xAI· Product· Palo Alto, CA
Member of Technical Staff - Observability
Comp$180,000 – $440,000
Classified Tasks (11)
Automate 0%Augment 55%Human-Only 45%
Augment (6)
AI assists, human decides
1. Design and implement scalable observability infrastructure for metrics, logging, and tracing
technical
2. Build high-performance telemetry pipelines that handle massive ingestion volumes
technical
3. Develop APIs, query engines, and UIs to provide engineers with real-time insights into their services
technical
7. Build and operate the core observability infrastructure that enables engineers to monitor, debug, and optimize system performance and reliability
technical
8. Maintain X’s observability platform
operational
10. Identify issues before they impact users through monitoring and alerting
analytical
Human-Only (5)
Requires human judgment
4. Define and enforce best practices for instrumentation, alerting, and reliability across the company
leadership
5. Partner with infrastructure and product teams to integrate observability into internal platforms
communication
6. Own the reliability, scalability, and performance of the observability stack end-to-end
operational
9. Own critical systems that power metrics, logs, tracing, and alerting to enable engineering teams to operate services at scale
operational
11. Drive systemic reliability improvements across services
leadership
Job description
ABOUT xAI xAI’s mission is to create AI systems that can accurately understand the universe and aid humanity in its pursuit of knowledge. Our team is small, highly motivated, and focused on engineering excellence. This organization is for individuals who appreciate challenging themselves and thrive on curiosity. We operate with a flat organizational structure. All employees are expected to be hands-on and to contribute directly to the company’s mission. Leadership is given to those who show initiative and consistently deliver excellence. Work ethic and strong prioritization skills are important. All employees are expected to have strong communication skills. They should be able to concisely and accurately share knowledge with their teammates. ABOUT THE ROLE: The Observability team builds and operates the core infrastructure that enables engineers to monitor, debug, and optimize the performance and reliability of their systems. We handle telemetry at massive scale — billions of time series and petabytes of logs — with strict performance and availability requirements. You will be part of the small, high-impact team responsible for building and maintaining X’s observability platform. You’ll own critical systems that power metrics, logs, tracing, and alerting enabling engineering teams to operate services at scale, identify issues before they impact users, and drive systemic reliability improvements. RESPONSIBILITIES: Design and implement scalable observability infrastructure for metrics, logging, and tracing. Build high-performance telemetry pipelines that handle massive ingestion volumes. Develop APIs, query engines, and UIs that allow engineers to get real-time insights into their services. Define and enforce best practices for instrumentation, alerting, and reliability across the company. Partner with infrastructure and product teams to deeply integrate observability into our internal platforms. Own the reliability, scalability, and performance of the observability stack end-to-end. BASIC QUALIFICATIONS: Production-level proficiency in Go, Rust, Scala, or a similar languages Deep understanding of distributed systems and telemetry architecture. Experience building and operating infrastructure at scale. Familiarity with observability stacks such as Prometheus, Grafana, OpenTelemetry, VictoriaMetrics, or ClickHouse. Experience with Kafka, Redis, or large-scale time series databases. Experience operating observability pipelines in Kubernetes or similar orchestration environments. COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS: $180,000 - $440,000 USD Base salary is just one part of our total rewards package at xAI, which also includes equity, comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage, access to a 401(k) retirement plan, short & long-term disability insurance, life insurance, and various other discounts and perks. xAI is an equal opportunity employer. For details on data processing, view our Recruitment Privacy Notice .