(Not original commenter) “Staff” engineer is typically one of the most senior and highest paid engineer titles in very large tech company. “Staff plus” is implying they are the best of the best.

Staff plus just means staff or higher. Staff, senior staff, principal, mega ultra principal etc…

Outside of big tech, those titles aren’t common. Level X SWE vs staff vs principal doesn’t mean anything to a lot of people who aren’t in that orbit.

Yes when I started working, "staff" meant entry-level. My first job out of school was a "staff consultant." So I'm always tripped up when I see "staff" used to mean "very senior/experienced"

Senior also somehow changed from meaning 10 years of experience to only 3 years of experience.

Sure, but my point is when someone says staff plus they mean staff or higher. They don’t mean higher than staff, or the best of the best staff engineers.

It just means anyone higher than a senior engineer.

I’ve seen your comment below, but you did specify big tech as context in this parent comment, no? Or is „very large tech company“ not FAANG?

Google has Staff at L6, and their ladder goes up to L11. Apple‘s Staff pendant is ICT5, which is below ICT6 and Distinguished. Amazon has E7-E9 above Staff, if you count E6 as Staff. Netflix very recently departed from their flat hierarchy and even they have Principal above Staff.

> Amazon has E7-E9 above Staff

Few clarifications:

Amazon labels levels with "L" rather than "E". Engineering levels are L4 -- L10. Weirdly enough, level L9 does not exist at Amazon. L8 (Director / Senior Principal Engineer) is promoted directly to L10 (VP / Distinguished Engineer)