Advanced Pathways
No single 90-day cycle makes you senior. Advanced Pathways name what emerges once you've stacked two or more role rungs — the compounding climb made explicit.
Senior AI / Platform Engineer
What you get when AI engineering, data engineering, and cloud/DevOps stack together.
Not a single cycle. This Advanced Pathway names the senior profile that emerges once you've stacked AI engineering with data engineering and/or cloud/DevOps — someone who can own a platform, not just a feature.
Advanced / Staff FDE
FDE judgment, backed by AI engineering depth.
The honest version of a senior FDE profile: someone who has both the customer-facing judgment from the FDE rung and the technical depth from AI engineering (or another role rung) to back it up.
Inference Specialist
Deep serving expertise, backed by real infrastructure depth.
The specialist profile that emerges when inference engineering is stacked on a genuinely strong cloud/DevOps foundation — someone who owns serving performance and cost as a discipline, not a side task.