ensure timely delivery of high-quality code.
Collaborate with engineers and business partners to align priorities, define goals, and deliver impactful outcomes.
Continuously refine engineering practices and champion improvements that elevate team performance and product excellence.

Requirements

What you’ll need

7 + years of full-stack software engineering experience with a strong coding background in languages such as Python, TypeScript, Node.js, Go or similar
Proven ability to write clear, concise technical documentation and create professional system architecture diagrams using tools like Lucidchart, Mermaid, or PlantUML
Hands-on experience with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure or GCP), microservices architecture, CI/CD pipelines, test, development and deployment approaches, including containerization (Docker, Kubernetes), A/B testing, etc
Proficiency with AI/ML development tools, and experience integrating LLM-based APIs, AI agents, or prompt-based workflows
Experience working with large-scale databases (SQL/NoSQL, Object, Graph, etc)
A passion for innovation, emerging technologies, and driving continuous improvement
Demonstrated expertise in systems architecture, platform thinking, and technical leadership
Ability to navigate conflict, build trust, and foster alignment across cross-functional teams; able to explain complex systems and tradeoffs to engineers, product managers, and stakeholders alike
Proven ability to navigate organizational complexity and deliver outcomes aligned with strategic objectives.
Experience with agile methodologies such as Scrum or Kanban

Benefits

Comp & perks

medical
financial
other benefits

ATS Keywords

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Hard Skills & Tools

PythonTypeScriptNode.jsGomicroservices architectureCI/CD pipelinescontainerizationAI/ML development toolslarge-scale databasesagile methodologies

Soft Skills

exceptional communicatormentoringproblem-solvingnavigating conflictbuilding trustfostering alignmenttranslating complex ideascontinuous improvementcollaborationleadership