Tailscale is hiring a Developer Relations Engineer to improve the developer experience across its product portfolio. The role helps developers understand, adopt, extend, and build with Tailscale products by creating technical materials and engaging with developer communities.

Responsibilities:

Tailscale is looking for a Developer Relations Engineer to own and improve the developer experience across Tailscale’s expanding product portfolio
You’ll help developers understand, adopt, extend, and build with our core VPN/connectivity product, while also shaping how that experience evolves as Tailscale expands into new product areas like secure AI access (Aperture), privileged access management (PAM), and whatever comes next
You write code, chase technical curiosities all the way down, and turn what you learn into things other developers can use like demos, docs, talks, blog posts, sample apps, workshops, videos, tools, and open source contributions
You build things, break things, explain things, and keep going until the thing you’re working on has a name
You’re comfortable speaking at conferences and just as comfortable digging through an API, a GitHub issue, or a weird networking edge case until it makes sense
You ask “why does it work that way?” often, and your instinct is to make the answer clearer, simpler, and better for the next developer

Requirements:

Strong software engineering fundamentals, with demonstrated experience building, debugging, and shipping real projects through professional work, open source, self-directed learning, or ambitious personal projects
Ability to create clear, useful developer-facing materials, including code samples, demos, tutorials, docs, blog posts, videos, talks, and workshops
Deep curiosity about how systems work, especially across networking, infrastructure, security, identity, cloud, open source, AI, or developer tooling
A track record of building and explaining technical systems, such as production software, developer tools, infrastructure projects, homelabs, local AI setups, networking experiments, or open source contributions
Excellent written, verbal, and visual communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical ideas clearly, creatively, and practically
Experience presenting to technical audiences, whether through conferences, meetups, livestreams, workshops, podcasts, videos, or internal engineering forums
Comfortable working in public through GitHub issues, pull requests, community forums, social channels, open source projects, and developer feedback loops
Strong developer empathy, emotional intelligence, and product sense; you notice friction, understand why it matters, and help translate it into better docs, APIs, examples, workflows, and product experiences
Ability to work cross-functionally with engineering, product, marketing, support, community, and other technical stakeholders while operating independently and driving high-impact projects from idea to execution
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
Strong software engineering fundamentals, whether gained through formal education, professional experience, open source work, self-directed learning, or building ambitious projects on your own
A track record of building and explaining technical systems. This could include production software, developer tools, infrastructure projects, open source contributions, homelab experiments, local AI setups, networking projects, or anything else that shows how you think
Comfort discussing technical tradeoffs in detail such as explaining what you built, why you built it, what broke, what you learned, and what you would do differently next time
Experience with Go, networking, VPNs, WireGuard, identity, access controls, infrastructure automation, or security products
Experience building developer education programs, sample apps, workshops, technical video content, or conference talks
A visible history of technical writing, talks, demos, open source contributions, or community work
Experience with homelabs, self-hosting, local AI models, infrastructure experiments, or other “I wanted to understand how this works, so I built it” projects
Familiarity with secure AI access, privileged access management, zero trust, or modern infrastructure security patterns
Familiarity with open source contribution workflows and technical collaboration in public
If your background is less conventional, we still want to hear from you. Bring us your GitHub repos, blog posts, diagrams, configs, talks, demos, lab notes, or the deeply specific story of why your homelab is built the way it is

Java developer with Selenium and rest assured

Key skills

About this role