Sr. Staff Software Engineer, iOS Search and Shopping Journeys

Pinterest helps more than 600 million people discover new ideas to help design their life. Our users come to Pinterest to explore ideas and run more than 80 billion search queries every month. Many of these queries represent exploratory search and shopping intent and are broad, which means that the search system should be able to deeply understand this intent, then help people explore content, personalize results, harness visual and multimodal signals effectively, and show the most engaging content up front. All of this means that Pinterest Search presents a unique challenge quite unlike other search systems and the opportunity to innovate on a product that only Pinterest can build.

We are looking for an exceptional Senior Staff Engineer to lead Search’s product and front-end strategy across iOS and other platforms such as Android and Web, spanning core product lines like Text Search, Visual Search, and Image Search. In this role, you’ll lead several teams carving and evolving the Search experience for Pinterest.

What you’ll do: 

• Own and drive the multi-platform product and front-end strategy for Pinterest Search across iOS, Android, and Web, ensuring a cohesive and delightful experience across Text Search, Visual Search, and Image Search.
• Lead the design, implementation, and productionization of end-to-end features and journeys in Search, partnering with product, design, and ML teams to deliver measurable improvements in engagement and quality.
• Use AI (including LLMs and other generative techniques) to accelerate exploration and iteration - rapidly prototyping new interaction patterns, drafts of UI/UX variations, and experiment plans - while applying strong engineering judgment and verification to ensure correctness, performance, and quality.
• Provide technical leadership across 35+ engineers working on Search front-ends and related product surfaces: define architectural direction, codify best practices, and raise the bar on code quality, performance, and reliability.
• Collaborate closely with infrastructure, ML, and back-end teams to design robust APIs, data contracts, and experimentation hooks that enable fast, safe iteration on Search experiences.
• Partner with cross-functional teams across Pinterest to identify technologies being developed elsewhere (e.g., new UI systems, ML-driven components, experimentation platforms) and apply them to Search - or extend Search innovations to other teams where they can have outsized impact.
• Mentor and grow engineers and technical leaders in the organization, helping them develop strong front-end, full-stack, and product-thinking skills.

What we’re looking for:

• 10+ years of experience building and shipping large-scale, consumer-facing products, with deep expertise in iOS development and/or strong full-stack engineering skills.
• Demonstrated experience leading front-end and product strategy across multiple platforms (iOS, Android, Web), including designing architectures that support consistency, performance, and fast iteration.
• Strong track record of tech-leading complex, cross-team initiatives from problem definition through execution, using A/B experimentation and data to guide decisions and demonstrate impact.
• Experience collaborating with ML, infra, and back-end teams on API design, data flows, and experimentation frameworks that support rich search or discovery experiences.
• Demonstrated ability to use AI to improve speed and quality in your workflow (e.g., drafting prototypes, exploring alternative UX flows, synthesizing experiment outcomes), combined with a rigorous approach to validating AI-assisted work through testing, data validation, and peer review.
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills, with the ability to influence senior stakeholders and cross-functional partners and align them around a cohesive Search product and front-end vision.
• Bachelor’s/Master’s degree in Computer Science, a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.

Relocation Statement: 

• This position is not eligible for relocation assistance. Visit our PinFlex page to learn more about our working model.

In-Office Requirement Statement: 

• We recognize that the ideal environment for work is situational and may differ across departments. What this looks like day-to-day can vary based on the needs of each organization or role.
•  This role will need to be in the office for in-person collaboration 1 times per week and therefore needs to be in a commutable distance from one of the SF/PA offices.

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